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to RNB " African Eve에 대한 자료
[ Christian ] in KIDS
글 쓴 이(By): staire (강 민 형)
날 짜 (Date): 1999년 11월 8일 월요일 오후 05시 40분 26초
제 목(Title): to RNB " African Eve에 대한 자료
이걸 언제 다 읽으란 말이냐! 라고 생각하신다면 @@@ 표시가 있는 단락만 읽으셔도
됩니다. RNB님께서 원하시는 부분이 바로 그거겠죠? 이 글을 '과학적 창조' 페이지
제작자들에게 보여주면 어떨까 싶군요. 그 공부 안 하는 엉터리들이 과연 끝까지
읽어낼지는 의문이지만요.
* 이 글은 창조론자의 글이며 저는 이 글의 세부에 대해서 동의하지 않는 부분도
많습니다. 그리고 이 글을 여기에 올린 것은 '사이언스와 네이쳐가 아프리카
이브를 인정하지 않았다니 금시초문이다. 증거를 대라.'라는 RNB님의 요구에
따라 증거자료로서 제출한 것입니다. 그러므로 이 글의 내용에 대해 이견이
있으신 분은 저에게 말씀하지 마시고 원저자에게 직접 연락하시기 바랍니다. *
--------------------------* 여기부터 *-------------------------------
The Apple (Computer) Bites the African Eve
by Marvin Lubenow*
Institute for Creation Research, PO Box 2667, El Cajon, CA 92021
Voice: (619) 448-0900 FAX: (619) 448-3469
"Vital Articles on Science/Creation" July 1992
Copyright 1992 All Rights Reserved
The "Out of Africa," "African Eve," or "Mitochondrial Eve" theory, proposed
in 1987, has captured the popular imagination. Cover stories in magazines
gave graphic accounts of this alleged "mother of us all," said to have lived
about 200,000 years ago. Since the theory dealt with the origin of modern
humans (not the origin of all humans), biochemist Allan Wilson (University of
California, Berkeley) was a bit out of line in dubbing her "Eve." However,
that historical mistake may have actually enhanced her popularity.
Although the theory was controversial, it was hailed as an important contri-
bution by biochemistry to the understanding of human origins. It now appears
that the results of that study were statistically flawed. Newer studies do
not rule out an African origin for modern humans, but they do not favor
Africa above other parts of the Old World. It further appears that the method
utilized is incapable of determining either the date or the geographic
location of the first humans.
The theory seemed to be rather brilliantly conceived. It dealt with DNA from
energy-producing organelles called mitochondria, which are in the cell but
outside the nucleus. This mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is inherited only from
the mother. The father's mtDNA ends up "on the cutting-room floor." Hence,
there is no mixing of male and female mtDNA from generation to generation.
The Berkeley biochemists who developed the theory, Wilson, Rebecca Cann,
and Mark Stoneking, made several reasonable but unprovable assumptions.
With no mixing from generation to generation, they assumed that all changes
in the mtDNA were the result of mutations over time. It was further assumed
that these mutations occurred at a constant rate. On the basis of these
assumptions, the researchers believed they had access to a "molecular
clock." Because mtDNA is thought to mutate faster than other DNA, it is
favored because it would lend itself to a more fine-grained index of time.
The original 1987 study involved mtDNA from 136 women from many parts of the
world having various racial backgrounds. The analysis led back to a single
ancestral mtDNA molecule from a woman living in sub-Saharan Africa about
200,000 years ago. A subsequent and more rigorous 1991 study seemed to
confirm and secure the theory.
Unfortunately, there was a serpent stalking this "Eve" as well as the first
Eve. The researchers used a computer program designed to reveal a "maximum
parsimony" phylogeny. This would be the family tree with the least number
of mutational changes, based on the assumption that evolution would have
taken the most direct and efficient path -- a rather strange assumption,
considering the presumed random and haphazard nature of evolutionary change.
The computer program was, however, far more complicated than the biochemists
realized. They did not know that the result of their single computer run was
biased by the order in which the data were entered. It is now recognized
that with thousands of computer runs and with the data entered in different
random orders, an African origin for modem humans is not preferred over the
other continents. There is also the suggestion that in the original study
the biochemists were influenced in their interpretation of the computer
data by their awareness of other evidence, which seemed to them to favor an
African origin.
@@@ <--- 여깁니다!
Henry Gee, on the Editorial Staff of Nature, describes the results of the
mtDNA study as "garbage." He states that considering the number of items
involved (136 mtDNA sequences), the number of maximally parsimonious trees
exceeds one billion.[1] Geneticist Alan Templeton (Washington University)
suggests that low-level mixing among early human populations may have
scrambled the DNA sequences sufficiently so that the question of the origin
of modern humans and a date for "Eve" can never be settled by mtDNA.[2]
In a letter to Science, Mark Stoneking (one of the original researchers
who is now at Pennsylvania State University) acknowledges that "African
Eve" has been invalidated.[3] There is general recognition that Africans
have greater genetic diversity, but the significance of that fact remains
unclear.
The "African Eve" theory represented the second major attempt by biochemists
to contribute to the question of human origins. Earlier, Berkeley biochemist
Vincent Sarich estimated that the chimpanzee-human separation took place
between five and seven million years ago, based upon molecular studies.
Although that date was much later than paleoanthropologists had estimated
from fossils, Sarich's date is now almost universally accepted.
In an article written before but published after the recent challenge to
"African Eve," Wilson (who died in 1991) and Cann (now at the University of
Hawaii, Manoa) laud the virtues of molecular biology in addressing human
origins. They state: ". . . living genes must have ancestors, whereas dead
fossils may not have descendants." The molecular approach, they claim,
". . . concerns itself with a set of characteristics that is complete and
objective." In contrast, the fossil record is spotty. "Fossils cannot, in
principle, be interpreted objectively. . . ."[4] They conclude that the
method of the paleoanthropologists tends toward circular reasoning. They
are right! Creationists have expressed that fact for many years.
However, Wilson and Cann were not able to see the logical fallacy in their
molecular biology when it addressed phylogeny. This approach, known as
molecular taxonomy, molecular genetics, or the newer related field of
molecular archaeology, also traffics in circular reasoning. Molecular
genetics, hiding behind the respect we all have for the science of genetics
and the objectivity of that science, is highly infused with subjective
evolutionary assumptions. In this field, the commitment to evolution is so
complete that Wilson and Cann understand "objective evidence" as ". . .
evidence that has not been defined, at the outset, by any particular
evolutionary model."[5]
The mtDNA study of African Eve, as well as other aspects of molecular
genetics, deals with mutations in the DNA nucleotides. Perhaps we could be
forgiven for asking: "When an evolutionist looks at human DNA nucleotides,
how does he know which ones are the result of mutations and which ones
have remained unchanged?" Obviously, to answer that question he must know
what the original or ancient sequences were. Since only God is omniscient,
how does the evolutionist get the information regarding those sequences
which he believes existed millions of years ago? He uses as his guide the
DNA of the chimpanzee.[6] In other words, the studies that seek to prove
that human DNA evolved from chimp DNA start with the assumption that chimp
DNA represents the original condition (or close to it) from which human DNA
diverged. That is circularity with a vengeance!
It is also necessary for the evolutionist to determine the rate of
mutational changes in the DNA if these mutational changes are to be used
as a "molecular clock." Since there is nothing in the nuclear DNA or the
mtDNA molecules to indicate how often they mutate, we might also ask how the
evolutionist calibrates his "molecular clock." Sarich, one of the pioneers
of the molecular-clock concept, began by calculating the mutation rates of
various species ". . . whose divergence [evolution] could be reliably dated
from fossils."[7]
He then applied that calibration to the chimpanzee-human split, dating that
split at from five to seven million years ago. Using Sarich's mutation
calibrations, Wilson and Cann applied them to their mtDNA studies,
comparing ". . . the ratio of mitochondrial DNA divergence among humans to
that between humans and chimpanzees."[8] By this method, they arrived at a
date of approximately 200,000 years ago for African Eve. Hence, an
evolutionary timescale obtained from an evolutionary interpretation of
fossils was superimposed upon the DNA molecules. Once again, the
circularity is obvious. The alleged evidence for evolution from the DNA
molecules is not an independent confirmation of evolution but is, instead,
based upon an evolutionary interpretation of fossils as its starting point.
We humans are enamored with our ability to develop sophisticated experiments
and to process massive amounts of data. Our problem is that our ability to
process data has outstripped our ability to evaluate the quality of the data.
Computers are not able to generate "truth" independently, nor can they
cleanse and purify data. With the recognition that mtDNA studies are
incapable of determining the origin of modem humans, biochemists are now
turning to nuclear DNA to help them solve the problem. There are also
attempts to recover DNA from Neanderthals and other fossil humans. More and
more, molecular genetics and sophisticated computer programs are being
enlisted in the service of evolution. The results are advertised as
independent confirmations of evolution when in reality they are not.
I suspect that molecular techniques are the wave of the future for
evolutionary studies. This approach is very convincing, because it appears
to be so "scientific" to those who do not recognize the evolutionary
presuppositions.
Paleoanthropologists such as Christopher Stringer (British Museum of
Natural History) are now claiming that an African origin for modern humans
is not dependent upon mtDNA studies alone. The fossils also are said to
suggest it. However, an exhaustive survey of the human fossil evidence
does not support an African origin for modern humans. In fact, when all of
the relevant human fossil material is placed on a time-chart, even
according to the evolutionist's dates for those fossils, the results show
that humans have not evolved from a primate stock.[9] The fossil evidence
against human evolution is so strong as to effectively falsify that theory.
The Bible is God's revelation to those created in His image. Genesis is
part of that revelation. God's revelation is more than just the passing on
of information. It is the imparting of truth which humans could not know by
any other means. The failure of the "African Eve" theory is just another
illustration of the impossibility of constructing an authentic record of
human origins by scientific means. It is for this very reason that God
gave us an authentic revelation of our origins in the book of Genesis.
-- References --
[1] Henry Gee, "Statistical Cloud over African Eden," Nature, 355 (13
February 1992): 583.
[2] Marcia Barinaga, "'African Eve' Backers Beat a Retreat," Science,
255 (7 February 1992): 687.
[3] S. Blair Hedges, Sudhir Kumar, Koichiro Tamura, and Mark Stoneking,
"Human Origins and Analysis of Mitochondrial DNA Sequences," Science,
255 (7 February 1992): 737-739.
[4] Allan C. Wilson and Rebecca L. Cann, "The Recent African Genesis of
Humans," Scientific American, April 1992: 68.
[5] Wilson and Cann, 68. Emphasis added.
[6] Marcia Barinaga, "Choosing a Human Family Tree," Science,
255 (7 February 1992): 687.
[7] Wilson and Cann, 68. Bracketed material added.
[8] Wilson and Cann, 72.
[9] See Marvin L. Lubenow, Bones of Contention (Grand Rapids: Baker Book
House, to be published in December 1992). This work is the most extensive
treatment of human fossils to be published as yet by a creationist.
* Professor of Biblical Studies and Apologetics at Christian Heritage College.
----------- Prometheus, the daring and enduring...
글 쓴 이(By): staire (강 민 형)
날 짜 (Date): 1999년 11월 8일 월요일 오후 05시 40분 26초
제 목(Title): to RNB " African Eve에 대한 자료
이걸 언제 다 읽으란 말이냐! 라고 생각하신다면 @@@ 표시가 있는 단락만 읽으셔도
됩니다. RNB님께서 원하시는 부분이 바로 그거겠죠? 이 글을 '과학적 창조' 페이지
제작자들에게 보여주면 어떨까 싶군요. 그 공부 안 하는 엉터리들이 과연 끝까지
읽어낼지는 의문이지만요.
* 이 글은 창조론자의 글이며 저는 이 글의 세부에 대해서 동의하지 않는 부분도
많습니다. 그리고 이 글을 여기에 올린 것은 '사이언스와 네이쳐가 아프리카
이브를 인정하지 않았다니 금시초문이다. 증거를 대라.'라는 RNB님의 요구에
따라 증거자료로서 제출한 것입니다. 그러므로 이 글의 내용에 대해 이견이
있으신 분은 저에게 말씀하지 마시고 원저자에게 직접 연락하시기 바랍니다. *
--------------------------* 여기부터 *-------------------------------
The Apple (Computer) Bites the African Eve
by Marvin Lubenow*
Institute for Creation Research, PO Box 2667, El Cajon, CA 92021
Voice: (619) 448-0900 FAX: (619) 448-3469
"Vital Articles on Science/Creation" July 1992
Copyright 1992 All Rights Reserved
The "Out of Africa," "African Eve," or "Mitochondrial Eve" theory, proposed
in 1987, has captured the popular imagination. Cover stories in magazines
gave graphic accounts of this alleged "mother of us all," said to have lived
about 200,000 years ago. Since the theory dealt with the origin of modern
humans (not the origin of all humans), biochemist Allan Wilson (University of
California, Berkeley) was a bit out of line in dubbing her "Eve." However,
that historical mistake may have actually enhanced her popularity.
Although the theory was controversial, it was hailed as an important contri-
bution by biochemistry to the understanding of human origins. It now appears
that the results of that study were statistically flawed. Newer studies do
not rule out an African origin for modern humans, but they do not favor
Africa above other parts of the Old World. It further appears that the method
utilized is incapable of determining either the date or the geographic
location of the first humans.
The theory seemed to be rather brilliantly conceived. It dealt with DNA from
energy-producing organelles called mitochondria, which are in the cell but
outside the nucleus. This mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is inherited only from
the mother. The father's mtDNA ends up "on the cutting-room floor." Hence,
there is no mixing of male and female mtDNA from generation to generation.
The Berkeley biochemists who developed the theory, Wilson, Rebecca Cann,
and Mark Stoneking, made several reasonable but unprovable assumptions.
With no mixing from generation to generation, they assumed that all changes
in the mtDNA were the result of mutations over time. It was further assumed
that these mutations occurred at a constant rate. On the basis of these
assumptions, the researchers believed they had access to a "molecular
clock." Because mtDNA is thought to mutate faster than other DNA, it is
favored because it would lend itself to a more fine-grained index of time.
The original 1987 study involved mtDNA from 136 women from many parts of the
world having various racial backgrounds. The analysis led back to a single
ancestral mtDNA molecule from a woman living in sub-Saharan Africa about
200,000 years ago. A subsequent and more rigorous 1991 study seemed to
confirm and secure the theory.
Unfortunately, there was a serpent stalking this "Eve" as well as the first
Eve. The researchers used a computer program designed to reveal a "maximum
parsimony" phylogeny. This would be the family tree with the least number
of mutational changes, based on the assumption that evolution would have
taken the most direct and efficient path -- a rather strange assumption,
considering the presumed random and haphazard nature of evolutionary change.
The computer program was, however, far more complicated than the biochemists
realized. They did not know that the result of their single computer run was
biased by the order in which the data were entered. It is now recognized
that with thousands of computer runs and with the data entered in different
random orders, an African origin for modem humans is not preferred over the
other continents. There is also the suggestion that in the original study
the biochemists were influenced in their interpretation of the computer
data by their awareness of other evidence, which seemed to them to favor an
African origin.
@@@ <--- 여깁니다!
Henry Gee, on the Editorial Staff of Nature, describes the results of the
mtDNA study as "garbage." He states that considering the number of items
involved (136 mtDNA sequences), the number of maximally parsimonious trees
exceeds one billion.[1] Geneticist Alan Templeton (Washington University)
suggests that low-level mixing among early human populations may have
scrambled the DNA sequences sufficiently so that the question of the origin
of modern humans and a date for "Eve" can never be settled by mtDNA.[2]
In a letter to Science, Mark Stoneking (one of the original researchers
who is now at Pennsylvania State University) acknowledges that "African
Eve" has been invalidated.[3] There is general recognition that Africans
have greater genetic diversity, but the significance of that fact remains
unclear.
The "African Eve" theory represented the second major attempt by biochemists
to contribute to the question of human origins. Earlier, Berkeley biochemist
Vincent Sarich estimated that the chimpanzee-human separation took place
between five and seven million years ago, based upon molecular studies.
Although that date was much later than paleoanthropologists had estimated
from fossils, Sarich's date is now almost universally accepted.
In an article written before but published after the recent challenge to
"African Eve," Wilson (who died in 1991) and Cann (now at the University of
Hawaii, Manoa) laud the virtues of molecular biology in addressing human
origins. They state: ". . . living genes must have ancestors, whereas dead
fossils may not have descendants." The molecular approach, they claim,
". . . concerns itself with a set of characteristics that is complete and
objective." In contrast, the fossil record is spotty. "Fossils cannot, in
principle, be interpreted objectively. . . ."[4] They conclude that the
method of the paleoanthropologists tends toward circular reasoning. They
are right! Creationists have expressed that fact for many years.
However, Wilson and Cann were not able to see the logical fallacy in their
molecular biology when it addressed phylogeny. This approach, known as
molecular taxonomy, molecular genetics, or the newer related field of
molecular archaeology, also traffics in circular reasoning. Molecular
genetics, hiding behind the respect we all have for the science of genetics
and the objectivity of that science, is highly infused with subjective
evolutionary assumptions. In this field, the commitment to evolution is so
complete that Wilson and Cann understand "objective evidence" as ". . .
evidence that has not been defined, at the outset, by any particular
evolutionary model."[5]
The mtDNA study of African Eve, as well as other aspects of molecular
genetics, deals with mutations in the DNA nucleotides. Perhaps we could be
forgiven for asking: "When an evolutionist looks at human DNA nucleotides,
how does he know which ones are the result of mutations and which ones
have remained unchanged?" Obviously, to answer that question he must know
what the original or ancient sequences were. Since only God is omniscient,
how does the evolutionist get the information regarding those sequences
which he believes existed millions of years ago? He uses as his guide the
DNA of the chimpanzee.[6] In other words, the studies that seek to prove
that human DNA evolved from chimp DNA start with the assumption that chimp
DNA represents the original condition (or close to it) from which human DNA
diverged. That is circularity with a vengeance!
It is also necessary for the evolutionist to determine the rate of
mutational changes in the DNA if these mutational changes are to be used
as a "molecular clock." Since there is nothing in the nuclear DNA or the
mtDNA molecules to indicate how often they mutate, we might also ask how the
evolutionist calibrates his "molecular clock." Sarich, one of the pioneers
of the molecular-clock concept, began by calculating the mutation rates of
various species ". . . whose divergence [evolution] could be reliably dated
from fossils."[7]
He then applied that calibration to the chimpanzee-human split, dating that
split at from five to seven million years ago. Using Sarich's mutation
calibrations, Wilson and Cann applied them to their mtDNA studies,
comparing ". . . the ratio of mitochondrial DNA divergence among humans to
that between humans and chimpanzees."[8] By this method, they arrived at a
date of approximately 200,000 years ago for African Eve. Hence, an
evolutionary timescale obtained from an evolutionary interpretation of
fossils was superimposed upon the DNA molecules. Once again, the
circularity is obvious. The alleged evidence for evolution from the DNA
molecules is not an independent confirmation of evolution but is, instead,
based upon an evolutionary interpretation of fossils as its starting point.
We humans are enamored with our ability to develop sophisticated experiments
and to process massive amounts of data. Our problem is that our ability to
process data has outstripped our ability to evaluate the quality of the data.
Computers are not able to generate "truth" independently, nor can they
cleanse and purify data. With the recognition that mtDNA studies are
incapable of determining the origin of modem humans, biochemists are now
turning to nuclear DNA to help them solve the problem. There are also
attempts to recover DNA from Neanderthals and other fossil humans. More and
more, molecular genetics and sophisticated computer programs are being
enlisted in the service of evolution. The results are advertised as
independent confirmations of evolution when in reality they are not.
I suspect that molecular techniques are the wave of the future for
evolutionary studies. This approach is very convincing, because it appears
to be so "scientific" to those who do not recognize the evolutionary
presuppositions.
Paleoanthropologists such as Christopher Stringer (British Museum of
Natural History) are now claiming that an African origin for modern humans
is not dependent upon mtDNA studies alone. The fossils also are said to
suggest it. However, an exhaustive survey of the human fossil evidence
does not support an African origin for modern humans. In fact, when all of
the relevant human fossil material is placed on a time-chart, even
according to the evolutionist's dates for those fossils, the results show
that humans have not evolved from a primate stock.[9] The fossil evidence
against human evolution is so strong as to effectively falsify that theory.
The Bible is God's revelation to those created in His image. Genesis is
part of that revelation. God's revelation is more than just the passing on
of information. It is the imparting of truth which humans could not know by
any other means. The failure of the "African Eve" theory is just another
illustration of the impossibility of constructing an authentic record of
human origins by scientific means. It is for this very reason that God
gave us an authentic revelation of our origins in the book of Genesis.
-- References --
[1] Henry Gee, "Statistical Cloud over African Eden," Nature, 355 (13
February 1992): 583.
[2] Marcia Barinaga, "'African Eve' Backers Beat a Retreat," Science,
255 (7 February 1992): 687.
[3] S. Blair Hedges, Sudhir Kumar, Koichiro Tamura, and Mark Stoneking,
"Human Origins and Analysis of Mitochondrial DNA Sequences," Science,
255 (7 February 1992): 737-739.
[4] Allan C. Wilson and Rebecca L. Cann, "The Recent African Genesis of
Humans," Scientific American, April 1992: 68.
[5] Wilson and Cann, 68. Emphasis added.
[6] Marcia Barinaga, "Choosing a Human Family Tree," Science,
255 (7 February 1992): 687.
[7] Wilson and Cann, 68. Bracketed material added.
[8] Wilson and Cann, 72.
[9] See Marvin L. Lubenow, Bones of Contention (Grand Rapids: Baker Book
House, to be published in December 1992). This work is the most extensive
treatment of human fossils to be published as yet by a creationist.
* Professor of Biblical Studies and Apologetics at Christian Heritage College.
----------- Prometheus, the daring and enduring...
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