“CONVERGENT EVOLUTION”:
OXYMORONIC JOKER

Oxymorons illogically fuse two opposite concepts, like “red-hot ice cubes.”
Sound reason rejects oxymorons.
Inductive science rejects “convergent evolution.”

“Divergent evolution” says anatomical or biochemical similarities among life forms show “close common ancestry.” Such “homologies” allegedly prove divergent evolution. But “convergent evolution” says that may not be true.

In “convergent evolution,” “distantly related” life forms may be very similar anatomically or biochemically without “close common ancestors,” because similar characteristics supposedly often evolved separately and independently.

Horseshoe crabs traditionally classified with crustaceans, based on anatomical similarities. Yet due to biochemical similarities, they recently reclassified as more closely-related to spiders, despite anatomical dissimilarities with spiders.

Anatomical and biochemical phylogenies not only frequently contradict each other; one biochemical phylogeny also often clashes with other biochemical phylogenies. “Convergence,” claiming to explain all, in fact explains nothing.

If each mutually-exclusive anatomical and biochemical phylogeny is equally valid, all are equally invalid. “Convergent evolution” cannot tell what really converged or diverged. It equivocates between alternative anathemas.

Evolution needs coherent phylogenies. “Converg­ence” cannot deliver them. “Convergence” is thus functionally non- or anti-evolutionary. “Convergent evolution” – “non- or anti-evolutionary evolution” – is therefore oxymoronic.

Inductive science stresses the process of the search for truth.
Deductive evolution stresses an explanation whose
end-justifies-the-means oxymoron fakes the truth.

“Convergent evolution” is not inductive science.
It is rhetorical art for philosophical naturalism.
Yanking this snag unravels the whole tapestry.
Phylogenetic self-destruction huge?
“Convergent evolution!” leers the stooge.
Cerebral chloroform no critic roils;
For clueless myrmidons, poor suckers' foil.
Oppressive orthodoxy's programmed funk
Will no accepted shibboleth debunk,
By current pseudo-science deeply scammed.
Incisive logic clear it smugly damns.
A sociology of “knowledge” strong
Intimidates the plebs to play along.
Its emperor's-new-clothes mentality
Inhibits hoi polloi effectively.
The spoils of following the party line
A masquerade of wisdom suits just fine.

Victorian taboos on talk of sex
Were ne'er as tight as how these strictures vex.
No Torquemada Inquisition dark
Enforced servile conformity more stark.
So slick the artifice, so sick the guile,
So cynical the game, corrupt the wile,
By turns clichèd to mesmerize the mind,
By fits illusory, by starts malign,
“Convergent evolution's” suicide
Is self-inflicted, richly justified.
Its stultifying soporific gall
O'er analytic rigor casts a pall;
A facile dump/sequester, deep and wide –
Antagonistic constructs for to hide.