Help with a project about evolution and the varying ideas around it?

Question

I have to write a transcript about having dinner with Plato, Charles Darwin, Charles Lyell, Jean Baptiste Lamark, Ernst Mayr, James Hutton, Thomas Malthus, and Stephen Jay Gould....and im so confused about the ideas that they represent....
HELP PLEASE!!!

Answer 1

Of all of them, only Plato would be skeptical of evolution. So the dinner would probably unfold with him making some remarks, and the others taking turns explaining evolution to Plato.

Plato - Will complain about the food, but love the wine (perfection). He will harumph at Darwin and Lyell. His view is that life, like all of nature, must have an "externally-imposed source of order" ... much like the way, in this restaurant, there is a perfect recipe was turned by the chef into this imperfect meal.

Darwin - Will love the food, commenting that it has "evolved" since the last time he was at this restaurant. (They all chuckle with approval at the witty Darwin.) He will use his linguini with clams to explain natural selection ... picking up several clams to illustrate "variation." Darwin knows his molluscs.

Lyell - Good friend of Darwin. The diplomat at the table, he'll be trying to calm tempers. (Lyell was Darwin's friend who persuaded him to co-publish with Wallace ... although Darwin got most of the credit.)

Hutton - A prim fellow sitting next to Lyell. He and Lyell together explain the idea of "uniformitarianism" ... namely, we can assume that processes in nature today are the same as were there in the past. This argument appeals to Plato (who likes constancy). Gould applauds the explanation by Lyell and Hutton.

Lamarck - Also loves the wine (because it is French). Agrees with Darwin, but gets all huffy (think Geico caveman getting huffy about people thinking he's dumb ... "I'm not hungry, thank you."), when Mayr and Gould start teasing him about "acquired characteristics". He hates being remembered for that one failed theory.

Malthus - The only non-biologist at the table. He's an economist (and so he worries about the check). He's a little confused by all this biology talk, but perks up when Darwin tells him that Malthusian economics was a major influence on the theory of natural selection.

Mayr - Jolly fellow with a slight German accent. He and Gould are the only two Americans (Mayr was born in Germany, but lived in the U.S.) When Darwin stutters explaining how new species occur, Mayr completes the explanation of how a species *branches* into two when they become geographically isolated (allopatric speciation).

Gould - Another happy fellow sitting next to Mayr, really enjoying the food (he's a round fellow) and offers to pick up the tab for Malthus. When Plato objects that creatures like crocodiles and sharks show evidence of "stasis", Gould points out that there is no conflict between stasis and evolution. In fact, the fossil record has entire periods of stasis (equilibria) that are interrupted (punctuated) by periods of growth and speciation using the same processes that Darwin and Mayr described.

The dinner would end with all of them happy with the meal, except for Malthus (who thought it was too expensive), and Plato (who thought it was too imperfect). When Plato suggests they go get some Greek food ("I know a place that has a perfect Greek salad"), they all decline (having just eaten), except Gould.

{Dedicated to Stephen Jay Gould ... my favorite essayist.}

Answer 2

Dinner with all of them?

Well you have a lot of reading to do.

You could suggest that the food was so delicious that there was no time for talking.

Stephen Gould doesn't really have anything to add apart from punctuated equilibria but I think thats just a part of normal Darwinian evolution.

Mendel deserves a seat far more than Malthus.

Answer 3

Well lets just put it this way: evolution is not true. And you can't have dinner with those people because they are dead.