Wednesday 14 October 2015

AIG: All cats are one kind

At AIG, they've partially answered a question I've had for a long time.  Some time ago, Ken Ham stated that kinds could be similar to the modern genus or even family level of relationship (His statement is highlighted at that link and also mentions the information below.  I only found it after the quoting below so I'm leaving this post alone - it now has internal confirmation).  And yet, I'd never seen an example to be studied and considered.

In an article mostly about errors in illustrating Bibles, Bodie Hodge states:
Putting too many individuals of a kind on the Ark: We often see lions and tigers and other cats entering or exiting Noah’s Ark.1 There is only one cat kind (cats can interbreed with each other), so Noah only took two cats on the Ark. Of course, they had the genetic information which can account for the cat variations we see today (as a result of various selection processes over time). The same with dogs—there is only one dog kind, so Noah only needed two dogs on the Ark, no dingoes, wolves, coyotes, and so on. The same goes for the bear kind, ceratopsian kind, sauropod kind, elephant kind, horse kind (zebras are part of the horse kind—they are a variation of the horse that is post-Flood), and so on. Learn more about kinds.
"There is only one cat kind
(cats can interbreed with each other),
so Noah only took two cats on the Ark."

Wikipedia tells me that there are 41 species of Felidae known today.  From massive saber toothed tigers (which aren't tigers, if it needed to be said) to pack-hunting lions to the solitary short-tailed lynx of North America, all are one Biblical kind.  That's a lot of variety for one kind, for 'micro' evolution to accomplish.  And even more to accomplish in a few thousand years.

How long did Cats have to evolve to this variety?  If the flood occurred four thousand years ago, that sets an upper boundary, but we can shrink it immediately to three thousand, six hundred because settlers in North America learned about local cats and the Native Americans did not note in oral legends any new species appearing recently.

Neither did European, Indian or Asian written records.  This puts a reasonable but negotiable upper limit at fifteen hundred years, plus or minus a little. What about the cats in North America?  It's hard to say but once the continents separated, it is unlikely for later transfer of species.

We are looking at 41 species to evolve and some to die out in under 2,000 years.  And none to evovle since then.

This is the problem with Creationist kinds.  They require evolution to occur at rates far faster than ever observed and also for evolution to stop even while we see it occurring today at rates historic records tell us are reasonable.

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