Creation scientists? Those are rare birds, rarer yet than the Pterodactyls our author Mr. Farrah believes are soaring over Asia even as we speak.
... have no problem with natural selection/survival of the fittest in terms of explaining variation within the limits of the created “kinds”.
Oh yes, I've heard this explanation. So you believe that Noah took just two frogs onto the Ark, 5000 years ago, and in just 5000 years, two frogs have "evolved" into more than 5000 different species of frogs? Is your understanding of evolution really so deficient as to believe that that's even remotely possible?
What they have a problem with is the Church of Darwin’s religious claims that natural selection accounts for the ORIGIN of species (every species, starting with the pre-biotic soup, then simple cells, simple organisms, and so on down the line right DOWN to modern man).
It's remarkable, given the overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that a few creationists still cling to this nonsense. You do know, for example, that the most-favored creationists du jour, the Intelligent Designers, fully accept common descent? Have you actually read any books by Stephen Jay Gould? Because I have -- and not the thin, popular ones, but his 1500 page magnum opus The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. Nowhere do I recall any doubts about common descent. You fundamentally misunderstand punctuated equilibrium -- again, I'd advise you to read for yourself rather than copy and paste creationist tracts.
That one is easy. Frogs can swim and thus did not need to hitch a ride on the Ark along with two dogs, two, cats, two elephants, two border collies, two duck billed platypuses, two termites, two pterodactyls and a couple of cockroaches.
BTW-Do you want to meet up in Mongolia to hunt pterodactyls?
I doubt there would be any need to take amphibians on the Ark.
==Is your understanding of evolution really so deficient as to believe that that's even remotely possible?
My understanding of Darwin's theory of evolution is that it is false. There is variation within the created kinds, and as many experiments have already shown genetic mutation can take place extremely fast. Indeed, more and more evidence is starting to suggest that at least some mutations are not random. If this evidence continues to pile up, neo-Darwinism will be out the window on genetic grounds alone.
==You do know, for example, that the most-favored creationists du jour, the Intelligent Designers, fully accept common descent?
Not all IDers accept common descent, but most do. At this stage of the game, it doesn't make much difference to me. For instance, most of the IDers I have read make no attempt to prove common descent, they just assume it. But IDers are still useful allies in bringing down the Church of Darwin. The debate amongst ourselves can begin in earnest once Darwinism becomes passe.
==Have you actually read any books by Stephen Jay Gould? Because I have -- and not the thin, popular ones, but his 1500 page magnum opus The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. Nowhere do I recall any doubts about common descent.
Yes, I have. And no, I have not read his 1500 page "magnum opus." Is it your contention that he comes to different conclusions in his "popular" books? And you are correct to note that he had no doubts about common descent...as already noted, he clung to his faith in the natural selection god despite his own admission that the fossil evidence does not support darwinian gradualism:
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The history of most fossil species include two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism:
1) Stasis - most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; morphological change is usually limited and directionless;
2) Sudden appearance - in any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'.
Gould, S.J. (1977) "Evolution's Erratic Pace" Natural History, vol. 86, May