Gould

["Ralph Chapman" <Chapman.Ralph@NMNH.SI.EDU>]

A few comments on Gould -

Realizing that it seems to be open game on Steve these days
I think some comments are appropriate.

First of all, although some have suggested that Steve is
pretty much your typical popularizer who has not done much
to contribute to the primary literature, this is totally
untrue for SJG. His early work on allometry and heterochrony
was (and is) extremely important and they were major
contributions towards pushing evolutionary scientists down
the path to thinking about these aspects more
quantitatively. His work applying multivariate analysis to
various things, especially factor analysis, served to help
contribute to the more basal works by Peter Sneath and Dick
Benson, and included various other people like Roger
Kaesler, Bert Rowell etc. that has led to the big
morphometric changes seen in the 80's until now. His work
with his cohorts Raup and Tom Schopf and, later, Sepkoski,
helped shift the whole discipline of paleontology. Although
many are still unhappy with the less specimen-based
direction of that group - which was the Rochester school
(when I was there) and then the Chicago school when Raup
moved there - the field is definitely stronger with the
shift, as long as the more specimen-based stuff is still a
huge component. Some of us (many) try to use the strengths
of both to do our work.

I've known Steve since either late 1975 or early 1976 and I
must say he is an absolute delight to converse with and has
amazing levels of knowledge. I like him lots and always look
forward to talking with him. When I was in graduate school,
we used to delight in the audacity of the opening paragraphs
in his papers, which always started with something like...

"Alexander wept when he had no more worlds to conquer..."

and my favorite, which I will do my best to recall as close
 as I can (any misspellings and inaccuracies are mine of
course)...{bear in mind this is from memory and is probably
a bit screwed up}

"I've often thought that La Gioconda's smile is because of
the many papers written about her. And have not the papers
written about Shakespeare's works exceeded the length of
those works by orders of magnitudes usually reserved for
astrophysicists? Well, if every biological discipline has
its Drosophila, can we not have one more paper on a Jurassic
oyster (Gryphaea)."

Whew. In a scientific world where people are throwing
things out to publication too fast, often very badly
written, in order to get impossible tenure and things have
gotten a bit too nasty overall,  seeing writing that is a
pleasure, and sometimes pretty outrageous, to read is a
wonderful change.

Yes, Steve's theoretical views can be a bit on the edge,
which can be a problem in a popularizer - also seen in
Bakker who was influenced a lot by SJG {can't recall if he
has ever acknowledged that but it is pretty obvious to those
who know both} - but we need to find a way for more up-front
people to get out there to counterpoint some more extreme
views of our popularizers, although these views do have a
habit of becoming accepted as well.

Also, Gould talks to the public all the time and that is
why he gives the talks he does the way he does. Repetition
is great for the public. It can sometime bore the pros in
the audience but he is talking to the crowd he has been told
is out there. Sometimes he is less entertaining than others,
but I have seen him give talks that have been absolutely
stunning.

So, read Gould and enjoy, even if you don't agree. Science,
after all, is not agreement but discussion and Steve does it
as well as anyone. I would like to see him spend more time
on hard research - even have a few projects I'm going to try
and talk him into - but his work is a huge plus for us,
despite what articles in recent magazines have said.

Just some thoughts - Ralph Chapman


Ralph E. Chapman
Applied Morphometrics Laboratory
National Museum of Natural history
ADP, EG-15  NHB, 10th & Constitution, NW
Smithsonian Institution
Washington, DC 20560-0136
(202) 786-2293, Fax: (202) 357-4122
Chapman.Ralph@nmnh.si.edu