Stephen Jay Gould, the evolutionary biologist, natural historian, educator, author, and science popularizer died Monday of cancer at his home in NYC. He was 60.
Gould was one of America's most recognizable and outspoken scientists. In addition to his voluminous professional publications and books [1], his monthly column in Natural History magazine ran ununterrupted from 1974 to 2001. A master expositor, he raised the genre of the scientific essay to an art form that both advanced while demystifying science.
In 1972, Gould and fellow paleontologist Niles Eldredge ignited a scientific debate with their views that challenged the mechanism of evolution. Since the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species, most scientists viewed evolution as a slow and gradual process, accounting for species change over the eons of time.
But in their studies of the fossil record, Gould and Eldredge observed patterns suggesting both relative historical stability for evol!
ved species, and rapid bursts of change, or discontinuities, for the evolution of new ones.[2] As Eldredge explains, these new ideas, "provided a far better "fit" to the data" [3] than did the gradualist approach held by most of their colleagues.
If the choice of terms seemed suggestive of a model building approach, it was intentional as both, especially Gould, relied heavily on statistical methodology.
In addition to his paleontological work, Gould was an indefatigable opponent of scientific racism and psuedo-science, especially in the area of public education. His willingness to debate and confront "scientific" creationists and "intelligent design" advocates won him the respect and admiration of the scientific community as well as the enmity of the religous right.
Prof. Isadore Nabi, a colleague of Gould at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology during the 1980's, remembers him as a "true dialectician and progressive thinker". He will be misse!
d.
Al Barron
Metuchen, NJ
[1] A nice sample of Gould's writings can be found at
http://www.freethoughtweb.org/ctrl/news/stephen_gould.html
[2] Eldredge, N. (1999) Pattern of Evolution,Freeman.
[3] Eldredge, N. (1985) Time Frames; The Evolution of
Punctulated Equilibria, Princeton.
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