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Punctuated equilibrium comes of age

Abstract

The intense controversies that surrounded the youth of punctuated equilibrium have helped it mature to a useful extension of evolutionary theory. As a complement to phyletic gradualism, its most important implications remain the recognition of stasis as a meaningful and predominant pattern within the history of species, and in the recasting of macroevolution as the differential success of certain species (and their descendants) within clades.

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Gould, S., Eldredge, N. Punctuated equilibrium comes of age. Nature 366, 223–227 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1038/366223a0

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