The Burgess Drama, Act 3. The Revision Expands: The Success of a Research Team, 1975-1978 Summary and Analysis

Opabinia represents the Burgess message. However, it remains to be seen how this message comes to be articulated. These new arthropods need new groups, and Opabinia needs a new phylum. Different paleontologists take on the new groups, but Whittington and his team focus on Opabinia.

Gould describes Whittington's team in more detail. For the most part, Oxford advisors do not pay much attention to their students and have a strongly hierarchical relationship with them. They also do not spend much time on their students' work. However, two brilliant students, Derek Briggs and Simon Conway Morris, are exceptions to this rule. Gould describes their distinct approaches and personalities. Morris is young, radical and "antisocial," Whittington, kind...