Q1: What is the Definition of a "kind"?

This is a vitally important question and quite valid for the curious to ask. Many answers have been given, ranging from species to genus to who-knows-what, though each is found to eventually have flaws and exceptions that tend to violate the defintion. It is a similar situation to when creationists attempt to compact the geologic column into a 6-10,000 year time frame. It cannot work, because the basis for having the column is to emphesize long ages.

While these things may be true, it is not a legitimate complaint, as there is a detailed taxonomic answer.

It is a relatively obscure fact, even among creationists, that there is actually detailed work being done to solve the problem. An entire system of taxonomic classification has been developed, known as baraminology, or the classification of created organisms (Frair 2000). The primary term is called holobaramin, which is a group classification based on a known genetic relationship believed to be of common ancestry (see figure 1)

(figure 1)


We will be returning to Figure 1 again, so compare what is being said with what is seen above. Next, of course, there is monobaramin class, which would be containing only organisms of common descent, but not necessarily all of them. So it would represent one of the branches of a whole homobaramin (see figure 1). E.g. if there is a homobaramin with three branches, like the above illustration, a monobaramin would be one of the branches.

After that is the apobaramin class, which would be a further branching off from the monobaramin, so an example would be; if a monobaramin is a single branch of the three-pronged tree, then a apobaramin is the small twigs branching off from each of the branches (Frair 2000).

This is all fine and good, and helps to understand the classification system that creationists use, but what is the definition of a kind? The general consensus among informed creationists is that a kind is defined by the ability to “bring forth” or “produce offspring” (Batton 2000) Thus there is a basis for determining kinds and a taxonomical analysis system built to organize these kinds. This is the creationist response. It is no longer valid to keep rehashing it every time a person speaks about kinds. Critics, thou hast been answered.

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