I find it interesting that there seems to be relatively little interest in actually examining and evaluating Ewert's research study. The latest (and outstanding)
explanation of it by Brian Miller that I offered a link to seems to have been somewhat ignored. It went over like a lead balloon, as they say. As has been my comment that perhaps the most "scientific" approach is to humbly follow wherever the data leads regardless of preconceptions. Of course this could be completely a lack of interest, but I think it may also show a certain hostility to any research that seems to or could be interpreted as leading to notions of God as an active force meddling in the world and evolution. Is it the problem of thinking this is letting God "get his Divine Foot in the door" (as famously remarked by Richard Lewontin)?
In reality this very good research study comes to no such conclusion, and its implications are only that some high intelligence or intelligences of some undefined nature have apparently been molding the great patterns of evolution (along with a lesser contribution from Darwinistic RM + NS in microevolution). This guiding of large-scale evolution has apparently followed a process or pattern over time of innovating with the reuse of previously existing designs, then waiting, then innovating again with reuse, and so on. The nature of this intelligence or more likely these intelligences is unknown, but they have apparently left indelible footprints in genetics and biology, as shown by Ewert's analysis of a great amount of genetic data.
At this point their nature can only be an object of speculation, and it seems to me as a non-Christian this speculation if it is indulged in should be allowed to range over the full array of possibilities offered by science including parapsychology and psychical research, and also even spiritualism and the non-Christian mystical traditions. I know - this is scientific heresy.
I think it is time to (reluctantly) and provisionally accept these unpalatable, indigestible research results as nevertheless perhaps being a glimpse of reality. These results unfortunately even if verified in time may not ever lead to a scientific identification and understanding of the true nature of such intelligence(s). They may be fundamentally inscrutable. But nevertheless these agents or this agent of nearly incomprehensible intelligence still appear to have been and still are guiding the large patterns of what we call evolution. In order to remain unbiased and objective, these apparent truths of the operation of nature should still be seriously considered despite the perhaps insuperable difficulty of elucidating the agents' nature.
If this research is wrongheaded and invalid that needs to be convincingly shown, not just dismissed out of hand.
There has already been some interest and some criticisms coming in from mainstream Darwinist circles. Time will tell.
One of these objections is
here.
This criticism has been addressed
here. To paraphrase, ".....this objection is that ...the scientific community already knows that life is not well explained by a tree, and ....the leading evolutionary explanation is really a reticulated tree or an undirected graph and therefore it is no wonder the dependency graph model beats a “strawman” model. Human genetic data fits an undirected graph better than a tree, and so would a dependency graph (or so can be predicted). The objection is that essentially, an undirected graph is what you get when you allow for species hybridizing as well as species splitting: genetic material merges from more than one branch of the tree. This is kind of like lateral gene transfer, but more extreme."
But the problem with this objection is that it isn't really relevant to Ewert's results. This mainstream criticism mainly applies just to the outermost twigs and leaves of the tree (genera and species) rather than the families, orders and classes - the large branches and the trunks of the descent trees. These are the levels of organization where the real innovative, creative work of evolution has taken part.
Quote:"Ewert specifically chose Metazoan species because “horizontal gene transfer is held to be rare amongst this clade.” Likewise, in Metazoa, hybridization is generally restricted to the lower taxonomic groupings such as species and genera. In a realistic evolutionary model for Metazoa, we can expect to get lots of “reticulation” at lower twigs and branches, but the main trunk and branches ought to have a pretty clear tree-like form. In other words, a realistic undirected graph of Metazoa should look mostly like a regular tree.
For example, a realistic undirected-graph evolutionary model could easily accept hybridization between modern humans and Neanderthals, but it would have to heavily penalize anything that looks like a hybridization between, say, finches and fish."