Chronology Current Month Current Thread Current Date
[Year List] [Month List (current year)] [Date Index] [Thread Index] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Prev] [Date Next]

Re: [Phys-l] Is evolution something to believe in?

At 05:21 AM 4/3/2008, John D., you wrote:

for every qualitatively correct explanation of evolution, there
are a thousand incorrect explanations. Consider the contrast:
-- The species evolves.
-- The individual does not evolve in the same way.
-- Rocks do not evolve in the same way.
(There is no good phylogenetic tree of rocks.)


Hmmm...a passing interest in the evolution of rock forms
can probably help us still (much as it helped the creators
of the evolutionary theories of plants and animals) while
we marvel both at the metamorphosis of caterpillars to
butterflies; and the structures of slate and anthracite;
the metamorphosis of sandstone to quartzite,
shale to slate, granite to gneiss, limestone to marble and etc...

Still, where phylogenesis is by definition about plants
and animals, one needs to accept the lack of a phylogenetic
tree of rocks, as such, by definition.



Brian Whatcott Altus OK Eureka!