Mitochondrial Eve

[callmeMurph]

So apparently the latest science can trace back modern humans to one woman (mitochondrial eve) that existed about 200,000 years ago.

Age of "Mitochondrial Eve" Confirmed: 200,000 Years Old - Tech Talk - CBS News

If this is the case then could this be the Eve of the Bible? Should we treat her as such? Any thoughts?

 

[Mallon]

If this is the case then could this be the Eve of the Bible? Should we treat her as such? Any thoughts?

Nope. For one, the Eve of the Bible lived several thousand years ago (if you subscribe to a literal Eve), not hundreds of thousands of years ago.
Second, Mitochondrial Eve is not the first woman of all, but 'merely' the first woman who gave rise to all human lineages living today. Many human lineages existed before and alongside Mitochondrial Eve and have since gone extinct. The lineage of Mitochondial Eve is the one that went on to survive.
More here:
Mitochondrial Eve - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[callmeMurph]

if you subscribe to a literal Eve.

True, but lets say we don't, at least as far as the time frame goes.

Second, Mitochondrial Eve is not the first woman of all, but 'merely' the first woman who gave rise to all human lineages living today. Many human lineages existed before and alongside Mitochondrial Eve and have since gone extinct. The lineage of Mitochondial Eve is the one that went on to survive.
More here:
Mitochondrial Eve - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ah, right I do remember hearing that. I was reading Denis Alexander's book "Creation or Evolution: Do we have to choose?" and he lists a few options for adam and eve one of which was that Eve was chosen by God to be the spiritual mother of humanity or whatever and that from her all humans would come.

 

[Mallon]

Ah, right I do remember hearing that. I was reading Denis Alexander's book "Creation or Evolution: Do we have to choose?" and he lists a few options for adam and eve one of which was that Eve was chosen by God to be the spiritual mother of humanity or whatever and that from her all humans would come.

I buy that. I guess it depends on how you want to define 'human', whether it be based on physical or spiritual characteristics. Conceptually, I find the latter more appeasing, albeit difficult to test.

 

[marlowe007]

I like to think of Mt Eve as the Edenic Eve, being someone who subscribes to an historical Fall out of theological necessity, but as with all non-Biblical speculations, I believe that it's equally wise not to idolise the notion.

 

[Dark_Lite]

So apparently the latest science can trace back modern humans to one woman (mitochondrial eve) that existed about 200,000 years ago.

Age of "Mitochondrial Eve" Confirmed: 200,000 Years Old - Tech Talk - CBS News

If this is the case then could this be the Eve of the Bible? Should we treat her as such? Any thoughts?

It may be able to satisfy certain dogmatic requirements, and one can certainly blend Mitochondrial Eve into the mythological history of Genesis, but the literal Eve of the Bible is quite a bit different from Mitochondrial Eve, as Mallon said.

 

[callmeMurph]

Found an interesting article on the biologos forum. http://biologos.org/questions/the-mitochondrial-eve/

Mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosome Adam lived at different times, were probably separated by thousands of years and quite possibly were in different locations. Thus, a pictorial diagram tracking all men’s Y-chromosome DNA would not trace back to the spouse of Mitochondrial Eve. Although coalescence does not indicate that all humans descended from a single couple, Mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosome Adam are nonetheless the source of a portion of our DNA, namely the Y-chromosome DNA and the mitochondrial DNA. The rest of our DNA, located in the nucleus, comes from a large number of other ancestors. Looking at the total variation in the DNA of humans around the world, scientists have estimated that all our DNA came from an original population of several thousand individuals. This relatively small population size suggests there was at least one bottleneck — a period of time where the population was reduced significantly — from which our current human population expanded.

 

[Searching_for_Christ]

Too bad this conversation didn't get very far. I just barely learned about Mitochondrial Eve and Y Chromosome Adam...I find it incredibly fascinating.