Thanks @deuteroKJ.
You are right that one layer of the GAE speaks to Christians who want to engage mainstream science, but that is just one layer.
The Genealogical Adam and Eve is Like an Ogre. As you may recall from Shrek, ogres are like onions, because onions have layers.
On another layer, the book challenges a key plank of the ID movement, that the rules of science have to be changed in order to make progress. I think @pnelson is objecting to the GAE because he is one of the architects of this plank. He wants to argue that the GAE depends on MN, but this is just unequivocally false (and the gymnastics required to make this link are telling). Rather, I found no reason to challenge MN, and therein lies the problem. It proves by demonstration that science doesn’t have to change for us to make progress.
Whether or not ID escapes the quagmire, there is a better way forward. Whether or not science follows MN, a cooperative exchange between theology and science is visible. This dialogue is that better way.
It is notable that several ID leaders feel different than @pnelson. To his credit, @pnelson writes,
Other ID advocates, he notes, such as Sean McDowell or Walter Bradley, liked the book. And scientists not explicitly affiliated with ID, such as the UK botanist and geneticist Richard Buggs, or Rice University synthetic chemist James Tour, also liked it.
Indeed, they did. Buggs said that Swamidass might be nominated for a Templeton Prize. Tour put him on the list for a Nobel Peace Prize
I won’t speak for @pnelson, but I think it is fair say that some people find these supportive comments for the GAE alarming. In an important way, the GAE is deeply appealing to the ID camp because it confidently and effectively shows that evolutionary science is not hte whole of reality, and there is space here for dialogue with theology.
That layer directed at ID is intentional, and I think @pnelson picked up on it, but he disagrees with it. Others in ID don’t disagree with it, so the conversation the book is provoking could be really interesting.
There are other layers too. This book has a layer directed at atheist scientists, and a layer directed at evolutionary creationists and other no-Adam Christians. There is a layer directed at questions of race and justice in a fallen world. There is a layer directed squarely at AIG and other YECs.
The book is multivalent, with many messages. In many ways, it is to be expected it will be a polarizing book, because (as @sygarte writes in his review) it challenges the assumptions of every camp in origins, and also of some camps outside origins. Some people want that challenge, because they are ready for something better than the quagmire we’ve all been stuck in. Others, I’ve observed, find the book maddening because it reshapes the conversation in ways that they don’t like. That’s okay, because that’s precisely the conversation I’m intending to provoke.
The key point, however, is that this book is not merely for Christians hoping to engage with mainstream science. It’s intended audience is much larger. @pnelson, though I disagree with him, did pick up on one important layer of the book. I did not need to challenge common descent or mainstream science to make legitimate progress. I can’t say for sure how he see it, but if I were in his shoes I might find it maddening. 