Will humans eventually be an ascendant of another species...

[hsilgne]

and if so, can you give an idea of what that species might be?

Also, if you believe humans will eventually become an ascendant to another species, do you believe the new species will be Gods children?

 

[Mallon]

and if so, can you give an idea of what that species might be?

Hard to say at this point. Humans will no doubt adapt to changing environmental conditions, and thus evolve. But humans have also done a good job in the last century at combating differential selection.
Whatever occurs, they would still be human, since they are descended of humans.

Also, if you believe humans will eventually become an ascendant to another species, do you believe the new species will be Gods children?

Yes.
Why? Do you think God only loves people with 10 fingers and 10 toes?
Just as sin continues to be heritable down through the generations, so too does God grant his mercy.
I don't think you quite understand the concept of cladistics and the very subjective and fuzzy delineation of species, hsilgne (if you did, I would be surprised you were asking such questions). Googling might help!

 

[hsilgne]

Yes.
Why? Do you think God only loves people with 10 fingers and 10 toes?
I would be surprised you were asking such questions)

Can I come to this forum to ask questions? Please let me know if I am not allowed to.

jw...Why do you feel the need to respond in such a manner? Was my post disrespectfull somehow? It was not intended to be.

 

[Mallon]

Can I come to this forum to ask questions? Please let me know if I am not allowed to.

jw...Why do you feel the need to respond in such a manner? Was my post disrespectfull somehow? It was not intended to be.

I wasn't trying to be insulting -- mine was a genuine question, too. You seem to think that God might not love human descendants as "His children", presumably because they would not bear all the same morphological/genetic features as ourselves. Why would you supppose this? Our connection with God is a spiritual one; not a physical one.

And while the rules say no debates in either anti-evolution or TE subforums, I personally don't care if you post here. There are certainly enough TEs posting in the anti-evolution subforum!

 

[hsilgne]

I wasn't trying to be insulting -- mine was a genuine question, too. You seem to think that God might not love human descendants as "His children", presumably because they would not bear all the same morphological/genetic features as ourselves. Why would you supppose this? Our connection with God is a spiritual one; not a physical one.

And while the rules say no debates in either anti-evolution or TE subforums, I personally don't care if you post here. There are certainly enough TEs posting in the anti-evolution subforum!

Mallon,

Peace to you in the Name of Jesus Christ.

Please, again I petition you to respond in charity. If you can't, please do not respond - at least to my questions anyways. How can you possibly think your question is not insulting? Did it occur to you that some people are like that(missing limbs, fingers - "deformed" in some manner)? Did it occur to you that perhaps someone in my family could be like that? Do you think I think God does not love them? That's a legitimate question that holds no offensive stench? Please stop and think before you post such things!

You seem to instinctively make presumptions to any and all questions regarding your beliefs. And it is obvious you feel defensive in your answers. Put your assumptions aside, please, and express your view with respect. Otherwise, people(including myself) are going to instinctively react in the same manner. And then our responses become over run with insinuation and insults. What good is that? Can I learn from you in a conversation like that? Can you from me?

My questions are valid! I insinuate nothing with them. And I believe they are worth answering. If you do not - then DON'T ANSWER!

I have more questions and I will post them if you like. But please, keep it respectful.

In Christ.

 

[Mallon]

I'm sorry if my posts are coming across as insulting to you, hsilgne. I don't mean for them to. I tend to be frank and straightforward in my responses, so please don't take anything I've said as veiled insult.
If my answers come across as presumptuous, it is because of the insincere manner in which many anti-evolutionists ask such question. I don't presume the same of you, however.
That said, I will ask again: Do you have any reason for thinking God might not consider the descendants of modern man as His children? What is the motivation behind such a question?

 

[hsilgne]

Thank you for your consideration.

Some background...
My belief is in Jesus Christ. As you can see, I am Catholic. As such, I believe and obey(try to) the teachings of the Church. I believe Her to be infallible.

Therefore, I believe in monogenism, as monogenism has been proclaimed as the Truth.

AFAIK, most evolutionists adhere to polygenism. Is that not true?

Do you have any reason for thinking God might not consider the descendants of modern man as His children?

No I do not have any reason for thinking that.

What I need to reconcile is the idea that we stem from another species.

If we say, "of course God will offer His saving grace to all human descandants" then, it seems to me we would also have to say, "of course God will offer His saving grace to all human ascendants".

Do you know what I mean?

Peace.

 

[Mallon]

AFAIK, most evolutionists adhere to polygenism. Is that not true?

No, it is not. Evolutionary theory posits a monophyletic Homo sapiens, and thus, a monogenetic origin for humans.

If we say, "of course God will offer His saving grace to all human descandants" then, it seems to me we would also have to say, "of course God will offer His saving grace to all human ascendants".

Do you know what I mean?

I know what you mean, but I don't know why you think that.
Inheritance is anisotropic -- it only happens one way, from one generation to the next. If God 'breathed' a 'soul' into the first human, there's no reason to believe He would retroactively breathe the same soul into man's ancestors.
Take the eucharist, for example. We understand that since the Last Supper, God assures us forgiveness of sins through holy communion. But does that same promise extend retroactively to those who lived before the institution of the eucharist? No. God had a different plan for them. I suspect the same is true of the first humans.

 

[hsilgne]

No, it is not. Evolutionary theory posits a monophyletic Homo sapiens, and thus, a monogenetic origin for humans.

Have I been misinformed? Polygenism is not the "accepted" view?

I submit the following;
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve

Wilson's naming Mitochondrial Eve after Eve of the Genesis creation story has led to some misunderstandings among the general public. A common misconception is that Mitochondrial Eve was the only living human female of her time — she was not. Had she been the only living female of her time, humanity would most likely have become extinct due to the extreme population bottleneck.

I know what you mean, but I don't know why you think that.
Inheritance is anisotropic -- it only happens one way, from one generation to the next. If God 'breathed' a 'soul' into the first human, there's no reason to believe He would retroactively breathe the same soul into man's ancestors.

I can accept that as long as all future descendants remain human.

Take the eucharist, for example. We understand that since the Last Supper, God assures us forgiveness of sins through holy communion. But does that same promise extend retroactively to those who lived before the institution of the eucharist? No. God had a different plan for them. I suspect the same is true of the first humans.

I don't want to get off track here but I do not agree with what you are saying here. The Eucharist cannot be confined by time. I know what you are trying to express, the example does not work for me - that's all. Anywho, that's a whole other topic.

 

[Mallon]

Have I been misinformed? Polygenism is not the "accepted" view?

I submit the following;
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve

Read carefully:
"Mitochondrial Eve (mt-mrca) is the name given by researchers to the woman who is the matrilineal most recent common ancestor for all living humans; the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) in all living humans is derived from hers. Mitochondrial Eve is the female counterpart of the Y-chromosomal Adam, the patrilineal most recent common ancestor."

She is the most recent common ancestor for all living humans. Her contemporaries did not produce a lineage that survived to this day. That doesn't make humans polygenic. Reading more about cladistics might help clarify matters.
How did you come to associate Mitochondrial Eve with polygenism?

I can accept that as long as all future descendants remain human.

By definition, they must be. Just as anything descended from a dog must be a dog, and anything descended from a vertebrate must be a vertebrate. This is why the usage of biblical "kinds" makes no sense. A dog cannot change into a non-dog.

I don't want to get off track here but I do not agree with what you are saying here. The Eucharist cannot be confined by time.

I can't see why not. Moses didn't take communion. But we digress.

 

[Assyrian]

I think we may have a mix up between theological and biological terms here. I suspect monogenism is not the same as monophyletic. Hsilgne, could you explain what you mean by monogenism?

 

[hsilgne]

Thanks guys.

How did you come to associate Mitochondrial Eve with polygenism?

Here is the quote again from wilkepedia. I have highlighted the text that has apparently confused me...

Wilson's naming Mitochondrial Eve after Eve of the Genesis creation story has led to some misunderstandings among the general public. A common misconception is that Mitochondrial Eve was the only living human female of her time — she was not. Had she been the only living female of her time, humanity would most likely have become extinct due to the extreme population bottleneck.

Perhaps I do not understand cladistics properly like you have suggested.

Are you saying that the above mentioned "Eve" was not human?

By definition, they must be. Just as anything descended from a dog must be a dog, and anything descended from a vertebrate must be a vertebrate. This is why the usage of biblical "kinds" makes no sense. A dog cannot change into a non-dog.

Again, correct me if I am wrong, does not evolution predict that ALL of life evolved from a single life form?

Did humans evolve from another species or not?

I can't see why not. Moses didn't take communion. But we digress.

You're right, he didn't while walking earth. But after death(where time does not exist) he shares in the Eucharist with us.
Another subject, another debate.

I think we may have a mix up between theological and biological terms here. I suspect monogenism is not the same as monophyletic. Hsilgne, could you explain what you mean by monogenism?

Sure.

Monogenism, is the fact that all humans are descendants of 1 Man and 1 Woman.

 

[shernren]

Thank you for your consideration.

Some background...
My belief is in Jesus Christ. As you can see, I am Catholic. As such, I believe and obey(try to) the teachings of the Church. I believe Her to be infallible.

Therefore, I believe in monogenism, as monogenism has been proclaimed as the Truth.

AFAIK, most evolutionists adhere to polygenism. Is that not true?

I don't know if bringing up Galileo will be offensive to a Catholic XD but I think all participants in the cr-evo debate need to read his Letter to the Grand Duchess Tuscany as a mandatory prerequisite. Here's a passage relevant to what you said above:

Again, to command that the very professors of astronomy themselves see to the refutation of their own observations and proofs as mere fallacies and sophisms is to enjoin something that lies beyond any possibility of accomplishment. For this would amount to commanding that they must not see what they see and must not understand what they know, and that in searching they must find the opposite of what they actually encounter. Before this could be done they would have to be taught how to make one mental faculty command another, and the inferior powers the superior, so that the imagination and the will might be forced to believe the opposite of what the intellect understands. I am referring at all times to merely physical propositions, and not to supernatural things which are matters of faith.

...

Hence it would probably be wise and useful counsel if, beyond articles which concern salvation and the establishment of our Faith, against the stability of which there is no danger whatever that any valid and effective doctrine can ever arise, men would not aggregate further articles unnecessarily.

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/galileo-tuscany.html

If polygenism is to be proved or disproved, it ought to be on physical, not dogmatic, grounds. (And even most evolutionists believe in the recent single-origin hypothesis, which certainly sounds a little like Adam and Eve, though not enough for the literalists.)

No I do not have any reason for thinking that.

What I need to reconcile is the idea that we stem from another species.

If we say, "of course God will offer His saving grace to all human descandants" then, it seems to me we would also have to say, "of course God will offer His saving grace to all human ascendants".

Do you know what I mean?

Peace.

The opposite of "descendants" is "ancestors". Hehe. But I do know what you mean. It is an interesting question.

My personal answer is that what determines the spirituality of our humanness is our relationship with God. This relationship has to be initiated by God: if God initiated this relationship with the first humans, and not with their biological ancestors, then the first humans would be spiritual creatures while their immediate biological ancestors wouldn't. It would be as simple as that, even if they were genetically the same or similar enough to be the same species.

Think about it. As Christians, where do we believe spirituality comes from? We certainly don't think that there's a "god gene" in our chromosomes - "if you cut it out, you get a robot who doesn't pray or worship or have a soul!" - and our spirituality isn't based in biology, even if it may be intimately intermeshed with biological mechanisms. We don't get our spirituality from our genes - so maybe our ancestors had no spirituality, even if their genes were identical to ours, simply because God never gave them that spirituality.

Does that make sense?

 

[gluadys]

Perhaps I do not understand cladistics properly like you have suggested.

Are you saying that the above mentioned "Eve" was not human?

No, mitochondrial Eve was human, but she was not the first human, nor the only human of her generation. She was one of thousands of other humans who existed at the time. What distinguishes her from her sisters, is that hers is the only lineage which has continued unbroken to the present generation. All humans alive today are her descendants. The other women of her generation may have had descendants for dozens, even thousands of generations, but somewhere along the way, their lineage died out. They have no living descendants today.

The same applies among men to Y-chromosome Adam.

Again, correct me if I am wrong, does not evolution predict that ALL of life evolved from a single life form?

No. On two grounds.

First, common ancestry is a conclusion, not a prediction. It is something that follows logically from what we know of evolution.

Second, if by "a single life form" you mean a single cell, no, evolution does not say that either. It is probable that whatever process produced one cell also produced many other cells, so there was never just one single cell in existence.

If you mean a species of unicellular organisms, then you are closer to the truth. However, it does not follow that life originated only once. It may be rather a similar case to mitochondrial Eve--that out of several primitive populations of unicellular life, only one is the ancestor of all life today.

The evidence does appear to lead to the conclusion that all life today has a common ancestor.

Did humans evolve from another species or not?

Yes, though I did suggest in another thread, that perhaps you do not understand the scientific definition of species. That new species arise from other species is an observed fact of nature. Many creationists, however, reject that, not because they question the evidence, but because they do not count the hundreds of different species of fruit flies in Hawaii, for example, as different species. As they say (correctly) "They are all fruit flies." While that is technically correct, what it means is that "fruit flies" does not designate a species, but a large group of similar species, all descended from a common ancestor.

If you understand what scientists mean by "species" it is not particularly remarkable that a population can divide into two or more species, given the appropriate circumstances. So it is not particularly remarkable that Homo erectus could, over time, become the ancestral species to both Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens.

 

[hsilgne]

I don't know if bringing up Galileo will be offensive to a Catholic XD...

What's " XD" ?

But no, it's not offenseive to me. I do not necessarily agree however.

If polygenism is to be proved or disproved, it ought to be on physical, not dogmatic, grounds.

Again, I must reiterate, I believe the Holy Mother Church is infallible in Her teachings. You may disagree, and that's ok with me, But first and foremost, this is where I stand, this is the perspective I must "look" from.

The opposite of "descendants" is "ancestors". Hehe.

Correct.

And the opposite of "ascendant" is "descendant".

My personal answer is that what determines the spirituality of our humanness is our relationship with God. This relationship has to be initiated by God: if God initiated this relationship with the first humans, and not with their biological ancestors, then the first humans would be spiritual creatures while their immediate biological ancestors wouldn't. It would be as simple as that, even if they were genetically the same or similar enough to be the same species.

Thank you for responding. As I said to Mallon in this regard, I can accept that as a possibility.

...What distinguishes her from her sisters, is that hers is the only lineage which has continued unbroken to the present generation. All humans alive today are her descendants. The other women of her generation.... ...have no living descendants today.

It seems to me, you are saying the same thing as Mallon here(see below)...

She is the most recent common ancestor for all living humans. Her contemporaries did not produce a lineage that survived to this day.

But I have a problem with this as I pointed to already. Here is the quote again from wilkepedia...

Had she been the only living female of her time, humanity would most likely have become extinct due to the extreme population bottleneck.

Are they not drawing the conclusion that there were several of these " Eve's". Not of another lineage, but of the same lineage.

No. On two grounds.

... if by "a single life form" you mean a single cell, no, evolution does not say that either. It is probable that whatever process produced one cell also produced many other cells, so there was never just one single cell in existence.

IOW, this cell "evolved" into a group that included crocodiles, that cell "evolved" into a group that included elephants, another cell "evolved" into a group that included humans and so on... While, at the same time, all of these "groups" maintain a commonality between them. Is that accurate?

If you understand what scientists mean by "species" it is not particularly remarkable that a population can divide into two or more species, given the appropriate circumstances. So it is not particularly remarkable that Homo erectus could, over time, become the ancestral species to both Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens.

So then, if this is true, it is reasonable to predict that Humans could be an ancestoral link to several other species that are not human. Correct?

 

[Assyrian]

I think the issue for Catholic theology is not a six day creation (Augustine didn't interpret the day literally) or even how Adam and Eve were created. The sticking point is the fall and original sin which came as a result of the fall and affects all mankind.

Now I don't think original sin is a biblical concept and I am no longer a Catholic but I understand the position you are coming from in your search. A lot more Catholic theology is built around the concept of original sin than how man was created. But a literal Adam and Eve who literally sinned and fell form part of many TEs understanding of Genesis.

 

[gluadys]

It seems to me, you are saying the same thing as Mallon here(see below)...

Yes, that's right.

But I have a problem with this as I pointed to already. Here is the quote again from wilkepedia...



Are they not drawing the conclusion that there were several of these " Eve's". Not of another lineage, but of the same lineage.

No they are not. They are saying the same thing I said--that mt-Eve was neither the first human woman, nor the only human woman of her generation. She is the only one to have living descendants today. In her own generation she was not mt-Eve, because there would be another woman of an earlier generation who was the common ancestor of the women living then. She would not become mt-Eve until the lineages of all the other women of her generation died out.

Let's use an analogy covering a smaller number of generations.

My great-grandmother had four daughters, one of whom died in childhood. She was the common ancestor of the remaining three.

My grandmother also had three daughters and one of her sisters had one daughter while the other sister had only a son.

This makes my great-grandmother the common ancestor of her three daughters and her four granddaughters.

But note that one of her daughters had no children and the other had no daughters. In those lineages, the line of women died out.

One of my grandmother's three daughters was my mother, so I and my sister are living descendants of my great-grandmother. So are my daughter and my niece.

But the daughter of my aunt did not have children. So that lineage will die out when she dies.

Now my mother, my grandmother and my grandmother's sisters have all passed away. Who are the living descendants of my great-grandmother?

Myself, my sister, my daughter and my niece and my mother's childless cousin. Four of us are all descended from my grandmother, and my mum's cousin is descended from my grandmother's sister. Our last common maternal ancestor is my great-grandmother.

But my mum's cousin is very elderly. When she dies, her mother's lineage dies with her. Then the four of us remaining will all be descended from my grandmother. The lineages of her sisters will all have died out.

Then the last maternal common ancestor of the women in my family will no longer be my great-grandmother, but my grandmother, since she is a common ancestor to all my great-grandmother's living descendants.

IOW, this cell "evolved" into a group that included crocodiles, that cell "evolved" into a group that included elephants, another cell "evolved" into a group that included humans and so on... While, at the same time, all of these "groups" maintain a commonality between them. Is that accurate?

No. First, the simple unicellular populations of the ancient earth diversified into many species. After about 2 billion years, a new more complex type of cell--with a nucleus appeared. This is called a eukaryotic cell. Only eukaryotic species went on to become multicellular. And that took about another 1.5 billion years.

This did happen more than once, but not on the level you suggest. It happened at least twice among unicellular algae. One type became multicellular algae of the brown, yellow and yellow-green type--such as various kinds of kelp and sea-weeds. The other became terrestrial plants, which are closely related to green algae.

It also happened among a type of protist called opisthokonts. The multicellular opisthokonts divided into two groups: fungi and animals.

Since the crocodiles, elephants and humans are all animals, they all have a common ancestor in the earliest animal. In fact they have more recent common ancestors than that since they are all also vertebrates and tetrapods, so they all have a common ancestor among the early vertebrates and another more recent common ancestor among the first tetrapods. And elephants and humans have a common ancestor among the first mammals.

This is where you need to develop your understanding of "nested hierarchy" or cladistics.

So then, if this is true, it is reasonable to predict that Humans could be an ancestoral link to several other species that are not human. Correct?

No, the descendants of humans will always be humans. They may be different species of humans, but they will always be humans. Just as humans, like all descendants of the first animals, the first vertebrates, the first tetrapods and the first mammals are still animals, vertebrates, tetrapods and mammals. And narrowing things down still further, we are--like our ancestors--still primates and still hominids. Our descendants, even if they become a different species, will also be animals, vertebrates, tetrapods, mammals, primates, hominids and humans. A species never leaves the taxonomic nest it was born in.

 

[Deamiter]

edit -- I deleted my response to these first bits as gluadys did a better job and we don't need multiple people saying the same thing at the same time. The below is very significant and the bit which I REALLY wanted to respond to:

So then, if this is true, it is reasonable to predict that Humans could be an ancestoral link to several other species that are not human. Correct?

No. Humans will ALWAYS be mammals just as our ancestors are and we will always be eukaryotes. We and our descendants will always be great apes. Our descendants will always be humans even if they split into distinct populations that can no longer interbreed (and thus are defined by today's standards as different species).

 

[Mallon]

Are they not drawing the conclusion that there were several of these " Eve's". Not of another lineage, but of the same lineage.

Ok, now it's obvious you don't know cladistics.
So, a scenario...
Let's say we have two biological sisters: sister A and sister B. Both sisters grow up to get married and have many children. Their children have children of their own, those children have children of their own, etc. Eventually, the two sisters produce a large branching family tree spanning hundreds of generations, stemming from two sources (branches, if you will), sister A and sister B. Now imagine some cataclysmic event occurs that kills all living descendants of sister A. All we are left with is descendants of sister B (that's us -- living humans). If you were to study the mitochondrial DNA of these remaining humans and produce what is called a 'molecular clock', you would find that they all shared a common 'mother' hundreds of generations ago: sister B. The same evidence could not account for the existence of sister A, since the remaining descendants do not stem from her lineage.
All this isn't to say that humans are polygenic, though. Those two sisters, sister A and B, had parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and so on... all the way to the first pair of humans. Thus, human evolution ultimately advocates monogenism.

If only I had a cladogram, this would be much easier to follow.

IOW, this cell "evolved" into a group that included crocodiles, that cell "evolved" into a group that included elephants, another cell "evolved" into a group that included humans and so on... While, at the same time, all of these "groups" maintain a commonality between them. Is that accurate?

No. All the vertebrates you mentioned share a common vertebrate ancestor that likely resembled something like this fella:

What gluadys is saying is that whatever process produced the first cell likely produced many such cells. Down the road, one or some of these cells likely went on to become multicellular organisms, which then went on to become flatworm-type things, etc. (yes, I left out a few steps for simplicity).

So then, if this is true, it is reasonable to predict that Humans could be an ancestoral link to several other species that are not human. Correct?

No. All descendants of humans are, by definition, humans. Similarly, all descendants of the common vertebrate ancestor (marked by "vertebrae") here:

... are vertebrates. And all descendants of the common ancestor of "primates" and "dinosaurs and birds" (see above) are amniotes. Evolution follows a branching pattern and it's important to keep that in mind. There's a good tutorial here:
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/

Good luck!

 

[Assyrian]

Another factor to look at is we are only tracing the mitochondria which are passed down (usually) through the female line. Lets say there is another woman around at the time of mitochondrial Eve, lets call her Lilith

Lilith and Eve had loads of children and their children had gave them grandchildren and great grandchildren... But if we we trace every line descended from Lilith, at some stage down along there are no daughters. Only Lilith's great[sup]n[/sup] grandsons carry on the line. The sons only thing needn't all happen in the same generation, but it does happen at some stage to every line.

If this is the case then while Lilith has plenty of descendants, none of her mitochondria have been passed on. If we knew how to search we could find copies of her X chromosomes and copies of lots of her other chromosomes too. But the only mitochondria will come from Eve. Eve is the common mitochondrial ancestry for everyone.