Baramin

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According to creationists, a baramin is a "created kind" (from Hebrew: bara, created, and min, kind. This word combination does not make sense syntactically in actual Hebrew). The term appears to trace to 1941 and Frank Lewis Marsh, a Seventh-day Adventist educator, writer, and scientist with a Ph.D. in botany from the University of Nebraska. These are all the organisms that are descended from some specially-created species. Walter ReMine has even invented some baraminology jargon:

Discontinuity Systematics

  • Polybaramin: any group of species
  • Monobaramin: a group of species that share a common ancestor
  • Apobaramin: a group of species that are unrelated to any other species
  • Holobaramin: a group of species that share a common ancestor and are unrelated to any other species. (essentially a baramin).

This jargon parallels the jargon of cladistics, which is not surprising; a baramin is essentially a kind of clade. As to identifying baramins, many creationists use the Bible; they find out which "kinds" are mentioned in it. But there are numerous species that the Bible says little or nothing about, and many creationists also borrow techniques from mainstream taxonomy

Contents

Criteria for baramin

There is no firmly set criteria for establishing the size and borders of a baramin. As a general rule, morphological and genetic similarity is ignored, as similarity alone doesn't distinguish between common ancestry or common design[1]. In addition, acceptance of such similarities would lead to acknowledging that humans are related to other ape species and so therefore wouldn't be acceptable. Therefore, when attacking evolutionary accounts, creationists often end up with kinds whose members share much similarity with members of other kinds, and yet were supposedly created independently.

On the other hand, as YEC's usually believe in the literal truth of the story of Noah's Flood, baramins must be broad enough to allow for Noah to feasibly build an ark to contain a male and female representative of each kind. Noah's family's task would be made much easier if they only had to take care of a few representatives of each baramin; after the Flood ends, they can proliferate and diversify, forming numerous species. So, when defending biblical accounts, creationists usually use broad baramins, even equivalent to the taxonomic level of order.

The one criterion that is often used is reproductive compatibility[1]. If two organisms can sexually reproduce to produce viable offspring, they are considered in the same kind. However, lack of reproductive compatibility is not usually considered evidence for separate baramins[1], as there are many observed examples of sympatric speciation via genetic incompatibility (for example, many different wheat varieties have arisen that cannot fertilise one another due to polyploidy).

Examples of baramins

Creationists have had great differences in opinion as to what baramins there are, and they often describe baramins in very imprecise terms.[1] This may be related to whom their intended audience is, which is mostly people unfamiliar with Linnaean nomenclature, but it is not very helpful to a serious biologist. This allows creationist groups, such as the CreationWiki [2], to state that "kind" could mean family for mammals and could be even higher. Going with this definition, creationists should have no problem with the idea that humans and apes (family Hominidae) share a common ancestor, as they would be of the same "kind". However, CreationWiki states that the definition of "kind" depends on what creature is in question, enabling them to make up any definition they seek to suit their needs. On their baraminology page, they state that Homo sapiens, a species, is a distinct "kind" but Canidae, a family, is also a kind. This enables them to move the goalposts by swapping definitions of kind to suit their purpose.

Humankind

Perhaps the most critical baramin is the one that includes Homo sapiens (sapiens). Genesis is very explicit about the creation of humans, and so any relationship to animals would be rejected. However, creationists have had a wide range of opinions about whether various fossil hominids belong to the human baramin or to some ape baramin. In particular, some creationists claim that Homo erectus belongs to the human baramin, some to an ape baramin, and some even claim that some H. erectus specimens belong to the human baramin and some to an ape baramin!

The 'Dog Kind'

Creationists often refer to a "dog kind", in the light of the artificial selection that has produced a great variety of dog breeds. Generally, the dog baramin is said to include the domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris), the wolf (Canis lupus lycaon), the dingo (Canis lupus dingo) and the coyote (Canis latrans). These species are all interfertile, and so are obviously the same kind. Other members of the Canis genus, such as jackals, are usually included too, though not all jackal species can hybridise with dogs.

Some creationists even claim the dog baramin includes other members of the family Canidae, such as foxes[1] and African hunting dogs, even though these are members of separate genera and are demonstrably not interfertile with the Canis genus. In this respect, creationists are accepting morphological similarity as evidence of common descent. However, when it comes to animals that also look like canids, such as bears, raccoons, weasels and seals (all placed in the suborder Canoidea by biologists), creationists are not so willing to accept morphological similarity as evidence of common descent.

The 'Cat Kind'

As with the dog kind, there is no broad consensus as to how many cat kinds there are. As a general rule, the genus Panthera, (including lions, tigers, jaguars and true leopards) are considered to be related. It is also common for the domestic cat (Felis silvestris catus) to be included, as well as the puma (genus Puma) , caracal (genus Caracal) and ocelot (genus Leopardus). However, each of these are from separate genera and are not considered interfertile.

Some creationists have even proposed a single kind for all cat species[1], which would include all members of the family Felidae. As with the dog kind, creationists are forced to accept the relatedness of cats as flatly denying that the various cat species could evolve from a common ancestor would likely be a ludicrous position to take in the eyes of even the creationism-inclined members of the public. However, animals that share many similarities with the cats, such as civets, mongooses and hyenas (all classified by biologists within the suborder Feloidea) are not considered to be part of the cat kind, despite having many of the morphological characters that those allegedly within the 'cat baramin' possess.

Bacteria

Some creationists seem to believe that all bacteria form a single baramin. But this proposed baramin is very diversified; bacteria have an enormous variety of metabolic capabilities and genetic distances that often greatly exceed those of macroscopic organisms. Creationists' favorite mechanism for explaining this diversification is evolution, and sometimes a large amount of it, though they distinguish inside-baramin evolution (microevolution) from outside-baramin evolution (macroevolution).

Others

Other baramin that have been proposed include a bear kind[1], elephant kind[1], horse kind[1].

Other views on baramin

Some creationists have a very broad concept of gone even further; some seem to believe that all bacteria form a single baramin! An interesting problem with the large-baramin viewpoint is what happens when one applies large-baramin criteria to our species. The human baramin will then include not only extinct hominids, but also living nonhuman species like various ape species. However, most creationists maintain that the only living species in the human baramin is Homo sapiens, even if doing so requires some rather serious taxonomic gerrymandering.

Interestingly, some creationists go to the opposite extreme; Hugh Ross seems to believe that a baramin is at most a species, and he has criticized large-baramin YEC's as hyperevolutionists. However, he is an OEC who believes that Noah's Flood was only local, meaning that Noah's family is not loaded down with caring for every land-animal species on Earth.

An especially curious circumstance is that creationists have shown little interest in comparing and reconciling various conflicting baramin proposals; by comparison, mainstream scientists often compare different hypotheses of proposed relationships, and sometimes get into heated arguments over them.

An examination of the kinds can provide evidence as to whether this "kind" business is of divine origin or of human origin. If it is of human origin, one would expect that the groups to fit a bronze age worldview, with only very general similarities being used, without knowledge of the detailed scientific findings since the Enlightenment. Categories could be expected to overlap because of this lack of knowledge. By this, one would expect the kinds to be very biased toward what a bronze age warrior can see.

On the other hand, if this is divinely inspired, one could expect that the classification will be far in advance of what a bronze age warrior would otherwise guess. For instance, it might be pointed out that There is more than one kind of worm (entire phyla), while all vertebrates are a single kind (phylum level). I hope everyone knows better than to use the “people back then could only understand dumbed down science” approach. People back then had the same brains we do, and were just as smart. They were ignorant, but that’s easy to fix with knowledge. Hindus for instance had already postulated a universe billions of years old, and the intricacies of language show that ancient Jewish people weren’t stupid. Because of this, simply telling them the correct answer would have worked well.

The Genesis account shows all the hallmarks of a bronze age human account, and is filled with scientific errors. For instance, nearly all phyla are hardly mentioned – such as sponges, nematodes, all prokaryotes and archaea, etc. All animal phyla but one (chordates) are lumped into “things that swarm in the water” and “land creepers”. Plants are very crudely classified apparently by reproductive method (except “forests”), with many plants falling into most of the categories simultaneously (many make forests, make fruit, have seeds, and sprouts). Where would all the mosses, ferns and the whole fungi kingdom go? Vertebrates, on the other hand, which bronze age warriors would be most familiar with, are mentioned explicitly.

Finally, mainstream science does have a baramin-like concept: all organisms descended from some single abiogenesis event. And as far as can be determined, all known Earth organisms are descended from a single such event, making them part of a single "baramin". Which may explain why creationists have so much difficulty identifying baramins.

References

    External links

    Retrieved from "http://wiki.cotch.net/index.php/Baramin"
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