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Jerry Fodor: Natural Selection Has Gone Bust

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Jerry Fodor

In a provocative article in the latest London Review of Books (18 October 2007), philosopher of science and cognitive scientist Jerry Fodor of Rutgers University argues that “the classical Darwinist account of evolution as primarily driven by natural selection is in trouble on both conceptual and empirical grounds.” As he elaborates,

The high tide of adaptationism floated a motley navy, but it may now be on the ebb. If it does turn out that natural selection isn’t what drives evolution, a lot of loose speculations will be stranded high, dry and looking a little foolish. Induction over the history of science suggests that the best theories we have today will prove more or less untrue at the latest by tomorrow afternoon. In science, as elsewhere, ‘hedge your bets’ is generally good advice.

Fodor has long been a critic of the use of natural selection in explaining human cognitive architecture. I recall as a graduate student hearing him lecture (as a visiting professor) on the topic, and was stunned by his blunt dismissal of adaptive accounts of human psychology. Now, Fodor doesn’t think much of intelligent design, and he isn’t challenging common ancestry: see, for instance, the last couple of paragraphs of this paper.

But lately his critique of Darwinian reasoning has expanded well beyond the boundaries of cognitive science, where he mainly policed runaway adaptive storytelling in the old days. Nightstick in hand, Fodor has recently been bopping heads right in biology itself:

In fact, an appreciable number of perfectly reasonable biologists are coming to think that the theory of natural selection can no longer be taken for granted….The ironic upshot is that at a time when the theory of natural selection has become an article of pop culture, it is faced with what may be the most serious challenge it has had so far. Darwinists have been known to say that adaptationism is the best idea anybody has ever had. It would be a good joke if the best idea that anybody has ever had turned out not to be true.

Bop. Solid ash nightstick, glossy black finish.

Comments
[…] https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/jerry-fodor-natural-selection-has-gone-bust/ 13 October 2007 Jerry Fodor: Natural Selection Has Gone Bust Paul Nelson […]What's Wrong About Darwin's Theory of Evolution ? - Jeffrey Dach MD
January 25, 2015
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[...] Pigs Don’t Fly“. You can get a good ‘take’ on this essay by reading Paul Nelsonat Uncommon Descent. (Maybe read this by Fodor: The Trouble with Psychological [...]A Couple of ‘Evolution’ Stories « Life Under the Blue Sky: The View From Below
October 15, 2007
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I think it's fairly clear that Fodor's chief complaint is with "adaptationism": the insistence that every feature of an organism must be an adaptation to some environment, whether past or present. He observes that there are serious conceptual and empirical problems with adaptationism, and that while popularizations of evolution are rife with adaptationism, it is increasingly contested among biologists. These are not new observations per se, but this may well be the first time an intellectual outside of biology with Fodor's acumen, rigor, and wit has presented these observations in a periodical as influential as the London Review of Books. In other news: today I noticed that Steve Fuller has a new and quite "pro-ID" book out, called Science vs Religion? Intelligent Design and the Problem of Evolution. I'm only one chapter in, but on that basis I would highly recommend it to anyone interested in the history or sociology of science from a "pro-ID" angle.Carl Sachs
October 15, 2007
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bfast, I wasn't aware that Mike Gene is a pseudonym as well. I guess my schtick isn't new. I don't want to seem rude, but I shy away from talking about my religious perspective when dealing with ID science because I wish to keep the discussions scientific. I am theistic, although I'm pretty liberal in my leanings. Of course, if you talk to the Darwinist troll on my blog, I'm in league with Kent Hovind in some nefarious plot to destroy the world. ;)professorsmith
October 15, 2007
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SeekAndFind, if I read Fodor correctly (and the only thing I know about him is this article) it would seem that when he uses the term evolution, he is referring to common descent. I, as many IDers such as Behe, concur that there is at least a VERY STRONG case for common descent. If you read "common descent" for "evolution" within this article, you will find that it makes complete sense, especially when discussing baboons. It would seem, however, that Fodor's understanding of ID is sufficiently limited as to think that common descent invalidates ID. That said, he seems deeply dissatisfied with RV + NS (in all of its complexity which would cover evodevo and genetic drift) as an explanation for how common descent happened.bFast
October 15, 2007
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I wouldn’t call Professor Jerry Fodor exactly an ID ally, not would I say that he is entirely a skeptic of Darwinism. The differences in opinion are pointed out straightaway in the OP. I've seen plenty of posts by people other than ID supporters or declared Darwinism skeptics at UD - it's not like only ID proponents have interesting things to say. As for the points, I'll leave details to others here - I'm not a big ID science proponent myself. But I imagine that once it's shown that traits can become widespread even without selection involved (And if it's shown that such traits can come about without there being a current or prior advantage to them), explaining them becomes a bit problematic. I don't doubt standard evolutionary theory can absorb that easily. Then again, it can absorb anything it needs to.nullasalus
October 15, 2007
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I am strictly refering to this article and what is written in it. I am uncertain if the intent of the author is to prove that Natural Selection has gone bust. As a follow up to my previous post, perhaps I should summarize what I believe to be Jerry fodor's main point ... 1) Because it can only select from phenotypes that are already available, natural selection is therefore limited in what it can select for, 2) Such traits tend to become widespread in a population even when they themselves are not specifically selected for. I am not sure how to the above points are wrong or even incompatible with Darwinism and how it can be interpreted as a bust for natural selection. Can someone explain to me how this article gives such an impression ?SeekAndFind
October 15, 2007
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Folks, I wouldn't call Professor Jerry Fodor exactly an ID ally, not would I say that he is entirely a skeptic of Darwinism. If you read the article, did anybody notice this statement he made : "What used to rile Darwin’s critics most was his account of the phylogeny of our species. They didn’t like our being just one branch among many in the evolutionary tree; and they liked still less having baboons among their family relations. The story of the consequent fracas is legendary, but that argument is over now. Except, perhaps, in remote backwaters of the American Midwest, the Darwinian account of our species’ history is common ground in all civilised discussions, and so it should be. The evidence really is overwhelming."SeekAndFind
October 15, 2007
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Pav, Dr. Alan MacNeill's first comment in a past response, stated the following here... "Before people on this list start hanging the crepe and breaking out the champagne bottles, I would like to hasten to point out that evolutionary theory is very much alive. What is “dead” is the core doctrine of the “modern evolutionary synthesis” that based all of evolution on gradualistic changes in allele frequencies in populations over time as the result of differential reproductive success." For those interested, the discussion is a good overview of current Dawinian guards speculation as to how they see evolution theory unfolding. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/cornell-evolutionary-biologist-declares-neo-darwinism-dead/ He gives a revised history of how evolutionist accepted changes and that it is ID supporters who do not understand or know this. The problem however is many uninformed evolution supporters do not know this level of detail. In fact, masses of evolutionary believers do not know the current level up upheval or "revolution" as Dr. MacNeill liked to phrase it. Nor is Evo-Devo fully accepted even within the core today as the solution. Dr. MacNeill admits it is only leaning in these directions. And he never fully answers Pav's questions. History of endosymiosys... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endosymbiotic_theory Even as Prof MacNeill points out Lynn Margulis paper in 1969, he neglects the truth of history past. She was largely seen as heretical for a long period of time within the evolutionary camp and has only recently been embraced as a materialist savior. It is only recently that they have publically shifted to the point that it can begin to matter in student textbooks. EvoDevo will not save them. It is but one part of the puzzle.Michaels7
October 15, 2007
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bfast, Theological naturalism is the proper term to describe the philosophy of those who are theistic evolutionists. We just refer to them by the latter term when evolution is being discussed.jerry
October 15, 2007
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bfast, ASA is an abbreviation for the American Scientific Affiliation, an American organization of Christians in science. Just search UD and they will show up. There were a couple of big dust ups earlier this year with them. They are an association of scientists but all they wanted to do was discuss theology. Now, I know why. However, they are just the tip of the iceberg in this debate which has been going on since the late 1600's and has essentially been instigated and won by what we refer to here as theistic evolutionists. I never knew the history and the depth of the debate over the last few centuries till I read Hunter's book. The materialistic debate is rooted in religion and atheists are late comers to it. First, it was about the cosmology of the universe and solar system beginning with Newton's findings and then in the 19th century accelerated with Darwin and his ideas concerning life. A God that tinkers or gets involved in day to day events is not worth our worship. He essentially is One who can't shoot straight. I am being a little coarse but that is the gist of the debate. I suggest everyone here read it. It is relatively short, inexpensive and I personally believe more important than anything Johnson, Dembski or Behe has written even though I love their work. As I said in an earlier post there will not be any further debate as to what theistic evolutionist means after reading it.jerry
October 15, 2007
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Jerry, you mention ASA. What is ASA? Janice:
some Christians accept evolution - one reason being that they have a “high” view of God such that they can’t imagine that He would involve Himself with the details of creation?
I have come to an understanding of this "high view" of God. The theory is that if God created something at the beginning that was the product of an infinite mind, he surely doesn't need to tweak it along the way. This, however, is the theory presented by Michael Denton in "Nature's Destiny" as an ID hypothesis. I refer to it frequently as the "by law" hypothesis. Whether the intelligent event was all in a single flash (big bang) at the beginning, or whether the course of history was adjusted along the way by an intelligent agent makes little difference. If the big bang was intelligently initiated, even if it was done in such a way that no interference is called for to get to man, we still are intelligently caused. I believe that there are two variants of "theistic evolutionists". There are those whose view of god is so small that he only acts as an observer to a great cosmic accident; and there are those whose GOD is so BIG that He made a perfect, tweak-free explosion some 13.5 billion years ago. The latter are IDers, whether they've figured that out or not. (I actually think there's a third camp that wants to be liked by the Christian community on Sunday, and by their scientific buddies on a work day. These are wishy-washy people pleasers that will follow whatever wind blows.)bFast
October 15, 2007
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Some more interesting tidbits relating to the lack of evidence for human evolution: A recent study examined the mutation rate for humans. Using "conservative assumptions" the authors found that the overall mutation rates was 4.2 mutations per person per generation, with a deleterious rate of 1.6 (11). When using more realistic assumptions the overall mutation rate for humans become 6.7 with a deleterious rate of 3.1. Such a high rate should have resulted in extinction of our species long ago. They stated in their conclusion: "The deleterious mutation rate appears to be so high in humans and our close relatives that it is doubtful that such species, which have low reproductive rates, could survive if mutational effects on fitness were to combine in a multiplicative way. ("Eyre-Walker, A. & Keightley, P. D. 1999. High genomic deleterious mutation rates in hominids. Nature 397, 344-347.) The authors had to rely upon a rare association of mutations, termed synergistic epistasis to explain why the numerous hypothesized deleterious mutations have not overwhelmed our genome. Instead of postulating the obvious (that the human genome is not as old as evolution would teach), evolutionists must rely upon the improbable to retain the evolutionary paradigm. Does that sound familiar???? http://www.godandscience.org/evolution/descent.htmlbornagain77
October 15, 2007
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Janice, Darwin is part of many Christian's theology. It has to be be according to them. The whole history of it is in Hunter's book. First it was the cosmology then it was life. It all has religious origins. It has been part of several threads over the last year but the details are in Hunter's book. It was dominates those at ASA. To these people, those who propose ID worship a lesser God.jerry
October 15, 2007
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O/T Sorry to do this but can anyone remember what was the thread that was about why some Christians accept evolution - one reason being that they have a "high" view of God such that they can't imagine that He would involve Himself with the details of creation?Janice
October 15, 2007
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jerry, While my assessment of Darwinists is the same as yours, i.e., they're unreasonable (in that they won't allow the facts to lead them to where they should go), I still think we're seeing a major retrenchment on the part of the Darwinist establishment. Now Fodor isn't an actual 'hands-on' practicioner, nevertheless, he expresses (1) a dissatisfaction with strictly classical NDE explanations, and (2) a view that 'evo-devo' represents some kind of 'endogenous' structure. This last viewpoint, it seems to me, more than vaguely hints at a 'nature' to things---something anathema to a materialist. I see this as a significant crack in the wall of Darwinian dogmatism---a healthy sign. Will this cause materialists to abandon their positions or their way of thinking? No. But I'm not so foolish as to think that anything will 'prove' to a committed materialist (/atheist) that 'life' was 'designed'. In Scripture we read: "They have Moses and the prophets. If they don't believe them, then they won't believe even if someone should rise from the dead." The power of the human mind (and the Devil to boot) to deceive and to be deceived, is immense.PaV
October 14, 2007
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Pav, I am sure that some will still want to fall on the sword of gradualism but all they really care for is a naturalistic explanation whether it is big or small. That is why the term random variation is more appropriate because it can encompass large scale changes to the genome into NDE. They constantly use these large scale changes such as gene duplication, endosymbiotic, hgt etc. Their use of evo devo is not a rational approach but another naturalistic" just so" approach using these complicated regulatory sections as the source of the real changes. Like anything else in the genome there is no credible explanation for how these complicated formations could arise. After reading Hunter's book, all is clear on how they think. They have to find an explanation, That is all that is necessary. Don't expect reason.jerry
October 14, 2007
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jerry: I believe evo devo fits just nicely into the NDE paradigm so using it does not do anything to change anything. I wonder if you missed my point, and the point that Fodor was making. I have no doubt that those who hold the 'evo-devo' position firmly believe this explains 'evolution', but 'evo-devo' is not the same thing as classic NDE. Classic NDE relies on gradualism; 'evo-devo', OTOH, as explained in The Plausibility of Life, gives rise to major phylogenetic change. That's why Fodor talks about Gould's criticism of classic NDE's gradualistic understanding of the fossil record. Remember, too, that Darwin insisted on gradualism. The move away from classical NDE to 'evo-devo', as I was attempting to point out, represents a retreat, therefore, from classical Darwinism. Now 'evo-devo' adherents might think they're in a better position to explain evolutionary phenomena---and I would agree---but this 'better explanation' is bought at a price; and the price is: how do you explain the presence of these Hox genes that you rely upon for your explanations. You see, once they've moved away from gradualism, they can't move back. Without gradualism, they lose their prized pet, which is 'intermediate forms'. It's as if these Hox genes suddenly arose---which seems to be more and more the case from what is being reported in scientific journals. Well, then, how did they suddenly arise. And from an information theoretic position, how could such 'information' arise so suddenly. They're really left in a very difficult position I think.PaV
October 14, 2007
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Off center; Continuing on the previous topic of the rate of variation to human genome from chimp common ancestor being at least 60,000 SNP generated per generation to generate the 60 positive mutations needed for the evolutionary scenario to be considered viable : I looked around on the web and I found this very interesting 40,000 year old ancient DNA study of anatomically correct modern humans from Austrailia: http://www.godandscience.org/evolution/multiregional.html Of special interest: five of those bases correspond to natural variations found in modern Aboriginal people, showing that those five bases were not lost at all. This leaves only a five base difference, certainly within the range of variation found among modern humans. This is absolutely crushing evidence to the evolutionary scenario: The 40,000 year old DNA was found within modern variation of aboriginals!!! The authors go on to note: Overall, the lack of "evolution" for humans over the last 40,000 years stands in sharp contrast to the large differences seen between modern humans and Neanderthals over the same period of time.bornagain77
October 14, 2007
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Jerry, I am contending that there are only two forces within the modern theory of evolution -- random variation, and natural selection. I contend that genetic drift is a "statistical effect" rather than a force. I find it to be scientific blowharding on the part of evolutionary biology to be claiming that there is anything more to the theory than these two forces. Once we recognize the simplicity of the theory, rather than being baffled by the bull, we can more accurately judge its efficacy. This theory is painfully simple, painfully hollow, and painfully inadequate to explain anything that vaguely resembles life as we know it. ProfessorSmith, or whatever your name is (I don't know if you are aware but Mike Gene is a pseudonym as well), I don't want to blow your career up, but I am wondering what your religious perspective is. I remember chatting with another young professor who lost his faith in darwinism while doing his thesis. I found his lack of religious faith to be a compelling proof of the non-religious nature of Id.bFast
October 14, 2007
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bfast, Yes, of course, I get it now. No, I'm not Mike Gene in disguise. I'm just a mild-mannered professor that got into biology as an undergraduate and started to learn the truth about what they aren't teaching us and finally converted to the ID side of things as time went on.professorsmith
October 14, 2007
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bfast, How is what you said any different from what I said? Genetic drift and natural selection are two separate processes which can theoretically operate at the same time. If you want to call them variants go ahead but they are different concepts and are treated as such by genetics. I am not sure what you are debating.jerry
October 14, 2007
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Jerry:
wikipedia has a short but good discussion of genetic drift and its relationship to natural selection.
If you read the wikipedia discussion on genetic drift you will notice, "In population genetics, genetic drift (or more precisely allelic drift) is the statistical effect..." I repeat "there are only two proposed forces in the modern evolutionary theory" Statistical effects are not forces. Genetic drift, the statistical effect of what happens when the quotient of natural selection is 0, can destroy the allele of interest, or can obliterate all other alleles of a particular gene in a particular species. In any case, as a variant of natural selection theory, it only has the ability to destroy. All new data, according to MET is caused by random variation, by accidents. The only positive (data increasing) force available to the MET is random variation -- and random variation is very good at making garbage, and pittiful at making anything but garbage. Hense, the modern evolutionary theory is garbage.bFast
October 14, 2007
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ProfessorSmith:
bfast, No, that is not my actual name. I chose the pseudonym “Smith” for its generic qualities.
Twas a joke, honest. Why would you use your real name, then say, "Once I’m tenured, I will also add my name to the list of those who are willing to speak the truth"? You wouldn't be Mike Gene of telic thoughts fame in disguise, would you?bFast
October 14, 2007
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bornagain77: I hear you --while arguing over at that _other_ site, I gave the example of elephants, with their considerably longer gestation period. Could the Earth even sustain a herd large enough to to pull those statistics from? I think once the "non-coding" DNA leg is kicked out from underneath them they'll flounder in the statistics. At any rate, as the years go by, our understanding of the genome and how it functions is only going to get more, and more interdependent/complex by several orders of magnitude. It's just going to get worse and worse for the materialists. I get the feeling that we have only found the data set -- DNA -- and that before too long we'll find the operating system. When we do, evolution will be finished as a concept. Panspermia, here we come!offcenter
October 14, 2007
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I would also like to point out that since the figure of 100,000-300,000 generation was given by you, and let's even give the evolutionists the benefit of a doubt and say that the ancient genome was only halfway between modern man and chimps (1% of 3.5 x 10^9 = 35 x 10^6), then .5 times 35 x 10^6 equals 17.5 x 10^6 beneficial SNP that are required to be generated for man to exist in the evolutionary scenario of the top limit of 3^5 generations given by evolutionists between monkey-like ancestor and man. Thus approx. 18 x 10^6 divided by 3 x10^5 equals 6 x 10^1 = 60 beneficial SNP required per generation.. Yet even using the evolutionists low end estimate for deleterious mutations of 999 out of 1000, we will find that 60,000 total mutations are required per generation to even generate the 60 beneficial ones we are required to have for a successful evolutionary scenario. What do you want to bet that the oldest human fossil we can find and sequence the DNA from, will not be noticeably divergent from modern man!bornagain77
October 14, 2007
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off center: In interest of your monkeys to man comment; Over at Myers’ site I had someone explain that the reason we could statistically get from Chimps to Humans in 100,000-300,000 generations rested on the “fact” that: “Of all of the differences found, only about 580 genes have undergone positive selection, and of those only a handful are critical to the difference between us and our cousins.” I would like to point out that The actual rate of Chromosomal rearrangements is unknown. Evolutionary assumptions about the recent divergence of chimp and man require high rates of such changes. These changes can affect large pieces of DNA, and so for the evolutionary scenario to work, many thousands of nucleotides on average, must move in this way every generation. I haven't done the math but certainly a significant portion if not all of these "required" mutations would also be required to be somewhat "beneficial"! Yet what is found for "beneficial" mutations? "Bergman (2004) has studied the topic of beneficial mutations. Among other things, he did a simple literature search via Biological Abstracts and Medline. He found 453,732 "mutation" hits, but among these only 186 mentioned the word "beneficial" (about 4 in 10,000). When those 186 references were reviewed, almost all the presumed "beneficial mutations" were only beneficial in a very narrow sense- but each mutation consistently involved loss of function changes-hence loss of information. He was unable to find a single example of a mutation which unambiguously created information. While it is almost universally accepted that beneficial (information creating) mutations must occur, this belief seems to be based upon uncritical acceptance of RM/NS (Random Mutation/Natural Selection), rather than upon any actual evidence."(Dr. J.C. Sanford PhD., Genetic Entropy: 2005 pg. 26 and 27)bornagain77
October 14, 2007
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offcenter: ten years? I hope you are exaggerating! Let's say three, and hope for the best...gpuccio
October 14, 2007
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Natural selection is not much more than a 0 = 0 statement -- it always has been -- it's only use is to beg a larger question. Maybe back in the day when we were "analog" it might have been enough to do some handwaving at the blogs of protoplasm. We now know that we are "digital" and that knowledge increasingly isn't lending itself to the same handwaving. Over at Myers' site I had someone explain that the reason we could statistically get from Chimps to Humans in 100,000-300,000 generations rested on the "fact" that: "Of all of the differences found, only about 580 genes have undergone positive selection, and of those only a handful are critical to the difference between us and our cousins." ...now that's an oversimplification, new additions have to added to the genome to create a human as well -- but that's where they're at. Most of DNA is supposedly noncoding, and that means we only have to sort out relatively few changes as in the example of human to chimp evolution. I believe we are close to a point where those sorts of numbers are in serious trouble. Given what's coming down the pike with a new understanding of RNA, and realizing how much DNA is actually in play -- a full understanding of the factors is going to put those numbers statistically out of reach. I give Darwinism ten more years before it completely degenerates into musings over panspermia, and multiverses.offcenter
October 14, 2007
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Yes,jerry, if you go back far enough whales would have come from a hoofed animal according to Materialists. Along the line, a hippo-like animal appears, although not hippo-like in stature, but more in activity, or so the story goes. HTH.professorsmith
October 14, 2007
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