Gypsy Moths Causing Evolution
On the subject of the fossil record, I wonder if the strata may be caused by invasive species causing punctuated equilibrium, instead of phyletic gradualism. This probably puts me in the minority because vocal scientists like Richard Dawkins seem to ignore punctuated equilibrium, favoring phyletic gradualism. This occurs to me because right now the trees around my house are covered in gypsy moths, such that it occurs to me that the death of trees over a hundred or perhaps a thousand years may appear as an actual geological stratum, or even strata. With modernity, if humans are still alive, and some say we won't be, there may be a time that we can discover this by studying patterns in creation of new species (given punctuated equilibrium new species would always be invasive), and migrant species, such as birds, bringing new species that are invasive.
I have since learned that a fungus has caused massive morbidity to the gypsy moth population, and that I never realized on the trees I examined, that the gypsy moth caterpillars were mostly dead.
ReplyDeleteThis massive death caused by the fungus is yet more reason to question the fossil record. In but one summer the gypsy moths have been devastated. That is how fast the fossil record can change.