Content provided in partnership with
Presentation of the Paleontological Society medal to Stephen Jay Gould
Journal of Paleontology, Jul 2003 by Eldredge, Niles
When Steve first asked me to deliver his citation on this occasion, we both thought we would be here together. That he is not makes this a truly sad occasion. But if Steve's passing robs us of the opportunity for simple out and out celebration, awarding the Paleontological Society's Medal posthumously to Steve today is instead an open invitation to us all to reflect on just how powerful and important a figure Steve was in the intellectual world of evolutionary biology, historical geology, history and philosophy of science-and especially for us today, paleontology. And in this light, we can recover the mood of celebration. For Steve never lost his identity as first and foremost a paleontologist-as a champion of the simple idea that the fossil record has much to tell us not just about what happened in life's long history up to this point-but how it happened as well. Steve was the prime mover and shaker in establishing without a shadow of doubt the relevance of paleontology to the modern scientific enterprise.
- Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »
Steve, of course, has left behind a prodigious amount of pure scientific work-especially, but not exclusively, in the realm of theory. No one-not even Stephen Jay Gould-can look for the unanimous agreement of colleagues, nor on the lasting acceptance of each and every finding and conclusion as the collective research endeavor continues apace. But it must be said that, on this score-the degree of acceptance of data, analysis and pure ideas among one's colleagues-and, I think, also the probability of lasting impact, Steve did very well! Damn well, in fact!
We all know what the highlights are: A vision of contingency in evolution-most graphically encapsulated in mass extinctions, which run rough shod over the specific adaptations of species, to the point where entire clades are annihilated, and to the point where evolution molds what's left over to produce the succeeding biota. What a healthy alternative to the ultradarwinian, hyperdeterministic adaptationist view of so much of the evolutionary biology that has held sway (as Steve himself might have said) throughout Steve's long, but too-short, career.
Then there's Steve's commitment to seeing the biological world as hierarchically structured, so that individuals, denies, species and perhaps even higher taxa can be seen to have their own particular internal processes, rules of organization, functions-and thus be, separately, targets of selection and perhaps other sorts of evolutionary processes. What a breath of fresh air, a vision that literally expands evolutionary theory away from the competing vision that collapses everything down to the selfish gene.
Then, too, Steve's unending commitment to wedding paleontology, comparative anatomy and developmental biology, using the early results of molecular biology, led him to speak about the possibility that relatively small changes in the genetic regulatory apparatus might cascade into relatively large-scale changes in adult morphology (a theme that took awhile to attract much interest, but one which lies close to the heart of modern evo-devo thinking)-and an area, not coincidentally, close to the hearts of many of today's younger paleontologists.
And there is, of course, good old punctuated equilibria, with its core blend of stasis and speciation theory, and so much more that has arisen as a fall-out from that initial statement. We wrote that paper in Tom Schopf's 1972 Models in Paleobiology book initially for the eyes of paleontologists only-and very much in the spirit that Tom (who, I have to say, absolutely hated the paper!) had in mind: of trying to get paleontologists to think in theoretical terms, to see the larger implications of their work, and to try, as well, to communicate these thoughts and perspectives to a wider scientific circle.
But, much as it might be altogether fitting and proper to spend this entire citation oration on cataloguing Steve's more notable scientific achievements, in a sense I think that would be doing only partial justice to the man, what he stood for, and what he in fact achieved in his professional lifetime. Maybe it's because he had such a tremendous impact on me as a student two years behind him in the quest for a Ph.D in geology, I cannot help thinking that, however much Steve contributed to particular revolutions of scientific theory (and he was dedicated to that quest!), it was the behavioral revolution in fundamental approaches to the fossil record and its interpretation that may well prove to be his most far-reaching and lasting contribution. I am speaking here of the revolution that Steve fomented in the switch from paleontology's passive role as dutiful documenter of what-came-before-what in the history of life, to its much more exciting, active, even downright New York feisty, role in challenging the idea that all we need to know about evolution comes from Drosophila experiments and the mathematical formulations of population genetics.
This was a revolution started by George Gaylord Simpson in the forties, but pretty much aborted by the time the Darwinian centennial rolled around in 1959. In many ways, I think Steve's most lasting contribution will prove to be the resurrection, articulation and consolidation of that revolution: the establishment of paleontology as a legitimate, important player in the high stakes game played out at the High Table of evolutionary theory. Every one in this room has benefited from this revolution.
Find Research Guides for:
Find Featured Titles for: Autos
Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »