Intervention Theory in regards to plant domestication is a bold claim. It is a factual claim and one that with time and study we should be able to find increasing and objective evidence for one way or another. As we lack definitive data currently it is not unreasonable for most to support the status quo of modern biology.
However, I also believe it unwise to totally reject the theoretical possibility of intervention theory. Our overall knowledge is limited. Until the history of crop domestication is fully understood one cannot completely rule it out.
I choose not to support the status quo of modern biology and its adherents on this question because "it is unlikely that such variants pre-existed as common, neutral alleles in wild populations". The things they find when examining [domesticated plants] are [very] far outside the accepted evolutionary paradigm that.
Especially troubling was the absence of "transitional species" in the fossil record. Those were needed to prove that, over vast amounts of time, species did in fact gradually transform into other, "higher" species. Like Pye, I am not "confident their fabled missing link will be found beneath the next overturned rock".
Thomas H. Morgan, who won a Nobel Prize for work on heredity, wrote: Within the period of human history, we do not know of a single instance of the transformation of one species into another if we apply the most rigid and extreme tests used to distinguish wild species. Colin Patterson, director of the British Museum of Natural History, stated: No one has ever produced a species by mechanisms of natural selection. No one has gotten near it. And these are by no means exceptional disclosures.
Scientists know these limitations of evolutionary theory are true and will be enduring, but shamefully few have the nerve to address them openly.
Darwin and his cohorts were promoting a theory based on three fallacious gaps in reasoning that could not be reconciled with the knowledge of their era. What is so telling about Dawsons three fallacies is that they remain unchanged to this day.
This results in much confusion:
Mathematicians model mutation rates and selective forces, which biologists do not trust. Geneticists have little use for palaeontologists, who return the favour in spades (pun intended). Cytogenetics labours to find a niche alongside genetics proper. Population geneticists utilise mathematical models that challenge palaeontologists and systematists.
Botanists know they have a serious problem here, but all they can suggest is that it simply had to have occurred by natural means because no other intervention--by God or You Know What--can be considered under any circumstances. That unwavering stance is maintained by all scientists, not just botanists,
to exclude overwhelming evidence such as the fact that in 1837 the Botanical Garden in St Petersburg, Russia, began concerted attempts to cultivate wild rye into a new form of domestication. They are still trying, because
their rye has lost none of its wild traits, especially the fragility of its stalk and its small grain. Therein lies the most embarrassing conundrum botanists face.
Most of this post is quoted from Pye's writings on Intervention Theory:
http://whale.to/b/pye1.htmlhttp://www.lloydpye.com/essay_interventiontheory.htmAmong those who study the processes of life on Earth,
they must cope with the knowledge that a surprising number of species have no business being here. In some cases, they can't even be here. Yet they are, for better or worse, and
those worst-case examples must be hidden or at least obscured from the general public. But no matter how often facts are twisted, data are concealed or reality is denied, the truth is out there.
When all of the above is taken together--the inexplicable puzzles presented by domesticated plants, domesticated animals and humans--it is clear that Darwin cannot explain it, modern scientists cannot explain it, not Creationists nor Intelligent Design proponents. None of them can explain it, because it is not explainable in only Earthbound terms.
We will not answer these questions with any degree of satisfaction until our scientists open their minds and squelch their egos enough to acknowledge that they do not, in fact, know much about their own backyard. Until that happens, the truth will remain obscured.
