Based on my experience, moving little earth on 14 holes and a lot on 4 is pretty typical. On rolling ground, its hard to make all the holes fit perfectly, but that's a pretty good ratio. And, as my mentors used to say, you have to get some cut from somewhere to build your greens and tees, so a few made holes aren't all that bad.
Tom Doak once wrote here that Jim Engh was one of the few gca's who didn't care if his stuff looked natural. I guess I fall into that category to a degree, for a few reasons. First, we both had Nugent as a mentor, who was trained at U of I, as was I. The most famous U of I LA grad was Hideo Sasaki, who is famous for the phrase, "The land is putty." Its fair to assume some of that filters through forty years later. Not that I haven't given it some thought since then, in a philosophical way.
It has always seemed a bit odd to me to have to move 400K dirt to be a minimalist! In truth, on many sites, its required. Once you shape a green to any style and start tying in the contours, sometimes you find you need to shape all the way down the fw - whether in minimalist or Rees Jones mound style. To me, it seems more "sincere" or "true minimalist" to simply accept the fact that greens, tees, and bunkers are built. For that matter, I never had the budgets to move 400K to be a minimalist, and found I can move less earth (100-200K) with the "accept it" philosophy.
Most golfers and people accept that, sort of like ignoring the puppeters running the marionettes and "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain." In those cases, the human mind can suspend that kind of reality and see what its "supposed to see." In golf, most will see it as natural because of the grass and trees, even if those, and the bunkers are far from natural.
If we tie those contours back to nature in a flowing way (usually by making sure the bottom of slopes flare out rather than hit ground abruptly) then most people think its natural, esp. after a few trees are planted mid slope. There are many golden age courses where the cuts came from the rough that this is the case and that fill was used to build up greens, etc. Whether nature covering up, or the human mind presuming older equal better, golf courses do get better with age.
I agree that many modern designs, mine included, crept away from that ideal, experimenting with the land is putty theory, making golf courses as visual as TV, etc. Perhaps there is room for all, and someone probably had to try different styles and directions to make their golf courses stand out.
And standing out may not have the objective on most courses. In most designs are seeking to provide reasonably priced golf, as in the old days of Scotland, and which is so sorely needed. They start out in the "struggle just to get buit" style! Do you pick a design style on anything other than the lowest cost to build and maintain? While we like to talk about the top 2% of the courses in the country, for the other 98%, practicalism or necessitism reigns. Not that minimalism isn't part of that, but minimalism while moving 400K isn't.
To us a Clinton paraphrase, since its another election year - "It's the golf, stupid!"