Baraminology and the Flood
Presented for your amusement as a relief from all the very deep philosophy: a fine example of the cargo cult science of young-earth creationist baraminology. That label “cargo cult science” refers to attempts to ape the surface features of science, perhaps in hopes of gaining a similar degree of prestige. Think of Ann Gauger in a white lab coat, standing in front of a green screen.
Our example today comes from Kurt Wise, perhaps the most famous of the scientifically trained creationists — Harvard degree in paleontology with no less an advisor than S. J. Gould. Specifically, this publication:
Wise, Kurt P. 2009. Mammal kinds: How many were on the ark? Pages 129-161 in T. C. Wood and P. A. Garner (eds.), Genesis kinds: Creationism and the origin of species, Issues in creation #5. Wipf & Stock, Eugene, OR.
As we shall see, one of the attributes of cargo cult science is the very careful handling of assumptions; their implications must be considered only in so far as they contribute to the desired conclusion, and any inconvenient consequences must be ignored. Wise actually does better than most, and is willing to let the data take him farther than most, but not so far as to endanger his beliefs.
The central task of baraminology, and the one that has most interested me, is the attempt to identify the created kinds. Wise proposes a novel method for this using the fossil record. But first, some assumptions, which must be granted for the sake of argument.
We must first suppose the literal truth of the entire Genesis story, including a strict timeline. Life, including all the kinds, was created over a week about 6000 years ago. These various kinds contained the potential to develop — one should not say “evolve: — into a great many species very quickly, which they proceeded to do. Around 1500 years later, there was a great Flood that covered the world, killing all terrestrial animals (at least) other than those preserved by Noah on the Ark. And Noah carried a few individuals of one species of each created kind; thus each kind suffered a severe bottleneck in the Flood: not only was each species reduced to a few individuals, but each kind was reduced to a single species.
Directly after the flood, the kinds re-diversified into new species (or quickly went extinct, in many cases). Traditionally in baraminology, the kind has been roughly identified with the family, thus the cat kind is considered to include lions, cheetahs, domestic cats, etc., 30+ living species and a fair number of extinct ones, all from an original pair of cats on the Ark. (Wise is willing to go much further than that, as we will see.)
There are also a number of assumptions about the stratigraphic record. The record can be divided in two: Deposits of the Flood, including the entire Paleozoic and Mesozoic and unspecified portions of the Precambrian, and deposits of the post-Flood, the Cenozoic. The K-T boundary represents the end of the Flood. Within these strictures, Wise accepts the worldwide correlation and sequence of rocks. It just all happened a lot faster than mainstream geologists think. And here’s the timeline, a combination of Wise and other papers in the same volume. Deposition gradually decreases in rate as time goes by, slowing to roughly modern rates around 650 years after the Flood, and the entire Tertiary is compressed into that time.
Wise’s final assumption is that the fossil record is very close to complete, at least at the level of mammal kinds.
And here we arrive at a test for kind status. As soon as a kind gets off the Ark and has had time to increase to a reasonable level of population, it should be represented in the fossil record. Wise figures that 30 years or so should be enough time, so that every kind should be represented in the fossil record by the end of the Lower Eocene. Taking a standard classification of mammals, he assigns kind status as the lowest taxonomic level having any representative by the end of the Lower Eocene.
This results in some interesting developments. The approximate level of the kind is not the traditional family but superfamily and suborder. For example, Wise considers Feliformia and Caniformia to be single kinds. The former includes cats, mongooses, civets, and hyenas, while the latter includes dogs, bears, weasels, raccoons, and, most interestingly, seals. By similar reasoning, he also supposes that whales are descended from terrestrial mammals aboard the Ark. This is much more evolution — sorry, diversification — than most creationists are willing to swallow. Wise, to his credit, doesn’t shy away from that.
Now, there is one group excluded from this method. Can you guess which one? Yes, it’s humans. Wise supposes that, given their long post-flood life spans, no human died until long after the Lower Eocene, and thus there could be no human fossils.
The fact remains that, given his assumptions and specifically excluding hominids, his method for determining kinds is perfectly valid. The assumptions are correctly followed where they lead. So where does this become cargo cult science? It’s in the failure to consider other implications of the scenario.
Wise completely ignores the Flood sediments. Under his assumption, every mammal kind (including humans, incidentally, which had a large pre-Flood population) should be represented in the Paleozoic and/or Mesozoic record. But this would imply that there are at most three or four kinds of placental mammals. And that’s being generous; many paleontologists think that no Mesozoic fossils represent placental mammals, which would make them at best a single kind.
Here’s another corollary that Wise does not consider: any species that appears both before and after the K-T boundary must be a separate kind from any other. While this applies to very few mammals, it would be useful for other taxa.
Speaking of other taxa, it’s clear that most kinds — tyrannosaurs, gorgonopsians, stegocephalians, palaeodictyopterans, and so on — became extinct too soon after the Flood to leave any fossil record at all. It isn’t clear why YHWH felt it necessary to put them all on the Ark, only to abandon them immediately after, but I suppose He moves in mysterious ways, etc.
We will not even think about plants, aquatic animals, forams, and such. They aren’t important, and Wise’s line of reasoning depends entirely on the Ark.
One final tidbit: if we accept the K-T boundary as the end of the Flood, and accept further that the Ark grounded on Mt. Ararat (which most creationists do), we have a conundrum, as Mt. Ararat is a Pleistocene volcano, which formed, by the chronology above, several hundred years after the Flood ended.
As I understand it, the essence of a cargo cult is to mimic a superficial cosmetic resemblance but nothing substantive or rational underlies it.
What Wise and those like him do is to apply the trappings and terminology of science, while carefully doing no actual science. To accomplish this, they must never actually TEST their assumptions to validate them. Science is in the business of testing its assumptions.
Universal common descent would be cargo cult science, if it rested on no evidence and made claims that either are not or could not be tested.
How is common descent tested?
I’m disappointed in you, Bill.
John, to colewd:
I am as well.
I wonder if he’ll ever get around to reading Theobald.
To be disappointed implies someone didn’t meet expectations.
One of my meditation teachers says that “Expectations are preconceived disappointments.” He has a number of those cheery bon mots.
Or that he did, which disappointed your hope for improvement.
Although such hope may well be preconceived disappointment.
Glen Davidson
colewd,
You really think UCD is a conclusion based upon only considering that evidence which supports it? Was there only ever going to be one outcome of the analysis, irrespective of the data? What have evolutionary biologists missed that ‘real’ scientists have uncovered?
Allan Miller,
Can you cite a paper that outlines the strengths and weakness of UCD? The competing inference that Darwin argued is creationism. I am highly skeptical of the young earth argument but am interested in discussing it. When John labeled it cargo cult science he belittles the opposing position up front and then expects Sal to join the discussion. Everyone who has a view tries to make the data fit their view. This is true for UCD, old earth creationists and young earth creationists.
“Strengths and weaknesses” is creationist code language. What an actual scientific paper would do is test the hypothesis against others. For example, see Theobald 2010. Of course one rarely tests UCD itself, usually just pieces of it, as in the paper I’m constantly trying to get you to read and understand.
Actually, Darwin argued against fixity of species, which implies separate creation of each species. This is a form of creationism that most creationists today don’t subscribe to. If you’re interested in discussing the young earth argument, why not do so?
Do you think anything I said wasn’t true? If so, please present an argument against it. Anyone who supports something absurd should be prepared to have it labeled as absurd.
You may do that, creationists certainly do that, and some scientists may do that, but a good scientist doesn’t do that. Rather, you’re supposed to make your view fit the data. If you will show me any case in which I have failed in this task, please do so. I have shown explicitly how Kurt Wise has failed, and if you disagree, please make some argument. Naive attempts to equate cargo cult science with real science will not do.
Theobald D.L. A formal test of the theory of universal common ancestry. Nature 2010; 465:219-223.
John Harshman,
First, I am the wrong guy to argue the young earth position. Hopefully Sal will join. As far as UCD goes one of the troubling stories is whale evolution. I agree with you that making the time frame shorter for a land animal becoming a whale is troubling. I don’t think any amount of time can reconcile this transition. If I were Kurt I would not try to argue that Whales came from surviving ark animals. I would simply say they were not affected by the flood.
At this point you have made a good counter argument to Kurt. Saying you showed that he failed is an argument from personal incredulity.
Whale evolution has almost nothing to do with UCD. Whales occupy a tiny little space in the tree of life. What, if anything, is your argument against whale evolution? Have you looked at the DNA evidence? The fossil evidence? Anything at all?
Wise, on that one occasion, allowed the data to overrule his inclinations. Why are you criticizing him for that?
And I don’t think you know what “personal incredulity” means. I showed that Wise’s conclusions were incompatible with his assumptions.
Which explains why John has me on Ignore for having the gall to point out his own absurd positions.
colewd,
Theobald’s test, which I have seen shoved your way more times than I’ve had hot dinners, could have gone either way. The evidence might have pointed against UCD – the common ancestry of ALL life – or towards it. In fact, he found plenty of support. The UCD hypothesis is supported at the deep roots of archaea and bacteria, to a very high degree of statistical confidence. To attempt to make a parallel point wrt ‘cargo cult science’ shows a deep and apparently uncorrectable ignorance of the methods of science.
Have you read Theobald yet?
But whales … I mean, fer chrissakes! Some salty mammals aren’t commonly descended with the rest of their assumed clade. Because … ?
They have sequence commonality with assumed relatives in every nook and cranny of their genomes, not just functional sequence but indels, and some very neat and hard-to-argue work on the binary signal of SINE inserts. You don’t like the SINEs they chose, pick some others; you would be a sensation if you showed the original signal to be wrong. Of course they are commonly descended with deer, hippopotami, pigs … what on earth would make you think otherwise? Some vague notion about how long evolution takes?
No, the competing inference is multiple origins vs 1. That’s what ‘UCD’ is in opposition to.
As I understand it, it’s tested every time a DNA relationship between parent and offspring is examined.
Seriously, what you seem to be doing is taking a conclusion based on an overwhelming preponderance of all relevant evidence, CALLING it an assumption, and equating it with assumptions based on nothing but theological necessity (with which evidence either agrees, or it was never evidence to begin with). You might as well label rainfall as an assumption and ask how it’s tested. You are making a category error.
Really. What other scientific theories can be tested just by getting a paternity test?
The Wise paper was recommended to me by a creationist as an example of good, rigorous work in baraminology. Yet not even that creationist has shown up here.
Maybe they don’t like your tone.
Mung,
Me, I like his tone, and not because we always agree. I appreciate people who take the trouble to challenge a position articulately – even when the position is my own.
Allan Miller,
I have just re read it and think that it does a reasonable job of highlighting evidence for common descent. I do not think it scratches the surface of supporting UCD.
John Harshman,
I have not examined DNA data. My skepticism is based on the dramatic morphological changes required.
UCD means we can tie all life together. A problematic transition is clearly evidence against it.
colewd,
The entire paper is about subjecting UCD to a statistical test. That’s not ‘highlighting evidence for UCD’, it is testing the hypothesis. The hypothesis passes the test, with flying colours. So I really don’t know how you think it does not ‘scratch the surface’, when that is entirely what it is about. It’s like saying that a paper that subjects clinical trials to statistical analysis doesn’t scratch the surface of evaluating the treatment in question.
colewd,
How do you explain the pattern of SINE data (among many other analyses)? Is that evidence for it? Do you just ignore it?
Then you didn’t comprehend it. As the title said, it was a test of universal common descent. It didn’t highlight evidence for common descent. It looked at an unbiased sample of evidence and tested several models (UCD, separate descent by domain, separate descent of all lineages), and found one model to be highly preferred by the data. That’s how an actual scientific test works.
I would agree with the last sentence. But what we have here is hardly a problematic transition. Not only is there overwhelming molecular evidence (which you perhaps ought to look at before making pronouncements), the morphological evidence, i.e. fossils, is quite good too. There are plentiful intermediates for all these “dramatic morphological changes” you don’t believe in. Are you sure you actually looked?
One can accumulate evidence for common ancestry without first having to show that the changes involved all happened by the mechanisms of the Modern Synthesis. And indeed, in these cases, the evidence is very convincing.
We can conclude that the butler killed Lord Crumley, without being sure exactly how he did it, as long as he had one or more way of doing it.
John Harshman,
I saw a debate involving Ken Miller where both sides of the debate agreed that there are 50000 morphological changes to get a land creature to become a whale. I am not sure this is right but if the number is even close skepticism is warranted. If you have a link to DNA data I would appreciate it.
John Harshman,
John, I understand you don’t think I comprehend it but you always believe this when I don’t agree with you. I think you lack the proper skepticism to have a balanced opinion.
Joe Felsenstein,
We at least need to know that it is possible to kill someone. Is it possible through isolated populations for a new protein function like hemoglobin to form.
Would it hold up in court? Or at least in peer review?
I hear Lord Crumley died of boredom, so I think the jester did it.
I wasn’t even in the country at the time!
I think you don’t comprehend it because what you say demonstrates that you don’t. Perhaps your miscomprehension is why I don’t agree with you. Your skepticism is quite unbalanced. And simply rejecting any conclusions whose arguments you don’t understand should not be considered a valid form of skepticism.
I wouldn’t know how to estimate the number of changes. I merely note that we have fossil evidence for a number of the intermediate steps. Why is that not enough? You don’t want a link to the DNA data, as you would be unable to analyze it. What you want is a link to some of the analyses of the data.
I suggest Shedlock A.M., Milinkovitch M.C., Okada N. SINE evolution, missing data, and the origin of whales. Systematic Biology 2000; 49:808-817. Can’t find it on the web, but that’s what libraries are for.
Here’s one using DNA sequence data:
http://mbe.library.arizona.edu/data/1996/1307/7gate.pdf
There are plenty of newer data sets, but that should really be enough.
The issue here is common descent, so the question is whether one species can become two species. Actually, baraminologists argue that yes, they can (at least, post-Flood), and imagine that this can be an enormously fast process.
Hah! So you admit that you knew the deceased, the country where the deceased met his demise, and that it is at least possible that you could have been in the country at the time.
What else are you not telling us Mr. walto?
Exactly. I’ve never understood the YEC aversion to evolution, given that their position logically needs hyper-evolution in order to explain extant species.
John Harshman,
http://mbe.library.arizona.edu/data/1996/1307/7gate.pdf
K-casein
This data clearly supports a common descent hypothesis.

B-casein
This data does not support a common descent hypothesis.


colewd,
Your Google-fingers bust again? I gave you one upthread; there are scads of papers on them like this
SINEs are useful, because their range of rates of change are such that they can resolve at several levels – right down to paternity tests. Deny SINEs and you’d be dismissing evidence admissible in court, along with multiple genealogical and ethnic studies, and close-species resolutions even a “but …but … it’s not bin long enough!” Creationist would struggle to rationalise away.
They are a binary signal: flank-SINE-flank or flank-flank. Very hard to explain by any means other than common ancestry, given the mechanism of transposition, and the way they stack into a pretty solid tree, entirely as expected by common descent.
Harshman,
This reads like more of a speculative conclusion that Hippo’s and Whales share a common ancestor.
colewd,
Therefore common descent is rejected?
Joe Felsenstein,
Do all baraminologists support a young earth?
colewd,
That’s a 20 year old paper you’re looking at there. The SINE data has pretty much resolved the issue.
Allan Miller,
NEVER: Common descent is a fact 🙂
colewd,
Yes, obviously. But in regard to whales and hippotamuses, I (quite clearly) meant.
The ones I’ve heard of do.
I suppose one could believe that there were separately-created “kinds” (baramins) on an old earth, without a Flood or an Ark. Perhaps all created at once, though that would rule out whales being a separate baramin from artiodactyls. Or perhaps popping up as needed.
So which of you folks are that way inclined?
Baraminology is a creationist method of biosystematics.
– understanding the pattern of life
Creation occurred roughly four thousand years before Christ or six thousand years before the present day.
– understanding the pattern of life
You will have to explain what you mean by that. I think you’re misreading again, since both genes support very similar trees. And this is an old paper, one of the first to address the question with molecular data. There’s a lot more data now that confirms the conclusion. Same with morphological data since that was published. Is this not something you could find on your own?
Allan Miller,
It is the same as other papers I have seen. The two species have similar sequences and different sequences. The data is inconclusive as to whether they share a common ancestor.
John Harshman,
In the first case the sequences line up and the second they don’t.