falsifying evolution

[John Grehan]

W.Wuster

>- Random stratigraphic distribution of phylogenetic groupings in the
>fossil record (e.g, mammals, dinosaurs and trilobites gayly mixed up
>across the entire stratigraphic column)
>
>- Total incongruence of phylogenies derived from different character
>systems (especially molecular evidence and morphological characters)
>
>To name but two very obvious and easily testable ones...

>Wolfgang W?ster

I guess I was looking at falsification in terms of what it already
known about the world around us. Given that the pattern of phylogenetic
groupsing is not random (at least as generally accepted), the alternative
does not come into direct consideration so I would not see it as a
practical test. Further, if such a situation were to occur, evolutionary theory
might still have been proposed, only in a different form to that we have.

In phylogenetic systematics I understand that often we do get total
incongruence of characters, hence the need to elaborate parsimony and
other criteria. Rather than taking the incongruence to indicate no evolution,
the ad hoc hypotheses of convergence and independant evolution are
invoked (by the way I have nothing against ad hoc hypotheses - they
are necessary to retain a preferred theory).

Since evolutionary theory is a research framework that defines our activities
it seems to me that one cannot simply falsify it through its own practice (i.e.
do evolutinary research).

John Grehan