1016 THE STRUCTURE OF EVOLUTIONARY THEORY
by pronounced stasis. Yet Simpson, as documented in Chapter 7, pages 562-563,
denied major importance to cladogenesis at all, and held that 90 percent of
evolutionary change occurred in the anagenetic mode. Moreover (see pages 528-531),
Simpson's important hypothesis of "quantum evolution"— the idea that our detractors
usually try to depict as equivalent to punctuated equilibrium—treats a vitally
important, but entirely different phenomenon of different mode at a different scale:
the anagenetic origin of major structural innovations, not the pacing of ordinary
speciation.
Several authors, in their desire to name Simpson as the true author of punctuated
equilibrium, completely misunderstood his work. Andrew Huxley, for example,
misinterpreted the well-known paleontological concept of a Stufenreihe. Huxley
quoted from Simpson's 1944 book (Huxley, 1982, p. 145): "He says (pp. 194-195):
'The pattern of step-like evolution, an appearance of successive structural steps, rather
than direct sequential phyletic transitions, is a peculiarity of paleontological data
more nearly universal than true rectilinearity and often mistaken for the latter,' and
quotes the name Stufenreihe given to this mode of evolution by Abel in 1929. This is
exactly equivalent to 'punctuated equilibria.'" But a Stufenreihe is a stratigraphic se-
quence displaying an evolutionary trend constructed of collateral relatives rather than
direct ancestors (called, by contrast, an Ahnenreihe). For example, Australopithecus
robustus, Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens form a Stufenreihe, while A.
afarensis, Homo ergaster, and Homo sapiens build a putative Ahnenreihe.
Stufenreihen are necessarily discontinuous because they pile a cousin on top of an
uncle on top of a grandfather, while true Ahnenreihen record genuine genealogical
descent without breaks. In any case, the contrast bears no relationship to the concept
of punctuated equilibrium (which is a hypothesis about the geometry of
Ahnenreihen).
Mettler, Gregg and Schaffer (1988, p. 288) even grant Simpson authorship of
our name! "Finally, there is the punctuated equilibrium view of Eldredge and Gould
(1972), and Vrba (1983). Even though the term was coined by Simpson, these authors
have given it new emphasis."
At least pathos can be balanced by bathos in our wondrously varied world. The
irrepressible Beverly Halstead, labelling me with my all-time favorite epithet of
"petty obnoxious in fauna," while depicting Simpson as a deity watching over his
loyal epigones from on high, reviewed Simpson's last book with a panegyric that left
even his earlier excoriation of the British Museum in the rhetorical dust (Halstead,
1984, p. 40):
Indeed, the original presentation of punctuated equilibrium was in anti-neo-
Darwinian language but the substance was nonetheless easily accommodated
within the framework given long ago by Simpson ... It has been Simpson's
overwhelming reasonableness and commonsense, as exemplified in this book,
that has done so much to entrench the Modern Synthesis in the consciousness
of most paleontologists, the literary pyrotechnics of Steve Gould
notwithstanding. Simpson's humility before his