Re: [asa] Two questions...Ayala's article

>Preston said: the any number seems to be same as the desired number
>of ancestors (2) :)
>
>I respond: I cited two. There are others. Probably as many (maybe
>5 or 10?) as there are on pop gen and the MHC. But so what?
>
>Preston said: have to go with Glenn on this. It just seems
>unreasonable to insist that no population anywhere, no matter how
>small, has remained isolated the whole time.
>
>I respond: I don't think you can "insist" on this, but it seems
>reasonably plausible. Do you have a specific example of a truly
>isolated population? As far as I'm aware, examples that have arisen
>in recent decades have turned out not to be as isolated as supposed.
>
>Preston said: But, the essential point seems to me to be, so what?
>What is the implication of a recent common ancestor if most of us
>don't actually have any DNA from that ancestor? What are we supposed
>to have inherited, a soul?
>
>I respond: Maybe -- why not? Let me flip it around: what
>difference should it make spiritually if we did all inherit DNA from
>that ancestor? Since when is "DNA" the locus of the image of God,
>or "soul," or "sin," or whatever other properties "Adam" was
>supposed uniquely to have possessed?
>
>My point in citing these studies is simply this: if a universal
>chain of ancestry to a primal pair is theologically important, that
>notion is not ruled out and can be supported. Obviously the studies
>I cited don't "prove" it, and obviously the MHC studies suggest more
>is going on than only two physical ancestors. But a "recent
>representative" view is not on this basis implausible.
>
>David W. Opderbeck
>Associate Professor of Law
>Seton Hall University Law School
Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology

The trouble I see with this is, what of the people, say, 3000 years
ago, who were not direct descendents of this supposedly theologically
important pair who lived 6000 years ago? Did they not have moral
responsibility or souls or whatever it is we are talking about?

I think they had consciences on the Kamachatka Peninsula and in
Tierra del Fuego 3000 years ago, whether they were direct descendants
of any particular recent pair or not. And remember too, that in those
simulations you quote, those MRCAs were not in the Middle East; they
were in the Far East.

This all makes me recall what I once heard someone call "gasping at straws." :)

If there was a pair who were so theologically and genealogically
important and it was related to conscience or a sense of a need to
put clothes on, whatever the temperature might be, they lived a lot
longer ago than 6000 yrs, and they weren't the only Homo sapiens
around at the time.

On the other hand, I'm just a scientist, and an obscure and
unemployed one at that. I haven't been to seminary, so maybe I just
don't know.

Is there a way to have a virtual beer together? I think I have an
idea for an internut business, about 10 years too late.

P.

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Received on Fri Feb 27 00:44:37 2009