Herepton writes:
GH seen and confirmed in the fossil record falsifies common ancestry.
OK, please provide some references for this, where the evidence for
genetic rather than
morphological stasis in the fossil record. At best all you can show is an indirect measure of variation in a fossil population and a similar measure for a fossil population from a different time period.
This is a complete nonsense statement, you clearly still do not actually understand what genetic homeostasis is. Contrary to what Crash suggested genetic homeostasis can still operate in small populations but it is far more likely to be overridden by other factors such as drift.
I am reminded of an analogy I read recently for how power cables could theoretically reduce interference to a sound system. The analogy was to the suspension on a car...
small, quick, one-inch-tall bumps will get filtered out by the springs in your suspension; but when you drive over a 200-yard-long one-inch-tall platform, your car does lift up into the air by an inch, while you're driving over it.
To my mind this is a pretty good analogy for genetic homeostasis. In a normal situation there will normally be continuous small changes in the environment which can interact with an organisms genome to affect its phenotype. In a population with a relatively high degree of variation, i.e a number of highly heterogenous loci, these environmental fluctuations can be compensated for resulting in little if any difference in the observed variation of the phenotype. The heterozygosity also has the advantage that when there is a more long term or drastic shift in the environment there is a larger pool of genetic variation from which a new 'optimally' fit phenotype can arise.
Consequently a population can maintain a higher average level of fitness in the longterm by carrying a pool of heteotic genes which are not themselves the fittest available for their current environment. There is a trade of between 'optimum' fitness for the specific environment and the ability to compensate for environmental fluctuations.
Gould and others may have offered GH as an explanation of static morphologies in the fossil record but without any actual genetic data it cannot concievably be considered convincing evidence for it. Any actual genetic evidence comes from population genetics studies.
The only methods of studying genetic variability in fossils are indirect, such as studying fluctuating asymmetries in fossil morphologies. Fluctuating asymmetries are usually correlated with the degree of developmental, and to an extent genetic, homeostasis.
Your conflation of kinds with large populations is completely muddleheaded. What sort of evidence would you actually accept as constituting a breach of this barrier? Given that you equate the kinds with the differing sides of this barrier and consider quadrupeds a kind I fear it must be something even more dramatic than the usual 'cat giving birth to a dog' demand.
TTFN,
WK
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