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In evolutionary biology, punctuated equilibrium (also called punctuated equilibria) is a theory that proposes that once a species appears in the fossil record, the population will become stable, showing little evolutionary change for most of its geological history. [1] This state of little or no morphological change is called stasis.
Jonathan Weiner's The Beak of the Finch describes this very process." (p. 96) Sterelny notes that despite the fact that the fossil record represents, for several reasons, a biased sample, "the consensus seems to be shifting Gould's way: the punctuated equilibrium pattern is common, perhaps even predominant".
It was developed to show how self-organized criticality may explain key features of the fossil record, such as the distribution of sizes of extinction events and the phenomenon of punctuated equilibrium. It is named after Per Bak and Kim Sneppen.
Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould proposed punctuated equilibria in 1972. Punctuated equilibrium is a refinement to evolutionary theory. It describes patterns of descent taking place in "fits and starts" separated by long periods of stability. Eldredge went on to develop a hierarchical vision of evolutionary and ecological systems. Around this ...
In 1996, Gould was hired as the Vincent Astor Visiting Research Professor of Biology at New York University, after which he divided his time teaching between there and Harvard. Gould's most significant contribution to evolutionary biology was the theory of punctuated equilibrium [2] developed with Niles Eldredge in 1972. [3]
For example, Denis Noble says that using terms and categories of the modern synthesis distorts the picture of biology that modern experimentation has discovered. [91] Proponents therefore claim that the extended synthesis is necessary to help expand the conceptions and framework of how evolution is considered throughout the biological disciplines.
The theory of punctuated equilibrium developed by Stephen Jay Gould and Niles Eldredge and first presented in 1972 [61] is often mistakenly drawn into the discussion of transitional fossils. [62] This theory, however, pertains only to well-documented transitions within taxa or between closely related taxa over a geologically short period of time.
Peripatric speciation is a mode of speciation in which a new species is formed from an isolated peripheral population. [1]: 105 Since peripatric speciation resembles allopatric speciation, in that populations are isolated and prevented from exchanging genes, it can often be difficult to distinguish between them, [2] and peripatric speciation may be considered one type or model of allopatric ...