Should one subscribe to natural materialism, then humanity belongs to the animal kingdom and we are free to deal with the existential considerations however our able minds think best. Personally, for what it is worth, I think that any quest to define, however oblique, humanity in terms of restricted set of particular genes, is a blind alley. Maybe some genes to do with vocalization and language, but I wouldn’t go there.
As I see it, classical Christianity distinguished man not by the dust by whence he arose, but by divine fiat having the image of God imprinted on soul or spirit, the breath of life being spiritual. A Christian worldview allows for the spiritual or miraculous, thus a creation event no matter how Adam is arrived at physically. That also renders moot the question of what genetic deficiencies would result in the loss of humanness.
If the first humans who had any religious awareness live 130kya, even if it was just 40kya, then the first writing would have occurred 5 1/2 to 5kya. And you think our written records would tell us anything about which came first? And what archeological information sheds any light on which came first? Flower petals in ancient graves? Wild conjecture about the meaning of cave paintings?
Yes, as does the distribution of monotheism across the world, clearly from a fairly recent Middle Eastern source. You may choose to postulate an evidence-free ancient monotheism, but you must then also postulate that it was lost until regained fairly recently, because it clearly was not present in the world at least immediately before the Egyptians (and, perhaps independently, the Hebrews) revived it.
There are just too many posts to respond to. After this, I just can’t repeat answers I’ve already given. Sorry. The story of Eve being created by being taken from Adam suggests Eve was his daughter. Simple as that. I’m not equating interracial marriage with incest. I’m equating incest in a special situation in which no one is harmed psychologically or physically and in which there isn’t even a social context to allow for social harm to be equivalent to interracial marriage.
That is not conceivable. All of our DNA is susceptible to mutation.
There is still a question of genetics vs. development. I think there is some evidence for a genetic component to diseases like schizophrenia, but I don’t know of any other strong genetic associations to other psychological disorders. I strongly suspect that how we are affected by our experiences and environment has a larger affect on our mental health than our genetics.
There could be a gene with multiple copies. However, I don’t think this scenario would really work. If function was dependent on gene copy number then mutations in single copies could be deleterious. If just a single copy of the gene can suffice then all but one copy would accumulate mutations, resulting in pseudogenes for all but one copy or evolution of the gene copies for a different function.
Everything I have seen on human intelligence and humanness is that it is a multi-gene trait.
Harshman’s comments have convinced me that the gene is more likely recessive than dominant. (Your response is referencing my statement that the gene is dominant.) As for evidence, I’m not offering any; I’m just offering this as a feasible explanation. Empirical “evidence,” if that’s what you are thinking of, is not even appropriate at this point. No “testable hypothesis” is appropriate here. I’m not trying to show that this model is more likely than any other by empirical evidence, I’m just showing that it fits all that we know of from our current science and that it fits the biblical account. If you think this is an “incomprehensible explanation,” the other contributors on this thread have understood my claims and have responded. If it was incomprehensible, they wouldn’t have been able to do so. Why can’t you?
Then it’s divorced from reality and not a solution.
It is not feasible, for all the reasons already given.
They’re appropriate as soon as you start making claims, which is exactly what you’ve done.
You have not shown that it fits all we know of current science, or the biblical account. You haven’t even attempted any formal exegesis of the biblical account, let alone attempted to verify your exegesis.
Like them, I have responded to the claims you’ve made which are comprehensible. Also like them, I have pointed out where you have made incomprehensible claims, such as your claim that Eve being made from the rib of Adam means Eve was Adam’s daughter. John Harshman already pointed out that this is apparently an idea which has only occurred to you, and is clearly not comprehensible to other people.
This is in response to my statement: “So this would not have been a genetically related moral problem for Adam and Eve because God could have simply arranged that the right sperm fertilize the right ovum to produce a healthy child.”
I have no idea what you mean by theological handwaving? What theological standard do you see that limits what I’ve said here or might say here? By genetically related moral problem I mean that we may say that one has a moral obligation to avoid incest because of the likelihood of harm, of genetic disabilities, that could result to one’s children. That problem is avoided in this scenario.
You’re whipping dead horses, Jonathan. I already admitted that we are not speaking of speciation so there is no point in bringing up John’s old post. I think I did early on use the term or spoke of producing new species, but I was mistaken if I did so. I think what I had in mind was the idea of one member of a species having a new mutation which made it human and then the others of that species which do not have that mutation eventually dying out. I was mistakenly thinking of those final members as constituting a new species. Rather, they are still part of the old species even though no one of the old species now exists who had the old non-human characteristics.
Yes that’s clear. What you’re doing is making a totally unsubstantiated claim, and attempting to support it by saying “Well God did a miracle”. So you’re attempting to support one unsubstantiated claim with another unsubstantiated claim, specifically a theological claim. That’s the theological handwaving you’re doing. Your entire model is simply fantasy.
You had just commented on my statement, “God made sure that there was no chance of deformities or infertility or other problems resulting from genetic mutations.”
Jonathan, there is nothing confused about this statement. Come on, if you can’t give a good objection, don’t pretend you can. Where is the confusion?
Josh (Swamidass) said I shouldn’t be afraid of using miracles if I feel I need to and that’s what I’m doing here. But as I explained earlier, the kind of miracle that is involved does make a difference. Those involving the least amount of interference in nature should be considered more likely since that is what we see God tends to do. For God to control the number of expressed genetic mutations an individual would have from incest should be considered a very easy miracle seeing that it’s close to a 50/50 chance anyway that an offspring by incest would have any deformities or handicaps. So my model does require some divine intervention after all. If the creation of humans was divinely guided, that would seem almost inevitable. Or should we think theistic evolution requires that humans just got here by chance?
If you can’t understand it after I’ve already explained it to you, then I don’t think you’re going to be able to see it.
So what? I disagree with him.
Believing that God was involved is one thing. I believe God was involved. Making specific claims about how God was involved, is quite another. Making specific claims about how God was involved, providing no evidence for those claims, then shouting angrily at people who aren’t convinced by your unsubstantiated claims, while demonstrating you don’t understand why unsubstantiated claims aren’t evidence, is in yet another ballpark.
You had just referred to my comment, “At any rate, we have no reason to censor Adam for taking Eve as his wife because of genetic issues.”
One of the reasons we find incest morally wrong is because of the harm is could bring to offspring. I’m just saying that that reason no longer exists in this situation.
To answer accusations like this, I cannot do much more than repeat my earlier statement. I do not think that there is nothing wrong with incest. I think there is nothing wrong with it if the social and genetic situations which make it morally wrong are absent.
