Editing Stephen Jay Gould (section)

===Cambrian fauna===
In his book ''[[Wonderful Life (book)|Wonderful Life]]'' (1989) Gould famously described the [[Cambrian]] fauna of the [[Burgess Shale]], emphasizing their bizarre anatomical designs, their sudden appearance, and the role chance played in determining which members survived. He used the Cambrian fauna as an example of the role [[contingency (evolutionary biology)|contingency]] has in shaping the broader pattern of evolution.

His view of contingency was criticized by [[Simon Conway Morris]] in his 1998 book ''The Crucible of Creation''.<ref name=Conway1998>{{cite journal |last1=Conway Morris |first1=S. |last2=Gould |first2=S. J. |year=1998 |title=Showdown on the Burgess Shale |url=http://www.stephenjaygould.org/library/naturalhistory_cambrian.html |journal=Natural History |volume=107 |pages=48–55 |access-date=January 4, 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101210200047/http://www.stephenjaygould.org/library/naturalhistory_cambrian.html |archive-date=December 10, 2010 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Conway Morris stressed members of the Cambrian fauna that resemble modern taxa. He also argued that [[convergent evolution]] has a tendency to produce "similarities of organization" and that the forms of life are restricted and channelled. In his book ''Life's Solution'' (2003) Conway Morris argued that the appearance of human-like animals is also likely.<ref>Conway Morris, Simon (2003). [https://archive.org/details/lifessolutionine01conw ''Life's Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe.''] Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.</ref> Paleontologist [[Richard Fortey]] noted that prior to the release of ''[[Wonderful Life (book)|Wonderful Life]]'', Conway Morris shared a similar thesis to Gould's, but after ''[[Wonderful Life (book)|Wonderful Life]]'' Conway Morris revised his interpretation and adopted a more [[Evolutionary progress|deterministic]] position on the history of life.<ref>[[Fortey, Richard]] (1998). [http://www.lrb.co.uk/v20/n19/fort01_.html "Shock Lobsters".] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090823073156/http://www.lrb.co.uk/v20/n19/fort01_.html|date=August 23, 2009}} ''London Review of Books'' 20 (Oct. 1).</ref>

Paleontologists [[Derek Briggs]] and [[Richard Fortey]] have also argued that much of the Cambrian fauna may be regarded as [[stem group]]s of living taxa,<ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1666/0094-8373(2005)031[0094:WSSSGA]2.0.CO;2 |last1=Briggs |first1=Derek |author-link=Derek Briggs |author-link2=Richard Fortey |last2=Fortey |first2=Richard |year=2005 |title=Wonderful Strife: systematics, stem groups, and the phylogenetic signal of the Cambrian radiation |url=http://systematicbiology.co.nf/BriggsFortey05_CambrianRadiation.pdf |journal=Paleobiology |volume=31 |issue=2 |pages=94–112 |s2cid=44066226 |access-date=June 17, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160812024700/http://systematicbiology.co.nf/BriggsFortey05_CambrianRadiation.pdf |archive-date=August 12, 2016 |url-status=dead }} [https://archive.today/20130415152549/http://www.psjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1666/0094-8373(2005)031%5B0094:WSSSGA%5D2.0.CO;2 Abstract]</ref> though this is still a subject of intense research and debate, and the relationship of many Cambrian taxa to modern phyla has not been established in the eyes of many palaeontologists.<ref>Kemp, Thomas (2016). ''Origin of Higher Taxa''. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [https://books.google.com/books?id=LJZPDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA88 p. 88.]</ref>

Richard Dawkins disagrees with the view that new phyla suddenly appeared in the Cambrian, arguing that for a new [[phylum]] "to spring into existence, what actually has to happen on the ground is that a child is born which suddenly, out of the blue, is as different from its parents as a snail is from an earthworm. No zoologist who thinks through the implications, not even the most ardent saltationist, has ever supported any such notion."<ref>Dawkins, Richard (1998). ''Unweaving the Rainbow'', [https://books.google.com/books?id=ZudTchiioUoC&pg=PA202 p. 202.]</ref> In the ''Structure of Evolutionary Theory'' Gould stresses the difference between phyletic splitting and large anatomical transitions, noting that the two events may be separated by millions of years. Gould argues that no paleontologist regards the Cambrian explosion "as a genealogical event—that is as the actual time of initial splitting", but rather it "marks an anatomical transition in the overt phenotypes of bilaterian organisms".<ref name=SETp1156>Gould, S. J. (2002). ''[[The Structure of Evolutionary Theory]]''. Cambridge: Belknap Press of [[Harvard University Press]], p. 1156. {{ISBN|0-674-00613-5}}</ref>