Right. I'd appreciate it of you would follow this link, which is a question I posed to another creationist (post 208) on another thread. I would appreciate your answer to that question.
First of all I would not necessarily concede that Earth is the age commonly accepted by mainstream science. Not to say that I necessarily believe some creationist's arguments that the earth is six to seven thousand years old, either. I just don't automatically accept that Earth is 4-6 Billion years old.
Next, I believe there are some problems with the accuracy of carbon dating relating to the assumption that the amount of radiation entering the system has always been constant, but I may be wrong there. As you point to the millions of fossils found lined up nicely in the appropriate strata, I would also ask what the explanation is for the numerous instances of single fossils bridging many levels of strata.
The visually striking patterns of apparent decent and DNA similarities simply point in another direction, in my opinion: Why wouldn't these organisms all be similar if they were created by the same creator? Again, it makes as much sense to me as does the assumption that by filling in the huge blanks with "billions and billions of years" we can explain away the missing links.
Obviously I have no qualms or disagreements with your statements about weaker vs stronger traits being bred out of species or harmful mutations being bred out. (Perhaps we are seeing a reason for the decline of classical liberalism here, as well. Those people seem to stick together and breed together...)
My real problem comes with your conclusion: 10. and given that all of the foregoing suggests a natural mechanism by which all species on earth could have gradually developed
Even if the common accepted age of the Earth is correct -- and it very well could be -- and even if I am completely out of my gourd on the carbon dating thing and I'm pulling a non-memory from somewhere in the recesses of the 5% of my brain I manage to use ... I don't see that as sufficient evidence to claim evolution is absolutely the way it happened. Some bit about correlation not being proof positive indication of causation from a stats class I slept through pops into my head at this point.
As I've stated before, I'm not claiming creationism is any more provable than evolution, only that evolution requires as much blind faith as creationism does.