CHAPTER FOUR

PUTTING EVOLUTION IN PROPER
PERSPECTIVE

Starting with a proof of God and aided by exercises in sound reasoning and formal logic, I established the truth of Law and Order in the behavior of the substance. I confirmed this truth to be the inevitable eventivity of God's Essential Law, dubbed it Natural Effectuation, and identified it as the driving force of evolution. I ended Chapter I with the truism that evolution was the inexorable unfolding of a preconceived design, a Grand Plan, set in motion under the control of Essential Law authored by our Creator. Succinctly put, I believe God chose to fulfill His plan of creativity by evolving the substance.

The truism just cited is the solid foundation upon which has been developed here in Part Two, a treatise about the processes and mechanisms that may have been engaged to carry out the Natural Effectuation of evolution and accomplish its purpose, ECOLOGIZATION (discussed in Chapter Five).

I have chosen not to argue the point whether or not evolution occurred. There is enough well-documented evidence in the fossil record to suggest the reality of it. Enough evidence, in fact, that not only justifies theorizing about how it may have happened, but begs for a theory that can be reconciled with that evidence. Never mind that making the case for evolution with an eye on the fossil record has been troublesome because of the incoherent theory Darwin and his followers have laid at our feet. Never mind that only the very wildest imaginings allow the modern synthesis even to survive the fossil record let alone agree with it.

What I intend to do is to overcome the difficulty of the fossil record by proposing a theory that actually makes sense. I demonstrate (in Chapter Nine) how the fossil record does not mitigate against evolution, once evolution is put in proper perspective; that gaps in the fossil record do not imperil the certainty of evolution, once evolution is taken in the context of Natural Effectuation. As we shall see, gaps in that record are a quite natural consequence of the fact that "gradualism" (including the "punctuated equilibrium" version of Eldredge and Gould) is an evolution myth.

We want to know more than that, however. To the best of our ability, we want to gain a true scientific understanding of evolution. Happily, by having exposed chance as the fundamental flaw on which the modern synthesis is built and by having confirmed the law and order in the behavior of the substance, the way was cleared to reconsider evolution theory with a recharged intellectual freedom that makes that understanding uniquely possible. We began the process in Chapter Three by setting aside those impediments to understanding that arose out of the belief in chance; i.e., natural selection and adaptation. We shall continue it by characterizing evolution firm in our knowledge that Essential Law governs and that chance is without meaning.

What we shall do now with this knowledge in hand is begin defining a New Paradigm - a new theoretical framework - to serve as a working hypothesis with which to reconsider the current body of knowledge impinging on evolution theory, and thereby produce a fresh, genuinely credible theory of evolution complete with sensible mechanisms of accomplishment.

Defining the New Paradigm is a difficult undertaking. Because there is so much interrelatedness to the terminology and concepts that must be introduced, much may need to be touched upon in a cursory fashion at first bite that will receive more detailed treatment further into the discussion.

There is also the need, along the way, to expose terminology of the old paradigm that disguises its flaws. The necessity arises, therefrom, to exclude certain of the old terms (selection and adaptation among them) from the New Paradigm lest they compromise the intelligibility of the concepts that define it. In their place, a unique variety of terms are introduced to describe those defining concepts. These terms are the neologisms I had said in the introduction would be forthcoming. Whether word or phrase, they are either new in construction or new in their application to evolution theory. Their usage enables us to refocus the mind-set so attuned to the modern synthesis. To have merely redefined existing terms, would have been a fruitless exercise because the mind balks at neatly setting aside old meanings. Instead of a clean break with the old ideas, there would be confusion of thought. Sixteen neologisms have been introduced thus far. Many others will be introduced in this chapter and the one that follows, and a few after that. As before, they shall appear underlined in bold-face type when first encountered.

There are two major flaws in the evolution theory of the modern synthesis that remain to be addressed, and which the new theory aims to correct. The first of these is the confusion over what constitutes true evolutionary change leading to SPECIATION, itself, vs. what constitutes change leading to mere VARIATION of species. The second flaw is due to confusion over how change comes about - Do species really change piecemeal until they accumulate enough phenotypic change to become new species?

With all of that in mind, I shall first plunge into the task of defining what is meant by, to evolve. We have to be clear on this meaning because evolution (the process of evolving) is a term frequently misused, particularly by followers of Darwin. We shall examine this misuse after we have put our definitions in order.