1
 Medieval philosophers used to hold the sensible belief 
5001
span

2
that it was more perfect to exist than not to exist, 
5002
List

3
and that to exist as a matter of necessity was most perfect of all.
5003
span

4
 Now, only God exists as a matter of absolute necessity; 
5004
span

5
it is built into His nature. 
4
restatement

6
But since the time of Darwin, we humans could at least claim a sort of natural necessity for the existence of our species.
5006
span

7
 Aren't we, after all, the inevitable culmination of that stately pageant called evolution?
6
reason

8
 If mutation and natural selection slowly but surely give rise to more and more advanced forms of life, 
5008
condition

9
then it was only a matter of eons 
5008
span

10
before splendid beings 
5009
span

11
endowed with reason, self-awareness and taste 
10
elaboration-object-attribute-e

12
shimmered onto the scene.
5010
Same-Unit

13
 Now along comes Stephen Jay Gould 
5013
span

14
to dash this flattering illusion.
13
purpose

15
 His credentials are excellent for the task.
5015
span

16
 Star lecturer at Harvard, author of numerous popular books on science, and scourge of the creationist lobby, Mr. Gould is perhaps the world's most eminent evolutionary theorist.
5016
Contrast

17
 Yet he puts quite a twist on the old story 
5017
span

18
handed down from Darwin.
17
elaboration-object-attribute-e

19
 For him, natural history is anything but a gradual, predictable march from primordial slime to human consciousness; 
5019
span

20
it is a careening, chaotic affair 
5020
span

21
in which the emergence of a featherless biped was a one-in-a-million shot. 
20
elaboration-object-attribute

22
 In Wonderful Life: 
5022
span

23
The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History 
22
elaboration-object-attribute

24
(Norton, 326 pages, $19.95), 
5022
elaboration-object-attribute-e

25
Mr. Gould makes his case for the awesome improbability of human evolution.
5024
Same-Unit

26
 The argument turns on the discovery in 1909 of an amazing fossil quarry high in the Canadian Rockies 
5026
span

27
called the Burgess Shale.
26
elaboration-object-attribute-e

28
 Here, in an area smaller than a city block, lay buried traces of countless weird creatures 
5028
span

29
that had frolicked more than 500 million years ago -
28
elaboration-object-attribute-e

30
- creatures 
5030
span

31
whose anatomical variety far exceeded what can be found in all the world's oceans today.
30
elaboration-object-attribute-e

32
 Such an embarrassment of riches was inconceivable to the man 
5032
span

33
who discovered the Burgess Shale, one Charles Doolittle Walcott.
32
elaboration-object-attribute-e

34
 The received Darwinian wisdom of the day said 
5040
attribution

35
that animals 
5038
span

36
living so long ago 
35
elaboration-object-attribute-e

37
must be simple in design, 
5039
List

38
limited in scope and ancestral to contemporary species.
5039
List

39
 Accordingly, the hidebound traditionalist reconstructed hypothetical organisms from the Burgess fossils in such a way 
5041
span

40
that they could be shoehorned into familiar categories.
39
elaboration-object-attribute

41
 It was not until the early 1970s that Cambridge Prof. Harry Whittington and two sharp graduate students began to publish a reinterpretation of the Burgess Shale.
5044
span

42
 By making clever inferences 
5043
span

43
about how the squashed and distorted fossil remains corresponded to three-dimensional structures, 
42
elaboration-object-attribute-e

44
this trio was able to piece together a series of wondrous beasties quite unlike anything currently on the planet.
5046
span

45
 One was so fantastic in appearance, 
5047
span

46
it was dubbed Hallucigenia.
45
cause

47
 Would that Mr. Gould's minute descriptions of these creatures was always so colorful.
5049
span

48
 A good deal of the book is boring, particularly the endless allusions to high and pop culture and the frequent jokes festooning the text.
47
antithesis

49
 These turns do not provide sufficient relief from sentences like, Most modern chelicerates have six uniramous appendages on the prosoma.
5049
example

50
 Interest picks up, though, 
5052
span

51
when Mr. Gould gets around to discussing the meaning of the Burgess oddities for the theory of evolution.
50
temporal-same-time

52
 Not long after the appearance of life, evidently, there was an explosive proliferation in the number of animal designs 
5054
span

53
seen on the earth.
52
elaboration-object-attribute-e

54
 The vast majority of them, however, were wiped out by a succession of environmental upheavals 
5056
span

55
that were too sudden and catastrophic 
5057
span

56
for the normal rules of natural selection to operate.
55
circumstance

57
 Consequently, the winnowing process was like a lottery 
5059
span

58
in which each group {held} a ticket 
5060
span

59
unrelated to its anatomical virtues.
58
elaboration-object-attribute-e

60
 So much for survival of the fittest.
5062
List

61
 So much, too, for the notion 
5063
span

62
that we humans triumphed in the Darwinian struggle 
5064
span

63
by evolving big brains. 
62
cause

64
Our mammalian forerunners lucked out through the extraterrestrial impact 
5066
span

65
that did in the dinosaurs 
64
elaboration-object-attribute-e

66
because they were small, not smart.
5066
cause

67
 If anyone has difficulty imagining a world 
5068
span

68
in which history went merrily on without us, 
67
elaboration-object-attribute-e

69
Mr. Gould sketches several. 
5071
span

70
In one, birds are the dominant carnivores; 
5072
List

71
in another the seas abound with little penises.
5073
span

72
 Back when the Burgess fauna were flourishing, 
5077
temporal-same-time

73
it seems, 
5076
comment

74
human evolutionary hopes hung on the survival of a little worm with a backbone 
5076
span

75
called Pikaia.
74
elaboration-object-attribute-e

76
 Mr. Gould finds this oddly exhilarating; 
5079
span

77
like an existentialist of old, he views our contingency as a source of both freedom and consequent moral responsibility.
76
elaboration-additional

78
 I, by contrast, cannot help feeling 
5081
span

79
that if some other curiosity from the Burgess Shale had survived instead, 
80
condition

80
beings at once wiser and less boorish than Homo sapiens might have eventually gained earthly dominion.
5082
span

81
 But even if no conscious life had evolved here at all, 
5086
hypothetical

82
the universe is a big place, 
5086
List

83
and given the right conditions, 
84
condition

84
sympathetic to creating some form of life. 
5087
span

85
Surely at some other cosmic address a Gouldoid creature would have risen out of the ooze 
5089
span

86
to explain why, 
5092
span

87
paleontologically speaking, 
86
manner-e

88
it is, indeed, a wonderful life.
5090
reason

89
 Mr. Holt is a columnist for the Literary Review in London. 
5093
TextualOrganization
Footnote
5001
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span

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multinuc
1
elaboration-object-attribute-e

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span
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List

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span
3
elaboration-object-attribute

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span
5014
summary-s

5006
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5011
span

5007
span
5006
explanation-argumentative

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span

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span
5010
Same-Unit

5010
multinuc
9
temporal-before

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span
5001
elaboration-additional

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span
5021
span

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span

5014
span
5012
span

5015
span
5013
elaboration-additional

5016
multinuc
15
elaboration-object-attribute

5017
span
5018
span

5018
span
5016
Contrast

5019
span
5017
elaboration-additional

5020
span
19
antithesis

5021
span
5031
span

5022
span
5023
span

5023
span
5024
Same-Unit

5024
multinuc
5025
span

5025
span
5012
elaboration-additional

5026
span
5027
span

5027
span
5024
background

5028
span
5029
span

5029
span
5026
elaboration-additional

5030
span
5028
elaboration-object-attribute

5031
span
5042
span

5032
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5033
span

5033
span
5021
elaboration-additional

5034
span
5032
elaboration-additional

5035
span



5036
span



5037
multinuc
5040
span

5038
span
5037
Same-Unit

5039
multinuc
5037
Same-Unit

5040
span
5034
span

5041
span
5037
concession

5042
span
5051
span

5043
span
5045
Same-Unit

5044
span
5048
span

5045
multinuc
41
elaboration-additional

5046
span
5045
Same-Unit

5047
span
44
elaboration-object-attribute-e

5048
span
5031
antithesis

5049
span
5050
span

5050
span
5044
elaboration-additional

5051
span
5093
TextualOrganization
Text
5052
span
5053
span

5053
span
5042
elaboration-general-specific

5054
span
5055
span

5055
span
5052
elaboration-additional

5056
span
5058
span

5057
span
54
elaboration-object-attribute-e

5058
span
5054
concession

5059
span
5061
span

5060
span
57
elaboration-object-attribute

5061
span
5056
comment

5062
multinuc
5059
comment

5063
span
5065
span

5064
span
61
elaboration-object-attribute-e

5065
span
5062
List

5066
span
5067
span

5067
span
5070
span

5068
span
5071
condition

5069
span
5067
hypothetical

5070
span
5063
antithesis

5071
span
5069
span

5072
multinuc
69
example

5073
span
5072
List

5074
span
5078
span

5075
span



5076
span
5077
span

5077
span
5074
span

5078
span
71
elaboration-object-attribute

5079
span
5080
Contrast

5080
multinuc
5083
span

5081
span
5080
Contrast

5082
span
78
elaboration-additional

5083
span
5074
comment

5084
span
5088
span

5085
span



5086
multinuc
5084
span

5087
span
5086
List

5088
span
5080
interpretation-s

5089
span
5084
consequence-n

5090
span
5091
span

5091
span
85
purpose

5092
span
5090
span

5093
multinuc



