At 01:56 PM 1/2/00 -0000, Bob DeHaan wrote:
>>Glenn,
>>
>>I read the web-site report S. Africa Apeman Is Guide to Human Origins. that
>>you referred to in your post of Dec. 30. Below is the last section of the
>>report. I fail to find any clues in the body of the section to either of
>the
>>two questions posed in the heading, especially the second one--WHY DID APES
>>AND HUMANS DEPART COMPANY?
I was more taken by the human-ness of the hands in that report. But what I
think the authors were getting at was that the hands and their
functionality was what caused us to depart from the apes.
Do you think we can find the answer that
>question
>>within the evolutionary paradigm? Or do we need to turn to revelation for
>>the answer?
I think we need both evolution AND revelation. God clearly says that we are
a special creation, and indeed, mankind is unique among all the animals
that have ever lived. If we are not a special creation then I would find
some problems with many aspects of Chrisitian theology.
On the other hand, for Christians to continue to ignore genetic data in
order to maintain an anti-evolutionary position, seems to fall into the
case of burying our heads so that we don't see how our views don't match
reality.
The data I am referring to are things like the pseudogenes, the 98%
similarity with chimps and the banding similarities [see Jorge J. Yunis and
Om Prakash, "The Origin of Man: A CHromosomal Pictorial Legacy," Science
March 1982, p. 1525.]
Doesn't the article imply that perhaps the future human
>lineage
>>appeared first and apes split off from it, rather than that there is a
>common
>>ancestor to both humans and apes?
Given that Gorillas and gibbons had already split off the line prior to the
chimp/human split the split was between us and chimps. In such a
situation, it is impossible to say one lineage arose first and the other
split off from it. Before the split the lineage belonged to both chimp and
human.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution
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