Sarfati on animal mortality

Jonathan Sarfati recently graced the combox at Tblog:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2013/09/young-earth-theistic-evolutionists.html?showComment=1401642845456#c7737243049008488066

I'm flattered that he'd take notice:

Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D.6/01/2014 1:14 PM 

Hairsplitting distinctives? Not when the Bible makes those distinctions. There is no indication that insects count as nephesh chayyah. 

i) In Gen 1, the basic distinction is between fauna and flora. Within fauna, Gen 1 draws further distinctions based on habitat (aquatic/marine animals, land animals, aerial animals). And it distinguishes between wild animals and livestock. 

ii) If these categories cover the origin of all the basic kinds of fauna and flora, then insects belong to one of those categories. What reason is there to think Gen 1 classifies insects as plants rather than animals? What reason is there to think Gen 1 classifies a lizard or tadpole as "breath of life" (nephesh chayyah), but classifies a scorpion or camel spider as a type of plant? 

iii) Likewise, in Lev 11, insects are grouped with other animals–rather than plants. Same with with Deut 14:1-21. 

See for example The Fall: a cosmic catastrophe: Hugh Ross’s blunders on plant death in the Bible. 

Let's consider that:

Romans 5:12–19 and 1 Corinthians 15:21–22 clearly teach that human death came because of the Fall. 

Correct. Human morality. Not animal mortality.

God gave Adam dominion over creation, so when he fell, the whole creation suffered—see The (second) greatest catastrophe of all time. This is taught in Romans 8:18–25, where the ‘whole creation’ is said to be groaning in pain, because it was ‘subjected to futility’.

That passage doesn't ascribe animal mortality or predation to the Fall. And it's conspicuous that the commentators Sarfati quotes in support of his position don't construe the passage that way. 

But fossils are the remains of dead creatures—therefore, millions of years entails that death predates sin, which in turn entails that death is not the result of sin. This makes God the author of gratuitous death and suffering instead of the righteous Judge who justly enacted punishment for sin.

i) This assumes that predation is gratuitous. Yet the predator/prey cycle clearly contributes to the natural balance. So it serves a purpose.

ii) Ironically, Sarfati is making the same mistake that atheists (e.g. William Rowe, Andrea Weisberger) and evolutionary animal-rights activists (e.g. Peter Singer) commit, by failing to draw a categorical distinction between humans and animals. But Gen 1-2 accentuates the difference between humans and animals. Man is made in God's image. 

And more recently, Chuck Colson and Nancy Pearcey gave a good account of the biblical teaching of the origin of death and suffering in their book How Now Shall We Live?

God is good, and the original creation was good [Genesis 1:31 actually says ‘very good’]. God is not the author of evil.

That simply begs the question of whether predation is "evil" as Gen 1 defines "good." 

Yet the Bible clearly teaches that animals were not always being destroyed by cataclysms, and were not always tearing each other to pieces.

It does? To the contrary, I'd say Gen 2-3 differentiates conditions inside the garden from conditions outside the garden. 

Why there are different models for the origin of carnivory is very simple: the Bible doesn't say why. But it does unambiguously teach a vegetarian diet for both humans and animals before the Fall. Also, regardless of one's view of end times, commentators on Isaiah such as Alec Motyer agree that he was alluding to Edenic conditions in chs 11 and 65, as documented in The carnivorous nature and suffering of animals.

That fails to draw a Biblical distinction between the quality of life inside the garden and the quality of life outside the garden. Even before the Fall, the whole world wasn't Edenic. The Garden of Eden was a special place. God prepared that separately and specially for Adam and Eve. And part of what makes the banishment from Eden punitive is the contrast between life inside the garden and outside the garden.