Came across the following article by Josef T. Long on the TrueAuthority creationist web site. In effect it says, Don't worry about the meaning of "kind" because science lacks universal agreement on the definition of "species." In other words, "As long as science cannot agree on one of its terms we need not worry about defining any of ours."
Long's remark:
Long's remark:
"In my experience, evolutionists will quickly question exactly what a "kind" is. I’ll admit that it is partially true that creationists don’t have a definite definition of what a kind is, but this shouldn’t be cause for concern. Evolutionists don’t have a definite definition on what a species is either, as Scientific American admits:
“recognizing a new species during a formative stage can be difficult, because biologists sometimes disagree about how best to define a species”. (John Rennie, Scientific American, “15 Answers to Creationist Nonsense”. June 2002)
Of course this doesn't mean science lacks a reasonable definition, as the quoted article goes on to explain.The most widely used definition, Mayr's Biological Species Concept, recognizes a species as a distinct community of reproductively isolated populations--sets of organisms that normally do not or cannot breed outside their community. In practice, this standard can be difficult to apply to organisms isolated by distance or terrain or to plants (and, of course, fossils do not breed). Biologists therefore usually use organisms' physical and behavioral traits as clues to their species membership.
So, even lacking a universally agreed upon definition of species, science DOES recognize the defining markers that characterize the members of each specific rank and makes distinctions among them, which means that within a genus the species that make it up are distinguishable by specific characteristics. "Kind" offers no such capacity. Species are all members of some genus, and have been so designated and distinguished with a specific name: Clupea harengus or Erica carneal for instance. But what can be said of a "kind"? Well, despite Long's claim that "it is partially true that creationists don’t have a definite definition of what a kind is" he evidently excludes himself from this uncommitted group and favors us with his definition"Kind: Any of the original kinds of organisms that can bring forth offspring."
Gotta say, I've never seen the definition of a term rely on the term itself. Kind of like saying, an airplane is a kind of airplane that flies. Anyway, he sticks "original" into his definition, but without explanation. Evidently there are quite a few unoriginal kinds also populating the world, but how could this be if "kind" only refers to the "original kind"? See how stupid things get when you think by the seat of your pants. But we're not surprised are we. We've come to expect such vain and ill-considered attempts from creationists. "As long as it looks good to the uncritical eye, it's good enough for 'em."
