Evidence for God from Science

Neo,

I can't help saying that I'm more than a little disappointed in you. Your Pope Cornelius tooth eating cat avatar was really growing on me.

What happened?

Kurieuo wrote:

neo-x wrote:

You do know you come across very arrogant and obnoxious? Not to mention you entirely avoid questions asked of you.

I don't know how to respond to this so I will leave it at that.

If you don't see how how science tracing women via one ancestral line fits with one Eve, as opposed to having many individual ancestral lines supporting many Eves, then feel free to remain that way. I think many readers here do see it, which I'm assuming by the way some have jumped on board to post. If you don't, then best of luck to you neo-x.

And I think this point is irrelevant, whether its a single line or not, mito eve was not the first human, nor was she the only woman nor she was any way related to mito adam, so no it does not remotely help your argument. Mito eve was a female among other females, she had a mother and a father.

Look one of us is misinformed, either you are or I am. My opinion is that you think mito eve is the biblical eve or close to one. I will leave it up to you how you patch it with genesis but I am going to quote from the ancestor's tale as to why we know this can't be.

That is not my opinion at all; I have never stated that I believe Mito Eve is the Biblical Eve, nor am I arguing this.

Though I believe it unintentional, there is an air of your superiority to your posts that is off-putting, and I don't mean that as an insult. You keep confusing or mixing my words. You do think I'm ill-informed or don't know my science right? Along with a great deal many others here who don't know theirs when it comes to evolutionary science. Such that you presume some sort of naivety within us who disagree with you on such matters, to the point you need to try teach us rather than take seriously any criticism.

It is that, which is what I meant by your coming across obnoxiousness and arrogant to me. And certainly, I wasn't name calling (Daniel if that was reference to me). Name calling would be simply saying you're obnoxious... but rather I am referring to what I feel as your adopted mode and manner of discussion that I just detailed.

Though I don't wish to particularly dwell on this, to provide a further example of what I mean here, I've observed previous discussions between you and others on the board. Whenever evolution is discussed or something pertaining to the Genesis creation, it seems you have this aura of superiority that often comes across in your posts during such discussions. I assume this is either a really sensitive topic for you or one that you are simply very passionate about.

However, this greater "superiority" that comes across, I saw grated on RickD and others here who disagree with "your science" and draw different conclusions from the scientific facts than you do. I'm not being purposefully insulting, but trying to point it out as I see it. For example, consider your trying to teach us the facts of evolution in a thread no one else was allowed to post on, on a discussion board of all places. How do you think that is perceived by others who know science and yet disagree with your positions? We mustn't know science right? And that's exactly what I mean. I'm just calling it as I see it and throwing to the wind any personal offense that might be caused because I personally find this attitude off-putting whether from an Atheist or Christian brother. Either my feeling "put off" is wrong and I should not feel this way, or there is some merit to what I say and perhaps a change in tune, maybe giving a bit more credit to others here could be in order (unless you truly consider us numbats).

I think it is best that we stop right here and address this first because I believe you have mistaken persistence and confidence with "superior attitude". I speak of these things with surety of being true, therefore that is what might have come across as "superiority" (but it isn't). I admit I don't give a middle way unlike some here who have proposed such. But really I don't think a middle exists. I am convinced of it now. I don't think one can patch genesis and evolution as we know it, in a tight consistent way without disrupting theology, and I tried! The more I read Genesis the more I see it working beautifully (no pun intended) inside the YEC framework. It makes absolute sense in it, and has the least of internal inconsistencies. That has really offset my previous views of mainstream T.E. And Since I do reject YEC as being inconsistent with science, the only logical conclusion was obvious to me and hence I rejected the story.

My teaching you guys evolution is really not true. For one I can assure you that I have seen a lot of confrontation and confrontation again, so no I cannot say I am trying to teach anybody, I am learning myself. I did however tried to set straight some misconceptions and their repeatedness kind of created an atmosphere where I was constantly pointing those out. I have NEVER tried to insult any members here. To show you guys as naive or ignorant has never been my goal nor agenda.

The question about the evolution thread is comical at this point as people did post there, I wasn't happy but I realized my mistake.

You are all free to believe what you must. I really have no problems with any of that, be it YEC, OEC, TE, PC, DA, FW etc. I however do find it upsetting when the concept of evolution is either demonized or painted in a false light. I am fascinated with biology and that is my passion so my strong stance comes right from there.

My honest opinion is most people, don't read much. They read summaries or conclusions rather than the fine print. I think much misconceptions comes from reading materials which are not peer reviewed or authenticated. This include many christian sites too which oppose evolution. I may be wrong but I really don't think its likely that one may escape the conclusions of the evolutionary theory if they read it without bias.

Now you may be different, you know your science and are not convinced, that's fair. However I don't think many are thoroughly knowledgeable in this area, I may be wrong but I am repeatedly given the chance to be correct when I roll my eyes over a wrong statement or a strawman. Even recently before my short departure from the forum, in an argument with a member( I respect him of course) on evolution I asked him for his source of his objections but he didn't give me one, because there was none. He was using his logic, which is admirable but doesn't help as its complex and the best answer is not gained by simply using occam's razor.

So do I think of you as numbats? NO. I don't. I don't think of you as inferior or me superior. I do think some are misinformed on evolutionary theory and I for the same reasons do not find "reasons.org" and similar places to be a good source of getting such info either...this again is not not an insult just how I see things happening and why I find them wrong.

It is one thing to be aware of some science finding, it is entirely another to understand it in context and be consistent with it. Unlike the guys at reason.org who consistently try to expand the genesis story and fit in, evolution all the way and since that can't be done, they have to negate some aspect of it. And its a constant bother because you have re-interpret your faith foundation over and over. I find now the whole exercise quite ridiculous.

Sometimes its a case of philosophizing science...anyway now to get to your argument.

One main argument I've been making is quite basic. To put in syllogistic form:

1) If the human population, in order to survive (beyond a generation or two and not have mutated babies as WannaLearn originally perhaps exaggerated in the original post), requires genetic diversity from an initial population of 300-3000+ ancestors then we would expect to see many traceable lines.

2) ALL human women existing today can be traced to one mother (Mitochondrial Eve) who existed ~100,000 years ago (an amount which mind you currently contradicts a Biblical scenario).

3) Therefore the human population today (matrilineal) did not start with 300-3000+ ancestors.

So, what physical scientific evidence can be presented to believe that such a high initial population is indeed required for current genetic diversity and correct?

1. No you would not necessarily expect that. Reason being if down a certain line a couple could not produce a daughter then the mito eve dna line is broken. That is why mito eve is a shifting title of various women, not one.

2. No, you are equating two things, dna with person. DNA is one thing, person is another. My question, is your DNA, your own DNA? No. Its half your father's, half your mother's. the same way mito eve's dna is half her father's, half her mothers, and mito eve's parents had their dna from there parents and so back you go. Mito eve is the point in dna (not person) mapping where all lines female lines converge and are not broken since we have women today.

3. Mito eve is not the MRCA of all humans. I think this is where the confusion is lying. There are other ancestors' DNA present. Its just that the female line has been broken. So we can't trace them back to mito eve but can trace them back to lets say 30000 years or 10000 years or 5000 years. Say if an only daughter begets only sons, then say 100 years later, the sons' descendants cannot trace their dna to mito eve.

Even the wiki article on Mito eve says this:

However, nuclear DNA studies indicate that the size of the ancient human population never dropped below tens of thousands. Other women living during Eve's time have descendants alive today, but at some point in the past each of their lines of descent did not produce a female, thereby breaking the mitochondrial DNA lines of descent.

I hope you can see the problem in the argument. There are other ancestor's dna present, its just that at some point the female line has been broken, that is why we DO KNOW that humans arose from more than one couple, because there is dna present of more than one person. The conclusion is without doubt, obvious.