Subject: Re: The species thread
Date: Jun 29 13:51:48 1995
From: James West - jdwest at u.washington.edu


There's an interesting side to the argument about species that hasn't
entered into the discussion so far, but is in the foreground for the
historian of ideas, including scientific ideas. It is the almost absurd
prevalence in most people's minds, and all of our minds some of the time,
of the idea that nature must present a picture of distinct species, with
hybrids and hard-to-separates being anomalies. Superficially, the
generally easy distinguishability of species supports this notion - which
at least in its strongest form isn't really compatible with the concept of
evolution, since every "species" is susceptible to evolutionary change, if
not actually engaged in it. In other words, we tend to treat an inherently
unstable picture, as long as it presents some analyzable regularities and
the rate of change is slow in relation to the human time-frame, as if it
were inherently stable. This quirk is characteristic of a great deal of
human thinking, not just biological.
_________________________________________________________________________
JAMES WEST Univ. of Washington Box 353580 Seattle WA 98195 206-543-4892