Some History on the Adam and Eve Exchange from Mike Heiser

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I was not aware of all the exchanges on this till reading this article by an exegete. It is definitely worth a read:

Some Christian geneticists have recently concluded that, statistically, it is not possible that the current genetic landscape for human beings can be accounted for by an origin from a single pair of humans. The article by Dennis Venema that sort of started all this off was entitled, “Does Genetics Point to a Single Primal Couple?” This article was a distillation for lay people of the points discussed in a much longer journal and more technical article published in Perspectives on Science and the Christian Faith entitled, “Genesis and the Genome: Genomics Evidence for Human-Ape Common Ancestry and Ancestral Hominid Population Sizes.” This article drew many responses. The well known old-earth Christian apologetics site, Reasons to Believe, responded in a series of essays by Fazale Rana. Frankly, RTB does poorly here, a failure pointed out by both Venema and (ironically, to say the least) by young-earth creationist (and geneticist) Todd Wood. Wood simply has a better handle on the genetics material than RTB and, despite his young-earth position, candidly acknowledges that Venema’s science is solid (though he wonders about the statistics part). You can read the exchanges between RTB, Venema, and Wood here:

Venema responded to two books by Hugh Ross and Fazale Rana as they related to the issue of genetics and human evolution (November 2010):

An Evangelical Geneticist’s Critique of Reasons to Believe’s Testable Creation Model, Pt. 1

An Evangelical Geneticist’s Critique of Reasons to Believe’s Testable Creation Model, Pt. 2

Fazale Rana then responded on behalf of RTB (all December 2010):

DNA Comparisons between Humans and Chimps: A Response to Dennis Venema’s Critique of the RTB Human Origins Model, Part 1

DNA Comparisons between Humans and Chimps: A Response to the Venema Critique of the RTB Human Origins Model, Part 2

DNA Comparisons between Humans and Chimps: A Response to the Venema Critique of the RTB Human Origins Model, Part 3

DNA Comparisons between Humans and Chimps: A Response to the Venema Critique of the RTB Human Origins Model, Part 4

Todd Wood went through Rana’s responses very carefully, and shows some disturbing “confusions” and even errors. Even though he finds Venema’s work uncomfortable, it is Rana that he takes to task on the science (all early 2011):

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 1

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 2

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 3

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 4

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 5

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 6

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome part 7

Todd’s Blog: RTB and the chimp genome Part 8

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