Paleontology's Public Intellectual Quiz

Answer: Fossil face

He explained in one of his essays that the constant teasing that 'nerdy' kids must endure probably keeps many brilliant people away from a scientific career.

Answer: Harvard

He taught many subjects, including geology, biology, zoology and the history of science.

Answer: Punctuated equilibrium

This theory proposed that evolution, rather than being a slow process of gradual change, instead takes place in 'fits and starts', with long periods of stasis punctuated by short periods -in an evolutionary sense; these periods are usually tens of thousands of years- of intense evolutionary change. In 'The Episodic Nature of Evolutionary Change,' in his book 'The Panda's Thumb- Reflections in Natural History', Gould described his theory thusly- 'Eldredge and I believe that speciation is responsible for almost all evolutionary change. Moreover, the way in which it occurs virtually guarantees that sudden appearance and stasis shall dominate the fossil record.

All major theories of speciation maintain that splitting takes place rapidly in very small populations. The theory of geographic, or allopatric, speciation is preferred by most evolutionists for most situations (allopatric means 'in another place'). A new species can arise when a small segment of the ancestral population is isolated at the periphery of the ancestral range. Large, stable central populations exert a strong homogenizing influence. New and favorable mutations are diluted by the sheer bulk of the population through which they must spread. They may build slowly in frequency, but changing environments usually cancel their selective value long before they reach fixation. Thus, phyletic transformation in large populations should be very rare-as the fossil record proclaims. But small, peripherally isolated groups are cut off from their parental stock. They live as tiny populations in geographic corners of the ancestral range. Selective pressures are usually intense because peripheries mark the edge of ecological tolerance for ancestral forms. Favorable variations spread quickly. Small peripheral isolates are a laboratory of evolutionary change.'

Answer: Natural History

It was these essays that were gathered into most of Gould's books.

Answer: An example of imperfect design

Pandas don't really use their true thumbs. Instead, one of their wrist bones- the sesamoid- has evolved into a thumblike structure that the panda uses to grasp bamboo. This is not an ideal structure, but it works. Gould loved to point out such anomalies, stating that they, not perfect designs, were proof that evolution does indeed occur.

Answer: The heredity of intelligence

Gould debunked the myths that certain races are more intelligent than others. This book was No. 24 on the Modern Library's list of the 100 greatest English-language nonfiction works of the 20th century.

Answer: Baseball

Gould loved baseball, and wrote several essays on baseball statistics. According to MSNBC, 'A longtime New York Yankees fan, he appeared in Ken Burns' PBS documentary history of the sport and in 1999 wrote an obituary tribute to Joe DiMaggio for The Associated Press.' His most famous work on baseball is an essay in which he argues that the 'demise of the .400 hitter' is the equivalent of an evolutionary arms race.

Answer: Theories of racial intelligence

The book was 'The Bell Curve', which stated that blacks were biologically intellectually inferior to whites. Gould wrote, 'The Bell Curve, with its claims and supposed documentation that race and class differences are largely caused by genetic factors and are therefore essentially immutable, contains no new arguments and presents no compelling data to support its anachronistic social Darwinism, so I can only conclude that its success in winning attention must reflect the depressing temper of our time -- a historical moment of unprecedented ungenerosity, when a mood for slashing social programs can be power-fully abetted by an argument that beneficiaries cannot be helped, owing to inborn cognitive limits expressed as low I.Q. scores.'

Answer: Teaching creationism to schoolchildren

According to Jeffrey St. Clair in 'Counterpunch', 'But Gould did more than write about `it; he savored political combat. In 1987, he put his weight behind a court case, Edwards v. Aguillard, challenging Louisiana's Creationism Act, which mandated that creation science (Gould dubbed it 'Genesis literalism') be taught along side evolution.

The Supreme Court struck the law down. In 1999, Gould rushed to Kansas to protest the decision by the Board of Education to banish evolution (and the Big Bang Theory) from public school classrooms.'

Answer: The Simpsons

William A. Dembski wrote, 'This episode was really a very clever cultural commentary. Lisa Simpson wants to stop a huge mall development from proceeding at 'Sabertooth Ravine' because the ravine is a fossil site. As a compromise, the mall developers decide to let Lisa dig for fossils while they continue to build the mall.

While digging, Lisa finds an almost human fossil. Almost, but not quite: in place of arms the fossil has wings. 'It's an angel' declare the naive and religiously motivated townfolk. Lisa, who plays the scientific naturalist, will have none of it.

She therefore enlists Gould to prove that the fossil is nothing of the sort. '

Answer: biology without evolution

Just as grammar is the backbone of English, evolution is the backbone of biology.

Answer: Liberal

In an interview with prominent skeptic Michael Shermer, co-author with Gould of 'Why People Believe Weird Things,' Gould stated, 'I think that the main reason why liberalism is under attack is that is has been so successful. That's the point Galbraith makes and I think he is right. Social Security worked. All these things worked.

A sufficiently large number of people are reasonably comfortable now, and many have become enemies of this comfort being extended to the smaller number of people who remain poor.'

Answer: Singing in a choir

Despite being Jewish and a confirmed agnostic, he sang with a choir for many years.

Answer: The Structure of Evolutionary Theory

It is a huge work, well over 1000 pages, that documents the history and the future of evolutionary theory.

Answer: Statistics of cancer survival

Gould wrote that the median survival time for abdominal mesothelioma was only 8 months. To the average person, that seems a death sentence. But Gould, with his statistical training, realized that it was more important to look at the right tail of the survivorship curve- yes, half the people were dead in eight months, but what of the other half? Gould found that that right tail extended for many years, and due to his age, health, and access to medical care he was likely to be on it.

He was- and he lived for 20 more productive years.

As part of the essay, he wrote, 'It has become, in my view, a bit too trendy to regard the acceptance of death as something tantamount to intrinsic dignity. Of course I agree with the preacher of Ecclesiastes that there is a time to love and a time to die--and when my skein runs out I hope to face the end calmly and in my own way. For most situations, however, I prefer the more martial view that death is the ultimate enemy--and I find nothing reproachable in those who rage mightily against the dying of the light.'