The object of the essay was to look at what the mathematicians and physicists are bringing to the table with regard to evolution. Here are the sources and the areas they question, in reverse order:
Thank you!
No real comment, other than that in my limited experience his biochemical argument seems specious. But as I said, I'm not deeply familiar with his works, nor am I particularly interested in his arguments. I'm mostly defending the good name of computational organic chemistry, which I worked in many years ago. I generally find chemistry to make for boring discussions, hence why I do not work in the field despite my background. :-)
Stephen Wolfram – questions the natural selection pillar of biological evolution
I actually think Wolfram is partially correct here. In fact, the idea of building functional complexity through automata rather than evolution predates Wolfram's thoughts on the subject. There is someone who is widely credited with the idea in theoretical circles, but I can't remember their name off the top of my head. I've stated for years here that there are other plausible natural mechanisms besides evolution for the increase in biological complexity. My personal belief is that it is a combination of both evolution (because some selection does obviously occur) and automata. Wolfram shouldn't really be given credit for this idea; he almost certainly borrowed it (like many of his other ideas) from the person whose name I cannot remember. I'll see if I can find it.
Luis Rocha – questions the syntactic autonomy that gives rise to self-organizing complexity
No comment. He does interesting theoretical work, but his particular theoretical tangent works with some assumptions that have fallen out of favor (and for good reason) for the purposes of our discussion here. It is interesting from a purely theoretical standpoint, but not entirely relevant for our discussion.
H.H. Pattee – questions the von Neumann challenge, what is the nature of this thing life
No comment. In an algorithmic information theory framework, his questions are essentially answered. He was not writing to this perspective (which I do write from), so I consider his questions not particularly relevant. If one takes a view from a non-AIT framework, his questions may still be relevant.
Hubert P Yockey – questions the rise of life from non-life
The first guy on the list I have an issue with. In short, Yockey has a simplistic and incorrect understanding of information theory, and misuses it in his theorizing. He is not a credible source.
Marcel-Paul Schützenberger – questions the rise of functional complexity
No comment. His particular perspective is somewhat narrow so as to exclude possibilities he doesn't consider, but I don't have any particular problem with him. I do think other people apply what he has said in a much broader scope than is valid.
Stephen Hawking – questions the beginning of time
No comment. He is a credible physicist. Questioning the beginning of time isn't entirely relevant to any of our discussions here (and I think very few people grok "time" enough in a theoretical context to have meaningful opinion on it -- myself included).
Sir Martin Rees – questions the rise of the six numbers which allow this universe
Not relevant, so no comment. The manner in which this type of fixation is irrelevant has been dealt with countless times elsewhere. It is mostly harmless though.
Robert Jastrow – questions the significance of a beginning
No comment.
Sir Roger Penrose – questions the bridge from quantum to classical and the physics of consciousness
Well, you know I have a problem with this guy. What you don't know is that I did discuss the specific issues with him many years ago that I've raised before. At that time the ideas were conjecture, but have since been proven correct. He nonetheless refuses to acknowledge this fact and continues to wallow in his ideological rut. The rest of the field has moved on without him. He is not generally considered credible in the field you mention above (and I have many personal specific reasons to question his credibility), but he is still a credible physicist in his field of expertise.
Max Tegmark – questions what is all that there is
No comment. He's fine with me.
Sir Karl Popper – questions what is science
I view Popper as engaging in entertaining mental masturbation, but I'm not sure that he is particularly relevant. Popper is harmless though, and I don't have any problem with him waxing eloquent about all manners of things and sounding less profound (to me) than he actually is. I put him in the pop-sci category.
So in short: Most of these guys are okay and get a pass by me. However, a couple have expertise in areas that could be argued to be tangential to the real issue and therefore not relevant even though technically correct, and couple are correct in a narrow scope but are routinely applied in a broader scope than is warranted (for this I blame the people misapplying it, not the guy himself). So a few of the people on the list don't real have a meaningful place in the discussion even though I don't have an issue with them.
And a couple (like Yockey) have zero credibility as far as I'm concerned, though your list is mostly okay with me.
Does this help you?