Did humans descend from other primates?

[McCulloch]

Man did not descend from the primates.

Did humans descend from other primates?
Are humans primates or should there be special biological taxonomy for humanity?
Please cite evidence.

[otseng]

If the basis of the creation model is the bible, is it not fair to question it's overall accuracy and provenance? At least to the extent TOE is being questioned here?

I have no problem with anyone questioning the human creation model that is based on evidence. But to reject it simply because it originates from the Bible would not be sufficient to counter my arguments. I am not simply stating what the Bible states and ending it there. I've presented a list of predictions and ways to falsify it and also presented evidence to support the model and predictions.

[Grumpy]

otseng

I have no problem with anyone questioning the human creation model that is based on evidence. But to reject it simply because it originates from the Bible would not be sufficient to counter my arguments. I am not simply stating what the Bible states and ending it there. I've presented a list of predictions and ways to falsify it and also presented evidence to support the model and predictions.

None of the evidence anyone has presented falsifies evolution, nor is creation supported because it does not deal with ALL of the evidence. Creationism is a top down theory, as any design is imposed from an outside source. This is not what we see in nature. We see bottom up accumulation of traits, that is not design. Almost every creature or plant on Earth grows from the DNA in one single cell. It does so by chemical processes, a good deal of which we now understand. NONE of which require a supernatural explanation. It is for these reasons that creationism was replaced by evolution, not because creationism comes entirely from religious belief.

I hear many Creationists complaining that creationism isn't given a chance, but the fact is that until a couple of hundred years ago it was the ONLY explanation for THOUSANDS of years(on pain of heresy and death). IT FAILED. Creationism has no explanatory power, it can make a few predictions(even a stopped clock is right twice a day)but it cannot account for or explain ALL of the evidence. Throw in things like Noah's Flood(which we know to be fiction as described by you), young Earth(ditto), recent creation of man separate from animals... Well, it might make a good story if you knew no better, but we do know better.

Religions have value as civilizing forces and philosophical reasoning, but as science they are superstitious, supernatural fiction. There may be kernels of history recorded in religious texts, but they are seen through the eyes of believers who heard most of it second hand at best, through garbled word of mouth covered in legend(bigger fish) more likely and some is undoubtedly pure invention(Revelations).

You would not allow a surgeon to operate on you if he said the only medical texts he needed to know were in the Bible, would you? The same applies in any of the sciences, the Bible is not a science book, it has nothing in detail to say about how the Earth and all the history of life on it. Believe, if you like, that your god created the heavens and the Earth, but don't presume to understand geology, chemistry, physics, medicine, genetics or history based on anything written in any religious text.

"...be on guard against giving interpretations of Scripture that are far fetched or opposed to science, and so exposing the Word of God to the ridicule of unbelievers."
--Saint Augustine

Use your beliefs, religious texts and other philosophical concepts where they apply, on the behavior and goals of man. Do not try to use them to describe scientific reality, they just do not apply.

Grumpy

[otseng]

Evolution has abiogenesis as its starting point, which is untestable. Or if you believe in panspermia instead, that is also untestable.

All we need to show is it was possible, and that has been done several times over.

What has been done several times over?

You tell me. Does human evolutionary theory posit that humans arose from one couple?

No. Evolution works on populations.

Then you reject these findings?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Adam
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve

The creation model doesnt say anything about location. The bible does.

You are right, my bad. I left that out assuming readers are familiar with the Bible. I'll amend the model to state that Noah's ark landed in the Mount Ararat region.

As Grumpy states - "Maybe you are talking about the end of the last Ice Age between 10,000 and 15,000 years ago, that's when Homo Sapiens Sapiens appears."

Homo sapiens appeared over 200,000 years ago.

Home sapiens is a broad term and is not consistently used. If it cannot be accurately defined, no accurate dating can be placed on it. From your same source:

"The category archaic Homo sapiens is disputed. There is no single agreed upon definition of archaic Homo sapiens."

Go ahead and present "almost every ecological principal known to man" that it violates.

Why? Its been repeatedly shown how the flood was absolutely impossible in many different ways. If you didnt believe it then, why should I try again?

If you present a claim that cannot be supported, it must be retracted.

We should start off at some higher, enlightened point.

What do you mean by "some higher, enlightened point"?

- A gradual transition is found from animals to humans in the fossil record.
- Genetic changes from one species to another and leading to humans are identified.

Present your evidence.

Its been done ad nauseum here. You can only fault yourself for not looking objectively.

Show where in this thread where "a gradual transition is found from animals to humans in the fossil record". The only thing I've seen is a purported list of human ancestors, which I've already addressed.

Also show where the "genetic changes from one species to another and leading to humans are identified" has been presented "ad nauseum". We don't even know the genetic changes necessary from just one species to another.

[otseng]

Just focusing in on the origin of man is enough for us to discuss. (Also considering I'm arguing against multiple people by myself.)

OK, fair enough. I was just trying to point out that the Creation model, which you propose as an alternative to TOE, falls apart when looked at from both the time frame required, and the fossil evidence showing vast periods of time between the existence of various life forms and man.

Let me state that I do not totally reject TOE. There are certainly instances where we see microevolution happening.

The human creation model will certainly raise many other issues, such as the validity of a worldwide flood. However, I would rather not go into a full treatise of other issues in this thread. If we were to address these things, it would make this thread too massive. The thread on the flood alone is 111 pages. (Which hopefully I'll be able to return back to some day.)

[Abraxas]

You tell me. Does human evolutionary theory posit that humans arose from one couple?

No. Evolution works on populations.

Then you reject these findings?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Adam
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve

As noted, these two were not a couple and in fact lived over a hundred thousand years apart.

Home sapiens is a broad term and is not consistently used. If it cannot be accurately defined, no accurate dating can be placed on it. From your same source:

"The category archaic Homo sapiens is disputed. There is no single agreed upon definition of archaic Homo sapiens."

This leaves you with a dilemma then. Either you accept a broad definition of Homo sapiens which then means we can trace modern man back over 200,000 years, in violation of the creationist model, or, if you accept a more narrow definition, we then have ample examples of fossils of whatever evolved into man, which violates your creationist model. Either way, it is bad for your argument.

If you present a claim that cannot be supported, it must be retracted.

Well, how about that had their been a flood it would have destroyed the ice caps and with what we know about climatology the icecaps could not have regrown in the past few thousand years? Or that had their been a flood it would have greatly changed the salinity of the worlds water supply, either wiping out salt water of fresh water sea life, or both? Or how about that we still have plants even though such a flood would have destroyed land vegetation the world over? Or how about the fact there isn't that much water on Earth and that the geological events necessary to reshape the Earth to have the current amount of water cover everything would have been more destructive than the flood itself in the quakes and tsunamis that would have been created? Or how about uneven erosion the world over? Or that with only two animals of each time (or 7 of the clean ones) the carnivores would have nothing to eat (usually fatal), or if they were herbivores before they would have had to rapidly evolve new digestive systems and jaws? Or that even with only two of each animal, coupled with their supplies, you could not possibly fit that many into a space the size of the ark? Or that 40 days of rainy cloud cover would have produced a massive drop in temperature that would have been extremely dangerous to a number of animals indigenous to warm, dry climates?

We can start with these and continue if necessary.

Correct, if the two did not exist at the same time, then they could not have produced offspring. So, what is the explanation that the genetic dating of males and females differ? In the human creation model, this is explained by the male genetic bottleneck during the flood. And this confirms the prediction that there is more genetic diversity in females than males.

For human evolution, how can the discrepency be explained?

You have not yet justified the idea there is more genetic variation in females than males. Until you provide some evidence that it in fact exists, I need not explain why it exists.

Though, that aside, the fact that there are roughly three times as many X chromosomes floating around the world due to the fact between a pair of males and females you have 3 X chromosomes and one Y chromosome accounts for it quite nicely.

As I mentioned before, even a gradual evolution among hominids to man cannot even be established. We do not have any fossil evidence of the common ancestor between chimps and humans. And we do not have any fossil evidence of a common ancestor with any other primate. So, I have a differing opinion of which fails dramatically.

None of which is really all that relevant. Even if many of the huge number of fossils found are offshoots of the human line, they still had to come from something. That we see differing ages over the course of several million years with an increasing resemblance to modern humans the closer we get to present is much more informative than you seem willing to consider. The creation model predicts none of those other humanoid fossils would exist as it states all humanoids stemmed from two modern humans. Whether they are direct ancestors is not important, what is important is they show what directions evolution was taking at various points in our history with beings closely related to our ancestors.

What do you mean by "Man" here?

Genus Homo.

<SNIP Tool list from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of ... technology>

Did you miss the tools listed as over a million years old or just not post them?

As I've mentioned in this thread, please avoid just posting a URL as a response. Present your evidence and only use links to state your source.

My apologies but there isn't a lot to add to that. Comparative DNA matches percentagewise with what one would expect from a branching tree of life, as do retroviral DNA markers, etc.

[nygreenguy]

Evolution has abiogenesis as its starting point, which is untestable. Or if you believe in panspermia instead, that is also untestable.

All we need to show is it was possible, and that has been done several times over.

What has been done several times over?

Show that abiogenesis is possible.

You are right, my bad. I left that out assuming readers are familiar with the Bible. I'll amend the model to state that Noah's ark landed in the Mount Ararat region.

Im quite familiar with the bible, but where the ark landed is not a model for creation, but for the flood. For creation, we would use the garden of eden

Home sapiens is a broad term and is not consistently used. If it cannot be accurately defined, no accurate dating can be placed on it. From your same source:

"The category archaic Homo sapiens is disputed. There is no single agreed upon definition of archaic Homo sapiens."

It is agree that modern humans were around 200,000 years ago. That part is a fact. Before that, its a bit more difficult to categorize.

If you present a claim that cannot be supported, it must be retracted.

Then I suppose you will retract your entire model then?

What do you mean by "some higher, enlightened point"?

If we were indeed created in the image of god, we shouldnt start off as using sticks and stones and drawing on walls.

Then again this creates the problem of knowing ANYTHING about how an unknowable entity would create anything.

Your entire model is based upon something unsupportable and should, by your own admission, be dismissed.

Show where in this thread where "a gradual transition is found from animals to humans in the fossil record". The only thing I've seen is a purported list of human ancestors, which I've already addressed.

Also show where the "genetic changes from one species to another and leading to humans are identified" has been presented "ad nauseum". We don't even know the genetic changes necessary from just one species to another.

It has been shown, and it has been posted. Like I asked in my "can the bible be wrong" thread the evidence presented is utterly irrelevant. We went through 100 pages on how the flood is IMPOSSIBLE and you still refuse to acknowledge it because you somehow have more knowledge that the thousands of people who spend their life actually doing this work.

If their work and research cant convince you, I sure cant.

[Scotracer]

You tell me. Does human evolutionary theory posit that humans arose from one couple?

No. Evolution works on populations.

Then you reject these findings?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Adam
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve

You show a lack of study on the above as they aren't a 'couple' given that Y-chromosonal Adam lived 90,000-60,000 years ago and Mitochondrial Eve did her thing around 200,000 years ago. Even reading the first paragraph of those Wikipedia entries reveals such. Please do some more research on what the most recent common ancestor means with reference to a population.

[otseng]

You tell me. Does human evolutionary theory posit that humans arose from one couple?

No, it does not.

Then what does it state?

And if human evolution is indeed a fact, it should be quite simply to prove, without simply relying on the vast majority of scientists in the field agreeing with it.

If general relativity is indeed a fact, it should be quite simple to prove it, without relying on difficult mathematics, right?

False analogy. My comment was directed at SailingCyclops stating that we should believe something simply because authorities state that it is true.

I have no problem demonstrating that something is supported by mathematics. But simply stating that something is true because authorities says it is true is not sufficient by itself.

There are features common in all primates which appear to be homologous, pointing to a common origin.

As I pointed out earlier, there is no objective method to determine if something is homologous.

If the god created every species separately, he seems to have done it in a way that appears to be evolutionary.

It may appear to some that way. It may not appear that way to others.

He did not borrow a useful feature from one apparent line of descent and fuse it into another line that might need it. Whales and dolphins with gills. Why not?

We see many examples of features where it did not originate from a common ancestor.

Some include:

- Koalas of Australasia have evolved fingerprints, indistinguishable from those of humans.
- Marsupial sugar glider and squirrel glider of Australia are like the placental flying squirrel.
- Opossums have evolved an opposable thumb, a feature which is also commonly found in the non-related primates.
- Microbats, toothed whales and shrews developed sonar-like echolocation systems used for navigation and for locating prey. DNA study has shown that echolocation in two types of bats, megachiroptera and microchiroptera, came about independently.
- Platypus have what looks like a bird's Beak (hence its scientific name “Ornithorhynchus�), but is a mamm
- In an odd cross-species example, an insect, the Hummingbird Hawk-moth (Macroglossum stellatarum), also feeds by hovering in front of flowers and drinking their nectar in the same way as the above mentioned birds.
- Oilbird like microbats and toothed whales developed sonar-like echolocation systems used for locating prey.
- The Antifreeze protein of fish in the arctic and Antarctic, came about independently.
- The smelling organs of the terrestrial coconut crab are similar to those of insects.
- Silk: Spiders, silk moths, larval caddis flies, and the weaver ant all produce silken threads.
- Swim bladders – Buoyant bladders independently evolved in fishes, female octopus and siphonophores such as the Portuguese Man o' War.
- Venomous sting: To inject poison with a hypodermic needle, a sharppointed tube, has shown up independently 10+ times: jellyfish, spiders, scorpions, centipedes, various insects, cone shell, snakes, stingrays, stonefish, the male duckbill platypus, and stinging nettles plant.
- Bioluminescence: A symbiotic partnerships with light-emitting bacteria developed many times independently in deep-sea fish, jellyfish, and in fireflies and glow worms.
- Hallucinogenic toxins: Plants as diverse as the peyote cactus and the ayahuasca vine produce the same form of chemical toxin to deter predators.

[otseng]

Here is the evidence for biological evolution:

-Paleontology (fossil record)
-Genetics (comparative sequence analysis, phylogenetic reconstruction)
-Comparative anatomy (common morphology, and living examples)
-geographical distribution (Continental distribution, Island biogeography, Endemism of species, Adaptive radiations)
-Comparative physiology and biochemistry (Universal biochemical organisation and molecular variance patterns)
-Observed natural selection (E.Coli in the lab, lactose intolerance in humans, Nylon eating bacteria ect... )
-Observed speciation (examples: Blackclap, Drosophila melanogaster, Polar bear, ect...)
-Artificial selection (dog breeding, ect...)

in summation, evolution is one of, if not the most sound scientific fact that exists, because of the extensive reasons listed above. checkmate, now lets move on

First off, we're narrowing the focus of discussions here to human evolution, not the general theory of evolution.

Secondly, just because you present a list doesn't mean that it's a "checkmate" and time to "move on".

[otseng]

This is particularly true if there is a bottleneck event, such as appears to have happened about 70 to 80K years ago. Then, a lot of 'y-chromosmes' and 'mitochondria dna' gets filtered out.

Right, the only way I see how the discrepancy can be resolved is by a male bottleneck event. Now, the difference is that this is predicted by the human creation model. Whereas human evolutionary theory does not predict this.

Also, what is the bottleneck event you are referring to 70-80K years ago?