On 29 Aug 1996 22:45:50 EDT, pdd@gcc.cc.md.us wrote:
[continued]
GM>Adam had to be prior to the time that language formed. As you
>can see, I believe that that means Adam was AT LEAST prior to 1.5
>myr ago. Otherwise, you have language possessing non-humans walking
>the earth.
Glenn's theory in fact is that Adam was 5.5 MYA to fit in with his
Mediterranean Flood theory.
Glenn's "language possessing non-humans" is another play on words.
First it was "sub-human", now it is "non-human". H. habilis could
have had a rudimentary language and be regarded as in a sense
"human", but not *fully* human.
The Two-"Adam" model would have no problem with H. habilis possessing
a rudimentary language as an early stage of an emerging image of God.
GM>"As I mentioned above, Genesis 2 is a totally separate event
occurred billions of years after Genesis 1...Can this scenario be
proven?... No,"
PD>So in essence you are saying, I can offer a theory which I cannot
>prove. I ask you for data that will disprove it. There is no force
>in the question.
GM>I can not prove it yet. But I do hope that the future will bring
>me a successful prediction...Successful predictions are the way
>science works. If a form of Homo is found far back towards the 5.5
>myr range, then I would consider that a successful prediction. No
>other Christian harmonization offers prediction. We seem to run
>from it for fear that we might be proven wrong. I might be proven
>wrong but we can not run from it.
Anyone could make a "prediction" that he knows has almost no chance
of being tested. Glenn's "prediction" is safe until they search the
entire floor of the Mediterranean and prove that there are no 5.5
million year old human implements there! :-)
Based on where anthropologists are looking for human ancestors, there
is no chance of Glenn ever being proved right or wrong. No
expedition will ever be mounted to look for the remains or artifacts
of human ancestors on the floor of the Mediterranean 5.5 million
years ago. Even if an ancient tool was dredged up by chance,
scientists would not conclude it was originally from there. They
would more reasonably assume it was lost overboard from a ship
enroute to an Roman or Greek museum! Glenn's 5.5 million-yea-old H.
habilis Adam theory/model is simply irrelevant. The main game is in
the exciting new discoveries in mtDNA that is pointing to an
explosive emergence of H. sapiens within the last 100 thousand years.
Young-Adam theories like the two-`Adam' model are at the cutting edge
of Bible-science reconciliation.
[...]
PD>Then we have theories built upon theories. Since you cannot test
>the 2-Adam evolutionary theory, it cannot be proven or disproven.
GM>Once again, I don't have a 2 adam theory. That is Stephen's
>theory.
More word-play. I do not claim that the Heb, Adham in Genesis 1 is
"Adam", but "Man". That is why I always put the "Adam" in the
"2-`Adam' theory" in quotation marks.
BTW, if 1. "Genesis 2 is a totally separate event occurred billions
of years after Genesis 1", and 2. Genesis 1:26-27 speaks of "Man",
then is Glenn saying that "man" existed "billions of years" before
"Genesis 2"?
GM>...My view is fully testable."
Glenn's "view" might be "fully testable" in theory, but it never will
be tested in practice. It is not a risky prediction, which was the
essence of Popper's falsification criteria:
"Popper was impressed by the contrast between the methodology of Marx
or Freud on the one hand, and Albert Einstein on the other. Einstein
almost recklessly exposed his General Theory of Relativity to
falsification by predicting the outcome of a daring experiment. If
the outcome had been other than as predicted, the theory would have
been discredited. The Freudians in contrast looked only for
confirming examples, and made their theory so flexible that
everything counted as confirmation. Marx did make specific
predictions-concerning the inevitable crises of capitalism, for
example-but when the predicted events failed to occur his followers
responded by modifying the theory so that it still "explained"
whatever had happened." (Johnson P.E., "Darwin on Trial",
InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove Ill., Second Edition, 1993, p148).
Glenn theory is safe because in practice no one will bother searching
the entire floor of the Mediterranean to look for evidence of H.
habilis when every other piece of evidence points to H. habilis
existing between 2.5 and 1.5 million years ago in Africa.
OTOH, the "2-`Adam' model" could be easily discredited by a pattern
of early emergence of intelligence, language, technology, culture,
art and spirituality, such that H. sapiens was fully human well
before the Biblical range of less than 100K years.
The Two-`Adam' model is just a variation on Pre-Adamite theories
which have existed since the 17th century and thus pre-date
Darwinism by 200 years:
"We may assert that there is a difference between fossil man and
Biblical man. Different alternatives are possible here. We may
believe that fossil man was part of the original creation of Gen. 1:
1, if we are adherents of the gap theory. We may teach that fossil
man is sub- human or pre-human. Or, we may resort to some theory of
pre- Adamism. If we reject the gap theory there is no source of help
in that direction. Pre-Adamism was systematically defended by Isaac
Peyrere in his Systema Theologicum ex Praeadamitarum Hypothesi
(1655). It was also defended by Winchel (Preadamites, or a
Demonstration of the Existence of Man Before Adam, 1890), and by
Fabre d'Envieu (Les Origines de la Terre et de l'homme, 1878) who
argued that these men before Adam had died before Adam was created.
Short (1942) thinks that these fossil men might have been pre-
humans, and that Adam was a de novo creation possessing spiritual
qualities these pre-Adamites lacked. Torrey (1907) accepts the pre-
Adamite theory, but believes some of them were alive at Biblical
times." (Ramm B., "The Christian View of Science and Scripture",
Paternoster: London, 1955, p221)
Similarly, Pearce says:
"Even as far back as mid-Victorian times there have been those of
fundamentalist outlook who have seen the possibility that
pre-Adamites existed. This is demonstrated by the fact that G. H.
Pember wrote his "Earth's Earliest Ages" well before fossil remains
of palaeolithic man had been found or acknowledged. He thought that
Scripture indicated that there were races of men before our own. His
conclusion was drawn from remarks made by the prophet Ezekiel, and
from other passages of scripture. "Why," he wrote, "if a pre-adamic
race really existed upon earth do we not find some indications of it
among the fossil remains? Certainly no human bones have been as yet
detected in primeval rocks; though if any should be hereinafter
discovered, we need find no contradiction to Scripture in the fact."
(Pember G. H. , "Earth's Earliest Ages", Hodder & Stoughton, 1876,
p73).
(Pearce E.K.V., "Who Was Adam?", Paternoster: Exeter, 1969, p36)
Pre-Adamism in general and the Two-`Adam' Model in particular, are
therefore not a recent invesntion trying to jump on the bandwagon of
the latest scientific evidence, although it is broadly consistent
with that evidence.
In fact, I don't really like the term "Two-`Adam' Model", because it
implies there were two "Adams", which neither I nor Pearce have ever
said. I used to call it the "Genesis 1 `man' - Genesis 2 `Adam'
model" but that is a mouthful. Also, my view is different from
Pearce's in that I do not claim that Genesis 1 man is Old Stone Age
man, but rather corresponds broadly to the genus Homo (I could even
stretch it to include Australopithecines, if it is shown they were
fully bipedal, since I regard bipedalism as part of the image of
God). Therefore, in future I will use the term "pre-Adamite" model
instead of "two-`Adam' model".
God bless.
Steve
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