[Alamo-Girl]

You imply that I have "cherry-picked quotes from literal creationist websites." I have done no such thing.

The sources I offer are carefully chosen, authoritative and mainstream - though you did not recognize at least one of them, i.e. Popper.

And I have not even been as dismissive of historical sciences as one of your own:

Nature.com editors

Henry Gee

Senior Editor, Biology, London
Education: BSc, University of Leeds; PhD, University of Cambridge.
Areas of responsibility include: integrative and comparative biology (including palaeontology, evolutionary developmental biology, taxonomy and systematics), archaeology and biomechanics.

From his book “In Search of Deep Time: Beyond the Fossil Record to a New History of Life” (emphasis mine)

“For example, the evolution of Man is said to have been driven by improvements in posture, brain size, and the coordination between hand and eye, which led to technological achievements such as fire, the manufacture of tools, and the use of language. But such scenarios are subjective. They can never be tested by experiment, and so they are unscientific. They rely for their currency, not on a scientific test, but on assertion and authority of their presentation.”

The historical sciences apparently seek comparable respectability to the experimental sciences:

Methodological and Epistemic Differences between Historical Sciences and Experimental Sciences

The article above (which also appears in Geology) is a valiant effort to defend the historical sciences - however, I'm quite certain discoveries in archeology will never be as respected as discoveries in physics.

I'm certain because within the historical sciences the absence of evidence is NOT evidence of absence whereas in the experimental sciences (especially the hard ones like physics) the absence of evidence is evidence of absence.

Interestingly, in the conclusion of her article, she observes:

"Insofar as they are concerned with identifying particular past causes of current phenomena, historical researchers cannot directly test their hypotheses by means of controlled experiments. They can, however, proliferate alternative explanations for the traces they observe and then search for a smoking gun to discriminate among them."

It would certainly be an improvement for evolution biologists to proliferate alternative explanations for the fossil record - but in reality, the theory of evolution is treated as dogma or axiomatic. It is a "given."

Alternative explanations are not seriously entertained.

So, ironically, in attempting to defend the historical sciences the author has revealed the poison pill of evolution theory.

[spirited irish]

“For example, the evolution of Man is said to have been driven by improvements in posture, brain size.... But such scenarios are subjective. They can never be tested by experiment, and so they are unscientific. They rely for their currency, not on a scientific test, but on assertion and authority of their presentation.”

Spirited: In other words, an “unseen something,” an “energy-force” mysteriously “drives” improvements. It cannot be seen or sensed in any way thus fails to meet rigorous scientific standards.

But because contemporary antitheist Gnostics (i.e. Lewontin, Dawkins) demand that God’s foot not be allowed in the door, they do what they must and brazenly foist a great deception off onto a gullible public. Make them believe a lie. Make the lie credible by dressing it up as modern science. Force everyone to partake of the lie by teaching it as science education. And destroy anyone who questions the lie. Destroy their good name. Paint them as insane, authoritarian, fundamentalist, antiscience, backwards, superstitious-—say anything so long as they are utterly destroyed.

We are talking here about the doing of evil. Even though man deceives himself into believing that he can lie, betray, and destroy and yet remain “good,” he cannot. For no man can think, speak, and do evil without becoming evil.