When do Humans Arise?

Oh, and @Guy_Coe, unusual collegiality is demonstrated here in this discussion group too; no one has killed anyone yet! And collegiality and peaceful co-existence is widespread through most of our current peoples and societies… the well-behaved still out number the axe-murderers. Thank God!!

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Agreed; it’s what lies within every human heart as a potential that’s being highlighted. I appreciate the opportunity to clarify!!
BTW, is a “rubber chicken murderer” any less reprehensible? ; )

I’m mostly concerned to show that a sequential reading of the first two pericopes in Genesis in no way does damage to NT theology, and, IMO, may be a better fit, exegetically, by actually elucidating the distinction Paul was making in Romans 5. Thanks for considering it, @AJRoberts !

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I am attempting to show the changes in behavior noted in early Genesis are accurately reflected in human history happening right where and when Genesis says they did. Among those changes are …

  • increase in violence - Gen6
  • transition to male-dominant societies - Gen3
  • increase in craftsmanship and inventiveness - Gen6

There are significant changes in human behavior that began in Sumer and spread across the world from there, making two distinct lines of humanity. Those who populated the planet before and lacked the above characteristics, and those who came from the events of Genesis.

The problem, @Jeremy_Christian , with labeling humanity as from “distinct” lines is if you think they persist until the presnt, you are inadvertently laying a foundation for racist conceptions --which, I’m quite sure you don’t mean; am I correct?
These days (and from, at least, the timing of the writings in the NT) we are all of one “type” of humanity, having Adam as a universal common ancestor, geneaologically… the NT emphasizes this point.
Otherwise, I’m onboard with the post above.

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My humble apologies, Jeremy, if I appear to be a bit obtuse. I am still in need of clarification. By * increase in violence - Gen6, do you actually mean advent of violence in humans or do you only mean, as you said, increase, in other words, violence was present all along and then just increased? I ask because increase implies that it existed and therefore did not begin (“began in Sumer”) at some more recent, and perhaps contested or refuted, date.

The two distinct lines of humanity you refer to again in this post is deeply worrisome to me… Could you please articulate what you are hoping to gain or assert by two distinct lines and are they still distinct somehow?

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The world has actually seen a decrease in violence.

Steven Pinker in Enlightenment Now has several chapters on the decrease in violence in the world since the end of WWII.

https://www.amazon.com/Enlightenment-Now-Science-Humanism-Progress/dp/0525427570

With the rise of civilization, there was a massive uptick in violence. War, for example, is a very recent invention.

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Despite ISIS and several civil wars, since World War II the world has seen on of the most extended period of peace. It is a familiar christian apologetic that the world is getting worse. Actually by many measures today is the best time to ever be alive on Earth for more people than ever.

True, but that is not a “christian” apologetic @Patrick. It is a very common notion put forward by all sorts of people. By many metrics, we are doing better. By others, we are doing worse. What one emphasizes is a subjective, and driven by narrative more than other concerns at the moment.

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Yeah, it’s really an unavoidable booby trap given this topic. Changes where God’s concerned are never magic “poof” 100% across the board applied. It’s an evolving process. A seed that grows into something. Where there’s changes to a group of humans, there’s going to inevitably be transition. Humanity emerged from the animal kingdom. Somewhere along the way there’s a line where that transition happened. But don’t you dare suggest any human alive today is on the other side of that line, Hitler!

And I’m not suggesting that. But regardless, this comes up. I’ve seen the calls of racism raised in discussions on this site. I’ve already been accused a couple of times and I’ve only been here a month or so. It’s going to happen. You can’t hardly discuss human development without running into it eventually.

Matthew 19:21 - Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

The humans on the other side of that “line” very much resemble what Jesus described. No care for earthly possessions. Not hung up on all the things that bind us and tie us down. The things that makes us hesitate and make sure we’ve got enough for ourselves and our loved ones before we start giving it all away. That’s what differentiates us. They are not lesser in any way. “Pre-Adamite” people are as capable as we are in every way. They just don’t have that fundamental discontentment that spurs us on to behave as we do.

We have to control things. Bend things to our will. I’m not going to just wonder around for food. I’m bringing the food and the river to me. And this river right here, this is mine. Stay out of it. That’s who we “fallen” people are. A-holes, basically.

If recognizing and pointing that out makes me racist, then I guess I’m a racist.

No problem at all, Anjeanette. My “dolphin murder” example I feel is a good comparison. Dolphins don’t have free will, yet murder happens. It doesn’t mean dolphins are evil or willfully choose to do evil. It just means the natural world is a challenging place. And brought forth challenging and complicated organisms driven by no more than the commands to “be fruitful and multiply”.

So I’m not saying human violence never happened before the fall. But, like dolphins, it wasn’t within the realm of normal human behavior. We were never savages.

But it’s in the Bronze age, right there where Sumer and Egypt came to be, that human violence as we know it today really began. That’s not an inherent human trait as many believe or assume. It’s a rather late development.

I seriously doubt it has anything to do with reason or enlightenment.

That’s about how long America has played the self-appointed police of the world and has held the threat of nuclear oblivion over everyone’s heads. It’s a stale mate between nuclear nations. It’s not like we’ve gotten better. Just scared into submission for the time being.

Give us time, we’ll get back there. We just can’t help ourselves.

It has nothing to do with a nuclear weapons stalemate. It has to do with an integrated world economy. War is too disruptive on commerce to be waged instead of negotiated away. The US and China are not a war because the world’s two largest economies need each other for trade more than could be gain in any shooting war. Russia is now a second tier economy and population. It is no longer a military power. Sure it can cause cyber trouble and take over the Crimea but it is having a hard time paying all the pensions it has to in its conquered land.

We could literally argue this all day.

War is an economy of it’s own. America has been at war consistently since the 90’s, if not earlier. It greases the gears of the industry we’re built atop of. It’s all we know. We don’t know how to exist any other way.

This is a relic of the past. It is no longer relevant in the 21st Century Global economy.

Why else would America still be at constant war?

We are not at constant war. How many 19 year old’s die in combat each year? Much less than in training missions. Compare that with nineteenth century Europe where it was a 1 in 4 chance that your son would die in a war by the age of 19.

Afghanistan - 2001 to present

Iraq - 2003 to 2011

Yeah, combat’s not the same kind of combat in these latest wars. Lower numbers doesn’t mean less war.

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That’s one of the problems. War is by remote control drone strikes. Real easy, you tell Syria that your sending in 50 Tomahawk missiles to destroy their Air Force, get your people and the Russians to safety. Today our general’s plan battles where the expected casualties are zero. Causalities are caused by malfunctions, mistakes and human errors. Limited remote control war is too easy to do. High casualty warfare is now longer tolerated by global society. Once a conflict heats up where there is a lot of causality, it is called a humanitarian crisis and stopped. The old system of allies that caused escalation of conflicts now comes in and ends the conflict “for humanitarian reasons”