I’m excited that you’re in touch with Olson (a couathor on the 2004 paper) and might talk to him on the podcast.
The answer to your question is that there was no obligation to be in touch with the authors. Professional courtesy, maybe, but we have already discussed the particular situations in which that would be more commonly expected, and this is not one of those situations. IMO the thing that is/was most important is to formulate new ideas and proposals (like GAE) in a scholarly community that includes experts on all aspects of the idea/proposal. I think that GAE stands out, really stands out, in this regard. The workshops included experts on population genetics. And as a result (this is an assumption of mine), there have been no technical challenges to the GAE idea.
Could the coauthors of the 2004 paper have provided useful input, even centrally important input, to the book? Sure, and yet their findings are public and have been discussed and vetted since their publication. This means–and I know this might sound strange at first–they don’t own those findings. They are global experts on the subject but they are not the arbiters of who gets to build on their work or who gets to draw conclusions from it. This is a good thing, actually, since it means that their conclusions are not peculiar personal positions or trademarked creations. Their conclusions are public knowledge, the thing we should all expect from successful science.
Would I love to hear from Rhode and his coauthors, from Graham Coop and dozens of others about their responses to the GAE? Yes! Does Joshua or anyone else need to consult the authors of a study, which Joshua took to be solid science, before building on it? JFC, no.
Well, there were technical challenges, specifically on the isolation of Tasmania, and these challenges very much shaped how I discussed and reasoned about isolated populations in the book, and how I publicly clarified my claims: How does the isolation of Tasmania impact recent universal ancestry?
After responding to their critique, I reached out to every scientist that had objections, and everyone signed off on the final text, agreeing I had addressed their objections entirely. So, to your point @sfmatheson, there were no sustained challenges in light of my response to reviewers.
At this time, I am unaware of any mainstream scientist that maintained their objections after reading what I actually wrote in the final version of the book. A few scientists were quoted as objecting to the book because of the isolation of Tasmania. However, it was also clear they were not actually reacting to what I wrote in the book, but what was conveyed to them about it at a very high level.
Their reactions might mirror Graham Coop’s in some ways. Perhaps they do have a negative view of the book, but when they get a chance to look more closely, I am confident that they would would come to a more positive assessment.
At the same time, some critics at times, seem to have been a bit flummoxed that the book’s conclusions are qualified with clear caveats. That is a testament to the quality of the review I received. I do think I covered all the caveats I needed too, so all my claims are defensible. There might be points of legitimate debate, or even minor errors at the margins, but I don’t see anything yet that is going to radically revise my key points. This is partly because my scientific claims are so focused and limited.
Oh, yes of course. I was addressing the existence of technical challenges to the book, not to its writing. And I want my main point in that paragraph to be underlined: the GAE idea was subjected to intensive prepublication peer review. Given the subject matter, I think that was appropriate and even necessary. But it was also beyond what is typically expected of a book, and I suspect it is far beyond what is EVER expected of a book in the “theology” space. I can list several books by Christian scholars that show telltale signs of having never been seen by a responsible biologist. It is an understatement to say that the GAE is the opposite of that.