(SOO.doh.eks.ting.shun)
n.
The evolution of a species into a different species. Also: pseudo-extinction.
Example Citation:
The technoprophets have made a persuasive case ... That we will soon be able to leave humanness behind. ... We would vnish in what the genetic enthusiast Gregory Stock calls a "pseudo-extinction," "spawning our own successors by fast-forwarding our evolution."
— Bill McKibben, "Enough," Times Books, April 2003
Earliest Citation:
Lamarck then proceeded to extract more from modern trigonians to buttress other pet themes. He was, for example, a partisan at the wrong end of a great debate resolved a decade later to his disadvantage by Cuvier (see my column of June 1982) — does extinction occur in nature? Human rapacity, Lamarck believed, might exterminate some conspicous beasts, but the ways of nature do not include termination without descent (Lamarck, as a transmutationist, obviously accepted the pseudoextinction that occurs when one form evolves into another).
— Stephen Jay Gould, "Nasty little facts," Natural History, February 1985
Related Words:
Category:
New words. 2013.