Chimps and humans: How similar are we really?

[pshun2404]

We have recently found 1,307 orphan genes that are completely different between humans and chimpanzees, and these from just four areas of tissue samples. We can only imagine the vast numbers of differences that will be revealed once more areas of the anatomy and physiology are analyzed (see J. Ruiz-Orera, 2015, “Origins of De Novo Genes in Humans and Chimpanzees�, PLoS Genetics. 11 (12): e1005721)

Orphan genes, as many here know, are found only particular lineages of creature or sometimes only in a specific species or variety within a species. What is really interesting is they appear to no have evolutionary history. Despite that we have come to know these genes are incredibly important! Their expression often dictates very specific qualities and processes allowing for specialized adaptations of particular tissues, like the antisense gene, NCYM, which is over-expressed in neuroblastoma; this gene inhibits the activity of glycogen synthase kinase 3β (GSK3β), which targets NMYC for degradation (Suenaga Y, Islam SMR, Alagu J, Kaneko Y, Kato M, et al. (2014) NCYM, a Cis-antisense gene of MYCN, encodes a de novo evolved protein that inhibits GSK3β resulting in the stabilization of MYCN in human neuroblastomas. PLoS Genet 10: e1003996. doi: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1003996). Some contribute to specific proteins unique only to that species or to varieties within a species.

This genetic curiosity has been being studied for around 20 years with little insight as to why they are there at all (where did they come from), and we are just beginning to see how they function, but the doubted thousands of additional differences this will add to the human/chimp difference scenario is staggering.

Any thoughts?

[Wootah]

[Replying to H.sapiens]

They give two different impressions to the average hearer...one implies "not really much at all" the other shows there are many...

But you do admit that:

• 1. they are, in this case, precisely the same thing?
  2. percentages exist to make grasping comparisons easier?
  3. if you are actually that impressionable you have no business pretending to participate in any discussion that includes the word "science."

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- if you are actually that impressionable
so is this
-makes immediate sense to most people.
and this
- I must be prescient, or perhaps you are just very predictable.

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[pshun2404]

[Replying to Wootah]

Okay from now on I will direct these ad hominems to your attention instead of just pointing them out

[PghPanther]

Actually a complete genome comparison of human and chimp DNA has never been done (period)! However the masses are given this impression (the art of persuasion), and yet the details are not clarified.

You sound like a "conspiracy theorist". Like as if science, academia, and the media are out to convince the masses of evolution over something else.

I have two questions concerning that view.

1. What would the "something else" be?

There is no evidence at all for any creator or intelligent design behind anything. That's a fact. All that exists on that front is religious rumors and superstitions that have not been the least bit valid in their claims.

2. Have you ever considered that what you have dubbed "the art of persuasion", is nothing other than a rock-solid case for the only rational conclusion that can be had?

There simply is no other rational theory. There is no rational "Theory" of a creator who supposedly designed the world and everything in it. All that exists on that front is superstitious mythologies, and very poor ones at that.

You haven't addressed my questions.

If there was a designer who actually designed the human genome, then why do humans have an intestinal appendix? And many other of the obviously "poorly designed" biological features we have.

If human genetics was actually designed by a supposedly "Intelligent Designer", then why do horrible birth defect occur? Surely an omnipotent intelligent designer could design a genetic system that wouldn't be so fragile and prone to error?

In short, what good does it do you to question the most obvious explanation for how humans came to be, when you don't have a better "Theory" to replace it?

You might question the numbers involved here, but unless you have a better theory to replace the current theory, then why accuse people of practicing "The Art of Persuasion", when in fact, all they are doing is explaining the only rational theory we currently have?

You would need to produce a better "Theory". And pointing to ancient myths about a supposed creator God hardly constitutes a "better theory". There are simply too many problems with those unsubstantiated myths. Not the least of which is that there is no evidence to support that hypothesis. If humans were "intelligently designed" whoever designed them wasn't a very good engineer anyway. The fact that genetic defects occur in some births already demonstrates a gross defect in the "design".

If there was an intelligent designer behind it why design it in such a way that it is so fragile that it can fall apart and not always work correctly?

You're attempting to find fault with a theory of a "natural process" that is expected to be less than perfect.

But what do you have to offer to replace it? An "intelligent designer" that doesn't design very intelligently?

What sense does that make?

I don't see the sense in complaining about a scientific theory when you have no viable option to offer to replace it.

Good post...........I often see the thought process of the theist as if they can somehow discredit the results of the scientific method on a particular discipline then it automatically defaults into their claim of God did it as being true.......

One doesn't get to the truth by claiming an automatic default result of reality with the position they hold without first demonstrating it to be true to begin with.

[pshun2404]

This is a thread about similarities and differences between chimps and humans. No one of my posts "discredit the results of the scientific method". the scientific method and what some scientists say these things mean can be quite different. In 2004, the famed evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr recognized the abrupt appearance of humans (Ernst Mayr, What Makes Biology Unique?, p. 198 (Cambridge University Press, 2004). He said “The earliest fossils of Homo… are separated from Australopithecus by a large, unbridged gap. How can we explain this seeming saltation? Not having any fossils that can serve as missing links, we have to fall back on the time-honored method of historical science, the construction of a historical narrative.�

Thus there is nothing wrong with the science, it is constructed historical narrative that should always be questioned. As H said it is best guess...nothing is proven.

[pshun2404]

More differences…

Just my observation but as far as I can tell even signing chimps only know objects wanted or not wanted and specific phrases taught by conditioning in order to get food, petting, sex, and so on. What we have discovered is that language requires not just vocabulary but also syntax. "Give orange me," for example, means something different than "give me orange" among different signing chimps.

On the other hand, from a very young age, humans understand this. We have an innate ability to create new meanings by combining and ordering words in diverse ways. Chimps studied, taught, and even conditioned for years, had no such capacity.

Also children demonstrate the ability on their own to vary syntax to express related ideas and concepts (sometimes abstracts) while the most mature and trained chimps show no sign of being able to produce this variance to either communicate or get their way.

Humans by nature are bi-pedal, where except for short bursts of uprightness, all the great apes travel on all fours.

Cognition scientists have concluded after half a century of research that “chimps� (not the great apes) are unable to infer the mental state of another individual, whether they are happy, sad, angry, interested in some goal, in love, jealous or otherwise, while even 1 and 2 year old humans can do this (see the Project Nim documentary). In addition, even trained “chimps� do not conversate with others.

Even IF a chimp could be conditioned to appear to mimic one of these it would remain the exception and should never be seen as some sort of rule.

[H.sapiens]

[Replying to post 44 by pshun2404]
The earliest known members of our species, Homo sapiens, roamed Africa back to 195,000 years ago, earliest fossil evidence for Homo erectus dates to 1.9 million years ago and the most recent to 70,000 years ago, Homo habilis was around from 2.4 million to 1.65 million and the most recent Australopithicene is dated at about 2 million years ... there's no gap in the fossil record.

[pshun2404]

[Replying to H.sapiens]

Well I'll be sure to tell Ernst that's your historical narrative if I ever see him...!

All the different creatures you mentioned existed (a fact)
Many came ay different times and some overlapped (a fact)
One therefore must have morphed into the other (a hypothesis based historical narrative)

Just because some men make up a "genus" described vaguely to fit them all in (we chose Homo because the Narrative says they are all some form or degree of human or humans as some degree or form of ape) does not make it so...it is merely a contrived system of classification (I am fine with it but meerely stating what it actually is)

For example many see creatures like habalis as not human but ape...Australopithicene is definitely ape

but What about more differences or similarities between CHIMPS AND HUMANS?

[H.sapiens]

[Replying to H.sapiens]

Well I'll be sure to tell Ernst that's your historical narrative if I ever see him...!

That will be difficult for you, he died ten-odd years ago. In any case, I know that he'd have no problem with the fact that human knowledge has grown since he made that statement.

All the different creatures you mentioned existed (a fact)
Many came ay different times and some overlapped (a fact)
One therefore must have morphed into the other (a hypothesis based historical narrative)

Just because some men make up a "genus" described vaguely to fit them all in (we chose Homo because the Narrative says they are all some form or degree of human or humans as some degree or form of ape) does not make it so...it is merely a contrived system of classification (I am fine with it but meerely stating what it actually is)

For example many see creatures like habalis as not human but ape...Australopithicene is definitely ape

but What about more differences or similarities between CHIMPS AND HUMANS?

No, it is a contrived system of classification, it is a system devised both for convenience and to reflect relationships. There was the interesting experiment were a group of people, including creationists, were asked to put the skulls in order and they invariably sorted the skulls in proper taxonomic (and thus temporal) order.

[pshun2404]

In 2010, Nature published a paper entitled "Chimpanzee and human Y chromosomes are remarkably divergent in structure and gene content", reveals that, in addition, the Y chromosomes of these two creatures are different in their genetic arrangement as well. So though many of the same genes are there, many are placed in different areas (thus not a sequential match), and many are arranged differently where they exist in the same place, and now thanks to ENCODE we know that when expressed they can affect different sets of other genes (act differently) thus producing radically different effects. Now this is “effectively� a significant difference.

Sets of unique genes necessarily work together during embryonic development to form each of our unique bodies (each creature’s unique variations being dependent on this). The chimp Y chromosome has only half the genes that a human has (a 37:78 ratio). Their set contributes to making them physically a chimp, our set contributes to making us physically a human, and never the twain has ever met as far as the actual data can reveal. The commonly accepted narrative MAY B one plausible explanation. Aside from the difficulty of coordinating new genes into this apparently consistent process, mixing then into the set of existing genes would alter the structure and function of the creature (making them NOT what they are…the chimp would cease to be a chimp and the human would cease to be a human…or else they would be a sick or distorted version).


Now regarding the fact that we are related, the concept of “Relationship� is one of those terms of ambiguity….I definitely see that the genetic data shows similarity (one form of understanding “related�) but it does not demonstrate lineage (another usage of the concept of “related�)…the first is an established fact, the second usage grows out of the story that is told, we must not confuse the two.
Just because we share a lot of DNA in common (which we do even with fruit) is simply due to the fact that we PHYSICALLY are living creatures, mammals, primates, and so on….that is really the only thing the data shows. Who knows maybe one day we will find a creature with less DNA common to both and then one with more added bringing one toward chimp kind and another with more added that shows the same creature morphing over time into two creatures….but until then “what it means� is convenient to the hypothesis that this actually occurred.

[pshun2404]

Besides the review by Gagneux and Vark which describes a whole list of genetic differences between humans and the great apes (despite their adaptation of the data to fit the historical narrative). The differences include ‘cytogenetic differences, differences in the type and number of repetitive genomic DNA and transposable elements, abundance and distribution of endogenous retroviruses, the presence and extent of allelic polymorphisms, specific gene inactivation events, gene sequence differences, gene duplications, single nucleotide polymorphisms, gene expression differences, and messenger RNA splicing variations. See Gagneux, P. and Varki, A. 2001. ‘Genetic differences between humans and great apes.’ Mol Phylogenet Evol 18:2-13.

For one example, again let us consider the Y chromosome. Many markers simply do not line up between the human and chimpanzee (Archidiacono, N., Storlazzi, C.T., Spalluto, C., Ricco, A.S., Marzella, R., Rocchi, M. 1998. ‘Evolution of chromosome Y in primates.’ Chromosoma 107:241-246). This again, is very important because my Y chromosome (inherited from my father) is the same as the one he inherited from his father, and so on back through time. And this human (not chimp) Y chromosome demonstrates ultimately they came from different patrilineal source creatures.

In addition, Scientists have prepared a human-chimpanzee comparative clone map of chromosome 21 in particular. They observed “large, non-random regions of difference between the two genomes.� They found a number of regions that “might correspond to insertions that are specific to the human lineage� (Fujiyama, A., Watanabe, H., Toyoda, A., Taylor, T.D., Itoh, T., Tsai, S.F., Park, H.S., Yaspo, M.L., Lehrach, H., Chen, Z., Fu, G., Saitou, N., Osoegawa, K., de Jong, P.J., Suto, Y., Hattori, M., and Sakaki, Y. 2002. ‘Construction and analysis of a Human-Chimpanzee Comparative Clone Map.’ Science 295:131-134), but they may NOT BE insertions, but ever present distinctions. (Be careful of the narrative…just look at the data)