To RTB’s credit they did change their model. But they still hold that one of my GA’s (a Neanderthal) wasn’t human. He may have been an ugly brute, but he was a good father to his child so I think he qualified as a human being. But RTB doesn’t think so, RTB thinks he was a non-human despite wearing (unfashionable) clothes, making (cheap) jewelry, and burying their loved one with flowers inside the grave instead of on top of the grave. Perhaps they will come around as more data is found like evidence of Neanderthal language is firmed up.
Scripture can be used for evidence as anthropological evidence does exist. (Thank you Alice) But it has to be used carefully and not as one whole blanket as in if this is factual and true then everything in Scripture is factual and true.
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Hahaha… I’m certain that you are right. I feel, in fact, as though I’ve read plenty of Neanderthal right here!! I fear, though, that distinctions like “unfashionable”, “cheap” and “ugly” fall more into the domain of theology than science. Perhaps we should take this to another thread??
GA’s: Great Ancestors?? 
I believe that there have been many non-human primates that have been great fathers, too. Great post!
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Genealogical Adams.
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Not nearly as funny as my answer.
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No, didn’t you hear - I got my DNA tested by Ancestry.com and it came back that I am 1.5% Neanderthal.
Also my maternal grandmother told me a story when I was young that her maternal grandmother told her a story when she was a child about her great great grandmother got “in trouble” with a guy who looked very different than she did. And had a child that looked very different and hence had to struggle in life.
At first I took this to be just an oral history of my family (like the Adam and Eve story of Genesis). But after getting my DNA results and learning about Genealogical Adams, I decided that one of my Genealogical Adams was a Neanderthal as it fits with the DNA data and my grandmother’s story.
So I don’t like it very much when RTB doesn’t think that one of my GA’s wasn’t human. (Note that it is my opinion that humanness goes all the way back to the first species of the Genus Homo - about 2 million years ago.)
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You could be right about all of that. Well, most of that. I’m just glad that you have been able to overcome your difficult past! Congrats to you and all of those maternal grandmothers, too.
If your kin had developed a written language, nice clothing, pretty jewelry, or exquisite cave painting 2 osmya (or so million years ago), we wouldn’t even be discussing this… it would be well-established fact. But, since they did not, and you may be the only surviving descendant, I blame you.
Maybe that’s why some folks like to be young earthers… the blame can only go so far back.
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It was a long time ago and they had it rough. The hunter gather lifestyle was hard, life was short. There was clean air and water but you had to get right up to a woolly Mammoth to jam a stone spear into its side - very dangerous.
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Neanderthals had non-written language. Try to hunt in groups without it or past down stone tool making without language. Neanderthal clothes were simple cloaks of animal hides. They didn’t piece together multiple hides like Sapiens did. And their jewelry was cheap shells and eagle talons on strings. Sapiens were more elaborate. Neanderthal cave painting shows signs of autism which might be a cold weather adaption. If Neanderthal had Autism Spectrum Disorder, it is really going to be hard to call them non-human.
I have watched spinner dolphins and pilot whales hunt in groups. They are quite articulate though, and their jewelry exquisite. Many here in Hawaii believe that they, too, are humans.
There is evidence of Homo Erectus being sailors 700,000 years ago. Really hard for a YEC to explain that.
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No, it’s easy, they just round down.
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Yes, and they communicate among the groups. But did they possess a language and then the more complex speech, the evidence doesn’t support that
H. Erectus after the flood 4350 years old. That would be such a site to see. Together with dinosaurs. Wow.
Seriously, in this day and age with the internet, how do you get a 10 year old to believe YEC?
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It’s all here I would imagine!!
It is the best thing that Freethinking Atheists have right now. Before Ark Encounter, all we had to make atheists was the the Old Testament of the Bible. Now we have Ark Encounter. Of course, the Catholic priest, bishops in Pennsylvania as well as the Pope are making as strong cases on why people should quit the Catholic Church.
If you start with a belief, strongly enough held, and build circumstances around it, cherry picking the evidence and presenting it just so, and then, just to make certain it will hold, discredit anyone who disagrees or presents evidence against it and shame them as a pariah.
That, my friend, is why it is so important that we all have a good, open dialog. We are not like them. But if we are, in any way, we will change that.
Then when they get to college - Bam! They get a two by four to the brain called Freshman Biology.
Is this typical? It seems like a tremendous amount. I’ve been hearing lately about this admixture, but I wasn’t aware it was that much. It’s functionally equivalent to having a Neanderthal great*4 grandparent.