I do not read Paley's argument as being against variation, but as acknowledging the limitations of variation in kind.

Yes, that's what I said. Paley argued that there was not much variation away from species "type," something that he assumed. This is not demonstrated anywhere in nature. In fact, as Darwin noted, variation is so broad that in some places it is difficult to discern where one species ends and another begins — and today we have dozens of examples of ring species, where this issue is extremely well documented. Paley's claims of limitations on variation simply do not stand scrutiny, based on observations of living things, corroborated by fossils.

Can we make classifications? Sure. But can we really classify the herring gull as distinct from the lesser black-backed gull? On what basis? If not, how can we say there are any limits to variation in a species, if the variation includes speciation to the point of not breeding together?

Chimeras? That's Paley being even farther off base. Do you really expect to see them? Evolution predicts they won't exist in nature.

You ascribe to me and my argument more strawmen claims than I care to count, and completely miss the point of Paley's errors, and the points of Darwin's observations. It's enough to drive one to hit-and-run posting.

We can imagine all sorts of life forms that could live and be 'fit' to existence on planet earth if life were as randomly chaotic and unbounded in kind/form as simple variation-selection would have it. We do not see them. Nor do we see any evidence (beyond humanity's mythological storytelling) that such beings have ever existed on this planet. THAT is what Paley was arguing.

I do not read Paley's argument as being against variation, but as acknowledging the limitations of variation in kind. An appeal to reliable means of inheritance, something 'science' didn't figure was pertinent to their silly evolutionary model until the 1930s (when they could no longer dismiss objections like Paley's from people who had eyes to see). And Paley was arguing against a naturalistic 'hypothesis' of evolution which was obviously prominent in his lifetime at least as early as the American Revolution, the Reign of Terror and other such notable events of the late eighteenth century's erstwhile "Age of Reason."

Thus your assertion that Paley argued against the [obvious to anyone with eyes] existence of variation is erroneous. Any argument that Charles Darwin invented variation and selection as mechanisms of evolution - out of his 'genius' and of whole cloth - in the mid-nineteenth century would be equally erroneous. And anyone who claims that ID type objections to the 'hypothesis' that selection acting upon natural variation is solely responsible for the biodiversity we see were invented in the early 1980s doesn't know enough about history or science to be taken seriously.

I am not saying you make all these mistakes, ed. I'm saying I've seen 'em all, more than once.

Triumph of hope over experience?

Paley makes the argument in several different places, as I recall. In Natural Theology he states the argument in Chapter 5, at about page 65 of the text you cite, where he argues against variation:

But, moreover, the division of organized substances into animals and vegetables, and the distribution and sub-distribution of each into genera and species, which distribution is not an arbitrary act of the mind, but founded in the order which prevails in external nature, appear to me to contradict the supposition of the present world being the remains of an indefinite variety of existences; of a variety which rejects all plan. The hypothesis teaches, that every possible variety of being hath, at one time or other, found its way into existence (by what cause or in what manner is not said), and that those which were badly formed, perished; but how or why those which survived should be cast, as we see that plants and animals are cast, into regular classes, the hypothesis does not explain; or rather the hypothesis is inconsistent with this phænomenon.

The hypothesis, indeed, is hardly deserving of the consideration which we have given to it.

There are other places that he makes the argument more directly, perhaps even in that book. I was unaware that the fact of Paley's claim would be controversial — are you challenging it?

Don't bother dissecting Ed's claims. His hit-and-run posts are practically legendary, and one of the easiest ways to make him leave a thread is to ask him to back up a claim.

This is an argument for the reliability of inheritance far as I can tell, which allows for the observable orderliness of classes, genera and species with no evident chimeras. Nowhere in Paley's work can I find an indication that he considered in-species variation the least bit controversial.

Moreover, because the term "species" is quite fuzzy, it is questionable that a Black Angus is a different species of critter than a Longhorn. Or that a Great Dane is a different species of critter than a Pekinese.

Recall that Paley published "Natural Theology" in 1802. Not only are his arguments directed against an evolutionary view, that evolutionary view obviously considered variation to be both 'random' and the source of observed biodiversity on planet earth. Charles Darwin wasn't born until 1809, and didn't publish "Origins…" until 1859, when he was 50 years old. He quite obviously didn't invent evolutionary thought, or either of the mechanisms attributed to "Neo-Darwinism" - RM or NS.

From Paley:

But, moreover, the division of organized substances into animals and vegetables, and the distribution and sub-distribution of each into genera and species, which distribution is not an arbitrary act of the mind, but founded in the order which prevails in external nature, appear to me to contradict the supposition of the present world being the remains of an indefinite variety of existences; of a variety which rejects all plan. The hypothesis teaches, that every possible variety of being hath, at one time or other, found its way into existence (by what cause or in what manner is not said), and that those which were badly formed, perished; but how or why those which survived
should be cast, as we see that plants and animals are cast, into regular classes, the hypothesis does not explain; or rather the hypothesis is inconsistent with this phænomenon.

"Paley argued for fixed species in Natural Theology."

Paley's Natural Theology is available online here. Where does he argue for fixed species?

Stock breeding and agricultural breeding have produced several new species, at an increasing rate since 1859. Modern beef clearly are not the ancient aurochs from which they descend. Neither radishes nor broccoli are the mustards from which they descended. Any stroll down an American supermarket produce aisle will show many new species just in the last 145 years.

Darwin used the domestic breeding examples precisely because they were common knowledge and, when looked at without bias, they provided the refutation of the idea that species are fixed. As Darwin noted in those chapters, the variation already present in many species is quite sufficient to produce new daughter species, without any new mutations being added. One of the great reasons Darwin's ideas won quick adherence was his use of common examples, and his note that the evidence had been before everyone all the time (Huxley noted that Darwin's book was likely to produce dope slaps among the educated for having not thought of it first).

Knowing about variation and selection, and realizing that these simple processes were responsible for more than just fancy pigeons, fatter pigs and new species of vegetable, was a large part of Darwin's genius. As Romans 1:20 notes, the evidence is always there, right before our eyes. Sometimes it takes a Darwin to explain it to us. Once so explained, we cannot see the world in quite the same way again, the conclusions that simple processes produce diversity in life won't leave our minds, nor should they.

Darwin's argument, by the way, is a better argument for design than anything Dembski has ever offered, if one were looking for theology. Good design is marked by simplicity, and bad design by complexity. The algorithms that select for traits naturally are easily replicated by a breeder. It is the overall set of "rules" that govern speciation that are simple, not the species themselves, necessarily.