All three points, which Ryan regards as scientifically validated tenets, originated with Lamarck. Ryan knows this, but his interest is not in setting the historical record straight, but in making a match between Darwinism and symbiotic theory. “As Louis Pasteur made clear,” he writes, “in science the credit goes to the man or woman who convinces the world rather than to the person who first thinks of the idea….” (Ryan, 262)
The two tenets not compatible with symbiotic theory, Ryan indicates, are “the slow accumulation of gradual change [gradualism] under the creative influence of natural selection….” (Ryan, 262-63) These tenets “offer an incomplete explanation of the real complexity of evolution,” Ryan writes. “ Darwin did not realize that the interactions between different species which we know as symbiosis are important forces for evolutionary change. Moreover, they have the potential of giving rise to sudden and radical changes, the saltations that he vehemently denied were part of how natural selection worked.” (Ryan, 263)
The gradualism doctrine in Darwinism has come under relentless attack in recent decades, from within the Darwinian establishment (Gould, Eldredge) as well as from without. It appears to this writer that the said establishment is already shifting—very gradually, of course—to the position advocated by the German biologist Werner Schwemmler, which combines the two explanations—Darwinian gradualism and symbiotic saltation. (Ryan, 265-66)
Regarding the natural selection doctrine: As defined by Darwin, natural selection is the “preserver,” the conservator, of favorable variations. The doctrine was whittled down over time, and currently the going definition is that provided by Ernst Mayr—“a process of elimination of the weakest.” Symbiotic theory offers Darwinists the opportunity of acquiring a constructive definition of natural selection. The acquisition does not require a great mental leap; it requires only a paper or two from leading Darwinists spelling out their agreement with the thesis that symbiotic merger may be viewed as a type, or mode, of natural selection.
Richard Dawkins has already taken a step in this direction. In his River Out of Eden, he calls the serial endosymbiotic theory of the origin of the eukaryotic cell “incomparably more inspiring, exciting and uplifting than the story of the Garden of Eden.… Like most biologists I now assume the truth of the Margulis theory.” (Ryan, 92-93) Hold on there…. What has Dawkins said? He has acknowledged that symbiogenesis is a source of speciation. By Darwinian doctrine, there is one and only one source of speciation, natural selection. What gives? Is Dawkins suggesting that there are two sources of speciation?—or does he consider symbiogenesis a mode of natural selection?
Ryan himself has not caught on to the possibility of defining symbiogenesis as a mode of natural selection, as indicated by his remark that “the lightning strike of endosymbiosis is not natural selection but the act of union of two or more existing genomes.” (Ryan, 264)
In a personal letter (August 27, 2003), Dr. Ryan elaborated on his position with regard to natural selection and symbiosis: Next > 1 2 3 4 5
