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Actually, Corning combines hyperbole with an informative brief history of the Modern Synthesis to make the case for an "inclusive new synthesis." I propose a different kind of synthesis, one that attempts to characterize the evolutionary process and its key features - the HOW question. ...We need to know where living systems came from, how they got here, how they work, and perhaps where they are going.

The new synthesis must not ignore a glaring lack: The ongoing evolutionary innovation that life on Earth exhibits has not been demonstrated in controlled experiments. To assert that new genetic programming (epigenetic, synergistic, etc.) can somehow invent itself is an extraordinary claim. A theory in which life arrives, and the programming is acquired, deserves consideration. Otherwise, the new synthesis is not really "inclusive," and Corning's well-posed questions will likely go unanswered.

But "evolution" has conflicting meanings. As history, the geological record tells a reliable story. But as a mechanism behind major (macroevolutionary) advances, the current science is unclear, undemonstrated and unlikely. The surveyors are disappointed by the students' lack of acceptance, "since evolution is going to continue to be central to biological literacy and – scientific literacy – in the 21st century." Which definition do the surveyors have in mind? Recognizing the difference could begin to relieve the gridlock that continues to bind the subject in the 21st century.

When we wonder about life on other worlds, octopuses should come to mind. Most of the liquid water in the solar system is in ice-covered oceans, which sounds favorable for octopuses. A female can produce up to 100,000 eggs the size of rice grains. Protected in icy comets, these eggs would easily endure interplanetary transport. Colleague Ted Steele has reasons to think so.