is there a link between people of color, melatonin, melanin, and the pineal gland?
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Detroit,
That's a rather broad question, but I will take a gamble that you're asking primarily about eth pineal gland.
In short, then, no.
The pineal gland is a tiny little thing, somewhere between the size of a grain of rice and a pea. Nevertheless, it's an important organ with several regulatory functions due to its secretion of melatonin and serotonin. These hormones regulate sleep, the onset of puberty, and our susceptibility to depression, and while those are important functions there is no other connection between the pineal gland and anything else. As if there would have to be, but there isn't. The fact that it has as much melanin in it as the, say, substantia nigra, is not of any importance.
The pineal gland is found in the posterior wall of the third ventricle, a cavity of the brain that is part of the cerebrospinal fluid circulating system. It lies in almost the center of the brain on the front of the cerebellum. On this wall in the midbrain it is connected to a stalk that rises from the floor of that part of the brain and has connections to the hypothalamus and to the optic system, and seems to help the hypothalamus regulated our sleep/wake (diurnal or circadian) cycle. It has no other known function.
To help regulate our diurnal cycle, it secretes melatonin, which affects the hypothalamus. It gets signals from the optic nerve, and depending on the amount of nerve signals received from it (how much light the eyes are receiving), determines how much it secretes the hormone melatonin. Melatonin blood levels reach their peak in the small hours of the morning.
Because it is dependent on light from the eyes, the melatonin secretion and therefore the circadian rhythm of the blind drifts, sometimes making them wide awake at night. Our natural diurnal cycle seems to have a period somewhat longer than 24 hours, and the reception of light by the eyes regulates the gland which regulates our sleep/wake system.
Because of its serotonin production, it effects clinical (chemically-based, natural) depression. The more serotonin (up to a point, of course), the less depression.
Because it is connected to the optic system, ancients sometimes believed that it had something to do with seeing the spiritual realm, thus it is sometimes known as the "third eye." But that was a guess, because of course the ancients couldn't observe its working in the living person. Moreover, all vertebrates have a pineal gland, and not many of them are very spiritual.
That was not the only guess as to its use. Second-century Galen thought it might regulate the flow of thought from one side of the brain to the other. Descartes thought it might be the "interpreter" of sight.
Because it is dark in color, sometimes people try to guess again about the significance of that, and say that it shows the superiority of the melanin-endowed over the melanin-challenged, or try to overstate the importance of melanin. It's not a good idea to do that. The trouble with that hypothesis is that there is no difference between the pineal glands of whites and blacks. Its look, location, size, function, and level of function is the same in all races. It calcifies at the same rate, and thus its function is reduced at the same rate in whites as it is in blacks.
If you saw a pineal gland from an AA and one from a white person, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference because there is no difference.
Does this begin to answer your question? What did I leave out?
That's a rather broad question, but I will take a gamble that you're asking primarily about eth pineal gland.
In short, then, no.
The pineal gland is a tiny little thing, somewhere between the size of a grain of rice and a pea. Nevertheless, it's an important organ with several regulatory functions due to its secretion of melatonin and serotonin. These hormones regulate sleep, the onset of puberty, and our susceptibility to depression, and while those are important functions there is no other connection between the pineal gland and anything else. As if there would have to be, but there isn't. The fact that it has as much melanin in it as the, say, substantia nigra, is not of any importance.
The pineal gland is found in the posterior wall of the third ventricle, a cavity of the brain that is part of the cerebrospinal fluid circulating system. It lies in almost the center of the brain on the front of the cerebellum. On this wall in the midbrain it is connected to a stalk that rises from the floor of that part of the brain and has connections to the hypothalamus and to the optic system, and seems to help the hypothalamus regulated our sleep/wake (diurnal or circadian) cycle. It has no other known function.
To help regulate our diurnal cycle, it secretes melatonin, which affects the hypothalamus. It gets signals from the optic nerve, and depending on the amount of nerve signals received from it (how much light the eyes are receiving), determines how much it secretes the hormone melatonin. Melatonin blood levels reach their peak in the small hours of the morning.
Because it is dependent on light from the eyes, the melatonin secretion and therefore the circadian rhythm of the blind drifts, sometimes making them wide awake at night. Our natural diurnal cycle seems to have a period somewhat longer than 24 hours, and the reception of light by the eyes regulates the gland which regulates our sleep/wake system.
Because of its serotonin production, it effects clinical (chemically-based, natural) depression. The more serotonin (up to a point, of course), the less depression.
Because it is connected to the optic system, ancients sometimes believed that it had something to do with seeing the spiritual realm, thus it is sometimes known as the "third eye." But that was a guess, because of course the ancients couldn't observe its working in the living person. Moreover, all vertebrates have a pineal gland, and not many of them are very spiritual.
That was not the only guess as to its use. Second-century Galen thought it might regulate the flow of thought from one side of the brain to the other. Descartes thought it might be the "interpreter" of sight.
Because it is dark in color, sometimes people try to guess again about the significance of that, and say that it shows the superiority of the melanin-endowed over the melanin-challenged, or try to overstate the importance of melanin. It's not a good idea to do that. The trouble with that hypothesis is that there is no difference between the pineal glands of whites and blacks. Its look, location, size, function, and level of function is the same in all races. It calcifies at the same rate, and thus its function is reduced at the same rate in whites as it is in blacks.
If you saw a pineal gland from an AA and one from a white person, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference because there is no difference.
Does this begin to answer your question? What did I leave out?
quote:
Originally posted by detroit1:
is there a link between people of color, melatonin, melanin, and the pineal gland?
Hi detroit1!
Read "The Science & Myth of the Melanin"
by T.Owens Moore, Ph. D.
It's a great book. T. Moore shows how the functional role for melanin lies beyond skin pigmentation, 90% of melanin resides within our brain! Aside from being the pigment on the external surface of the body and being human's only true protection from the natural rays of the sun. T. Moore says melanin also possesses the unique ability to absorb various energy sources and convert them into re-usable energy. Melanin is high forms of vibration-sophisticated psychochemical akin to computer engines that can absorb and process high rates of vibrations...Now, I understand how our Black ancestors (the indigenous people of this planet) have been able to reuse these energies in the past for the benefit of man in the expression of advanced civilizations!
Read the book, it's good work!
AfroMan
This is bunk.
All chemicals have the ability to absorb and re-emit energy. All chemicals emit that energy at characteristic wavelengths. Melanin is no different and no more special than any other.
It's usefulness is in protecting the skin from UV, an adaptation that we acquired from long centuries in a sunny climate.
Besides, whites have just as much melanin in their brains as we have in ours. Whatever melanin can do in our brains whites can do in theirs. So if we are somehow more "spiritual" than whites, it has to be becasue of something other than melanin, since they have as much as we do. All this mumbo-jumbo about absorbing high frequency energy and converting it into "reusable" (what does that mean, exactly?) energy is silly. We don't live on energy like that. We are chemical burners, always have been. Anything other than the visible wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum we cannot use and is damaging one way or another.
The problem with Dr. Moore's two books (his most recent is "Dark Matter, Dark Secrets") is when he departs from the scientific to speculate (and that's what he does) about the material-spiritual relationship of melanin.
It is guesswork. While he is largely right about melanin's role in the brain and the nervous system (he is a psychologist, not a medical doctor nor a physiology researcher), he gets out of his depth when he tuns to the cosmic-energy function of melanin. What comsic energy? The only cosmic rays that we know of are lethal to us. Melanin doesn't help there. Any other cosmic energy is guesswork.
There is absolutely no evidence that that is possible, let alone that it happens.
All chemicals have the ability to absorb and re-emit energy. All chemicals emit that energy at characteristic wavelengths. Melanin is no different and no more special than any other.
It's usefulness is in protecting the skin from UV, an adaptation that we acquired from long centuries in a sunny climate.
Besides, whites have just as much melanin in their brains as we have in ours. Whatever melanin can do in our brains whites can do in theirs. So if we are somehow more "spiritual" than whites, it has to be becasue of something other than melanin, since they have as much as we do. All this mumbo-jumbo about absorbing high frequency energy and converting it into "reusable" (what does that mean, exactly?) energy is silly. We don't live on energy like that. We are chemical burners, always have been. Anything other than the visible wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum we cannot use and is damaging one way or another.
The problem with Dr. Moore's two books (his most recent is "Dark Matter, Dark Secrets") is when he departs from the scientific to speculate (and that's what he does) about the material-spiritual relationship of melanin.
It is guesswork. While he is largely right about melanin's role in the brain and the nervous system (he is a psychologist, not a medical doctor nor a physiology researcher), he gets out of his depth when he tuns to the cosmic-energy function of melanin. What comsic energy? The only cosmic rays that we know of are lethal to us. Melanin doesn't help there. Any other cosmic energy is guesswork.
There is absolutely no evidence that that is possible, let alone that it happens.
Afroman: Read "The Science & Myth of the Melanin"
by T.Owens Moore, Ph. D.
ANAKSANAMUN: Excellent reference. Although I have not read the book, I see by the jist of what you have posted that this author is right on. Those of us who are already aware of the power of melanin, understand full well, that there are those who are of the negative energy who would try to put us off from the true knowledge, so that we will not reclaim our past and find out who we truly our. There are those also who would rely on the false teachings of the devils, rather than do the work it takes to find out about the power of self.
by T.Owens Moore, Ph. D.
ANAKSANAMUN: Excellent reference. Although I have not read the book, I see by the jist of what you have posted that this author is right on. Those of us who are already aware of the power of melanin, understand full well, that there are those who are of the negative energy who would try to put us off from the true knowledge, so that we will not reclaim our past and find out who we truly our. There are those also who would rely on the false teachings of the devils, rather than do the work it takes to find out about the power of self.
I don't sweat it Anaksanamum. I don't have the time to debate antagonists. Sometimes I read their posts, more often I don't. I'm more interested in things to uplift me, my people and ancestors.
The research of T.Owens Moore is quite notable. Thanks to his work and some other authorities I came to realize that melanin, though 90% of melanin does reside within our brain, is still higher in Black folks. Its power is kept secret because of its importance to Human Survival. It's no wonder that black folks when properly stimulated excel in most areas, including music, science and technology. Aside from being human's only true protection from the natural rays of the sun, it also possesses the unique ability to absorb various Cosmic energy sources and convert them into re-usable energy.
The universe is singing a melody or song, well known to our ancients ancestors on Earth who were super-humans among the stars. Melanin act as a semiconductor to transform energy. The melanized land, plants and animals all sing into existence. Unification via melanin is mythically profound, it is a primitive mode of expression of the rainbow-Serpent, the Spirit of the One and only Mind in the Universe, the Mind of God to whom the Mayas referred to as Quetzalcoatl the Great Spirit.
Just remember...self-castigating is not the way of our ancestors.
AfroMan.
[This message was edited by Afroman on November 15, 2003 at 01:36 AM.]
The research of T.Owens Moore is quite notable. Thanks to his work and some other authorities I came to realize that melanin, though 90% of melanin does reside within our brain, is still higher in Black folks. Its power is kept secret because of its importance to Human Survival. It's no wonder that black folks when properly stimulated excel in most areas, including music, science and technology. Aside from being human's only true protection from the natural rays of the sun, it also possesses the unique ability to absorb various Cosmic energy sources and convert them into re-usable energy.
The universe is singing a melody or song, well known to our ancients ancestors on Earth who were super-humans among the stars. Melanin act as a semiconductor to transform energy. The melanized land, plants and animals all sing into existence. Unification via melanin is mythically profound, it is a primitive mode of expression of the rainbow-Serpent, the Spirit of the One and only Mind in the Universe, the Mind of God to whom the Mayas referred to as Quetzalcoatl the Great Spirit.
Just remember...self-castigating is not the way of our ancestors.
AfroMan.
Believe it if you wish, gentlemen, but it is wrong. YOu have no argumetns in your last two posts, no attempt at presenting evidence. You are only asserting that something is true (the song of the universe, melanin is a semiconductor) without showing how it can be so.
As a result, what you present is not fact but wishful thinking. This is not self-castigating, for objecting to an untrue belief is not self-castigating. There are plenty of reasons to be proud of being black. We don't have to believe in a fantasy that everybody knowledgeable knows to be false to be happy that we are what we are and to strive to be better.
Tikela melamu.
As a result, what you present is not fact but wishful thinking. This is not self-castigating, for objecting to an untrue belief is not self-castigating. There are plenty of reasons to be proud of being black. We don't have to believe in a fantasy that everybody knowledgeable knows to be false to be happy that we are what we are and to strive to be better.
Tikela melamu.
Melesi,
There are plenty of certified indigenous Professors (not some W.A.S.P. University people) who know this information already, so this is nothing. It is just you who don't choose to accept the truth and that is okay. Just like your oppressor-indoctrinator, you are too pretentious to partake in any 'afrocentered' scientific or metaphysical discussion.
AfroMan.
There are plenty of certified indigenous Professors (not some W.A.S.P. University people) who know this information already, so this is nothing. It is just you who don't choose to accept the truth and that is okay. Just like your oppressor-indoctrinator, you are too pretentious to partake in any 'afrocentered' scientific or metaphysical discussion.
AfroMan.
And just what kind of discussion is this that we both are participating in?
I'm asking you to prove your point. This was the third post in a row in which you didn't not provide proof. Oh, ou mentioned a book, and that's good, but what does hte book say? IF we are so much more melanin-brained than white people are, just where is this melanin that we have that white people do not have? I say that there is just as much melanin in our brains as there is in white ones. If that is the case, then there is no mental advantage from it that we have that whites do not.
Now, I'm asking you to prove me wrong. I would like to think that we have better brains than white people do, but I do not see any evidence for it at all. Can you find it?
I'm asking you to prove your point. This was the third post in a row in which you didn't not provide proof. Oh, ou mentioned a book, and that's good, but what does hte book say? IF we are so much more melanin-brained than white people are, just where is this melanin that we have that white people do not have? I say that there is just as much melanin in our brains as there is in white ones. If that is the case, then there is no mental advantage from it that we have that whites do not.
Now, I'm asking you to prove me wrong. I would like to think that we have better brains than white people do, but I do not see any evidence for it at all. Can you find it?
Melesi "It's usefulness is in protecting the skin from UV, an adaptation that we acquired from long centuries in a sunny climate."
Can you explain this, are you suggesting we started off without Melanin thus we were all white at one time?
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Can you explain this, are you suggesting we started off without Melanin thus we were all white at one time?
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Faheem,
Not necessarily. Adaptation is not uniform nor does it proceed according to our common sense.
From our perspective it apears to just happen. Whatever we cannot predict looks like chance to us whether it is or not. But for the moment it looks like chance. That means that, whatever we were at the beginning--and we have no idea what that might have been--being out more or less in the open in Africa would have selected for those who were darker than others.
Ultraviolet sunlight depletes folic acid in our bodies. Without folic acid, or with a too-low level of it, babies die or are born weak and with neural tube defects (like spina bifida), and the genetic family without sufficient melanin in a sunny climate will not have children survive to have their own children. Thus the line dies.
Hence darkness is an adaptation like all other ones, to make sure the genetic line survives.
The presence of predominately light-skinned people in the more northern areas of the world shows that their adpatation was in another direction, to less melanin in the skin so that sunlight could penetrate their skin and manufacture vitamin D to prevent bone malformations like rickets.
Skin color then is an adaptation. South American Indians, who spend their lives in the rain forest, are lighter than Africans because they don't get as much sunlight and so have adapted for that environment.
And the chimpanzee is an interesting case, for this dark-furred forest creature has light, almost white skin.
Even though we cannot say for sure, my guess is that we started out dark. Australopithecus would have faced the same adaptive pressures as we do, so when we developed, we would most likely have been dark, perhaps even black. But over the couple of millenia since then, our blackness would have been kept and even strengthened because of our continued adaptation to the climate of the open equatorial regions.
Adapatation never ends. We continue to do so. AND that means, I would be willing to bet, that, if we lived here for another million years without mixing with more recent arrivals from Africa, we would lighten.
But then, a million years is a long time.
Not necessarily. Adaptation is not uniform nor does it proceed according to our common sense.
From our perspective it apears to just happen. Whatever we cannot predict looks like chance to us whether it is or not. But for the moment it looks like chance. That means that, whatever we were at the beginning--and we have no idea what that might have been--being out more or less in the open in Africa would have selected for those who were darker than others.
Ultraviolet sunlight depletes folic acid in our bodies. Without folic acid, or with a too-low level of it, babies die or are born weak and with neural tube defects (like spina bifida), and the genetic family without sufficient melanin in a sunny climate will not have children survive to have their own children. Thus the line dies.
Hence darkness is an adaptation like all other ones, to make sure the genetic line survives.
The presence of predominately light-skinned people in the more northern areas of the world shows that their adpatation was in another direction, to less melanin in the skin so that sunlight could penetrate their skin and manufacture vitamin D to prevent bone malformations like rickets.
Skin color then is an adaptation. South American Indians, who spend their lives in the rain forest, are lighter than Africans because they don't get as much sunlight and so have adapted for that environment.
And the chimpanzee is an interesting case, for this dark-furred forest creature has light, almost white skin.
Even though we cannot say for sure, my guess is that we started out dark. Australopithecus would have faced the same adaptive pressures as we do, so when we developed, we would most likely have been dark, perhaps even black. But over the couple of millenia since then, our blackness would have been kept and even strengthened because of our continued adaptation to the climate of the open equatorial regions.
Adapatation never ends. We continue to do so. AND that means, I would be willing to bet, that, if we lived here for another million years without mixing with more recent arrivals from Africa, we would lighten.
But then, a million years is a long time.
Melesi, I do not necessarily by the adaptation spill for if this was the case then those Arabs of light complexion that have been in parts of Africa and the so-called middle east for centuries would have darker skin, there are some Arabs that do but many that do not. Even the Native American skin does not reflect acclimatized complexion as explained in your theory. I do understand that when the sun hit skin that has melanin present that skin gets darker but I do not believe that pigmentation is lost because of the change in location. This topic is one that most scientist and anthropologist can not agree on being that a Black man and a Black woman can have a child that is for all tense and purpose white, however we call the child Albino and the child is considered to be suffering from lack of pigmentation or melanin. While the albino is seen as an abnormal child because his or her lack of melanin, the Caucasian essentially is the epitome of this abnormality in that not only is their skin recessive but their blue eyes and blond hair is recessive
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Faheem,
So it would seem at first glance, but albinism is quite different from being white-skinned. There are other problems that albinos have that the general run of white people do not.
As I said, adaptation does not proceed at a uniform pace nor according to our commonsense expectations. Who was it who said that common sense is only that layer of prejudice laid down in the mind before the age of eighteen? I don' tagree with that, but it has an element of truth to it. We espect what we've come to expect. But adaptation doesn't ask our opinion.
Arabs do have lighter skin than we do, and some are quite dark. Remember, it's only been about 20,000 years since the appearance of homo sapiens sapiens, time for some adaptation but not all. Those adaptations that directly and quickly affect the birthrate will happen fastest, and the lack of folic acid or the lack of vitamin D will do that. It's either adapt or die off, and we've had about, what, 15,000 years or so (maybe a little more?) to migrate from Africa to Europe?
When I said what I did about oru growing lighter in the next million years, I was speaking a little broadly, for there are two things about our rate of adaptation that will affect it today:
1. Transportation, and
2. medicine.
1. We travel a lot and mix our genes quite a bit, in ways and to amounts that has never been done in the history of the earth. That will have an effect on our adaptation because the effects of nature on local populations is limited by our travel.
2. Our medicine eases adaptive pressures on us to a very large extent. If women in burkhas in Cincinnati are getting rickets (and they are--there's a rise in rickets in large temperate-climate cities here, in Europe, and in Australia among women and children who are shielded from the sun and who do not drink vitamin D-fortified milk), they can just get vitamin D in a pill or a glass of milk. If a white missionary in Republic of Congo loses to much folic acid, she can just cover up or wear sunblock and take a pill.
However, these show the adaptations which we have made for our different climates.
Native American skin is acclimatized to their environment because the US does not get the amount of sunlight that equatorial Africa does. Check out the insolation maps available and see how much less solar energy falls on America as opposed to Uganda.
Lack of melanin is an adaptation. Pigmentation is lost in the white because of where he lived for how long a time. That's not albinism. Albinism is a well-known and well-charted genetic condition. We can tell just what genes are affected, too. Most whites do not have that genetic characteristic. Therefore they are not albinos. And African American albino will look like an African American, just with light skin. A Cacausian albino will look like a Cacausian, just with white skin and very likely hair, too.
There are varying degrees of albinism. Not all of them are the stereotypical white-hair-blue-eyed person.
But one thing they all share--since they do not have melanin in their skin (or at least it's greatly reduced) they all have a much higher risk of skin cancer and of blindness from retinal damage from sunlight, for our adaptation helps against that, too.
Yes, genetically the light skin, hair, and eyes is recessive, but that only is in regards to the gene's expression. The gene is there, it's just "dormant." It is not expressed. It's not a fault, and it doesn't mean anything else except that it is not expressed.
So it would seem at first glance, but albinism is quite different from being white-skinned. There are other problems that albinos have that the general run of white people do not.
As I said, adaptation does not proceed at a uniform pace nor according to our commonsense expectations. Who was it who said that common sense is only that layer of prejudice laid down in the mind before the age of eighteen? I don' tagree with that, but it has an element of truth to it. We espect what we've come to expect. But adaptation doesn't ask our opinion.
Arabs do have lighter skin than we do, and some are quite dark. Remember, it's only been about 20,000 years since the appearance of homo sapiens sapiens, time for some adaptation but not all. Those adaptations that directly and quickly affect the birthrate will happen fastest, and the lack of folic acid or the lack of vitamin D will do that. It's either adapt or die off, and we've had about, what, 15,000 years or so (maybe a little more?) to migrate from Africa to Europe?
When I said what I did about oru growing lighter in the next million years, I was speaking a little broadly, for there are two things about our rate of adaptation that will affect it today:
1. Transportation, and
2. medicine.
1. We travel a lot and mix our genes quite a bit, in ways and to amounts that has never been done in the history of the earth. That will have an effect on our adaptation because the effects of nature on local populations is limited by our travel.
2. Our medicine eases adaptive pressures on us to a very large extent. If women in burkhas in Cincinnati are getting rickets (and they are--there's a rise in rickets in large temperate-climate cities here, in Europe, and in Australia among women and children who are shielded from the sun and who do not drink vitamin D-fortified milk), they can just get vitamin D in a pill or a glass of milk. If a white missionary in Republic of Congo loses to much folic acid, she can just cover up or wear sunblock and take a pill.
However, these show the adaptations which we have made for our different climates.
Native American skin is acclimatized to their environment because the US does not get the amount of sunlight that equatorial Africa does. Check out the insolation maps available and see how much less solar energy falls on America as opposed to Uganda.
Lack of melanin is an adaptation. Pigmentation is lost in the white because of where he lived for how long a time. That's not albinism. Albinism is a well-known and well-charted genetic condition. We can tell just what genes are affected, too. Most whites do not have that genetic characteristic. Therefore they are not albinos. And African American albino will look like an African American, just with light skin. A Cacausian albino will look like a Cacausian, just with white skin and very likely hair, too.
There are varying degrees of albinism. Not all of them are the stereotypical white-hair-blue-eyed person.
But one thing they all share--since they do not have melanin in their skin (or at least it's greatly reduced) they all have a much higher risk of skin cancer and of blindness from retinal damage from sunlight, for our adaptation helps against that, too.
Yes, genetically the light skin, hair, and eyes is recessive, but that only is in regards to the gene's expression. The gene is there, it's just "dormant." It is not expressed. It's not a fault, and it doesn't mean anything else except that it is not expressed.
There seem to be an inherent contradiction in your thesis Melesi, Your thesis supposes that Black skin became white due to migration to other parts of the Earth like Europe; where the sun does shine mind you just not to the degree it shines in Equatorial Africa, however at the same time you are also suggesting that our Black skin is an adaptation in and of itself because of Equatorial Africa thus its original state is not as dark as it is. What is the original state?
The whole idea of genetic change due to migration is still a thesis and has not been proven and I believe can not be proven; it is merely guess work or a projection of what would happen if what is believed to make it happen is true. While migration in your thesis Melesi causes skin to loose its pigmentation and melanin, does this migration also cause Blue eyes and Blond hair? What acclimatized behavior is expressed in the changing of hair and eye color? What benefit is their in having those things in areas outside equatorial Africa?
Medicines have existed for years of course not in the degree to which they exist today but there have always been medicines, so why do you believe the medicines of today would hinder such changes as expressed in your thesis? Is it that our medicines today are stronger? While human transportation exceed transportation of old, the segment of modern population that is migrating between hemispheres is not so great that modern transportation and travel should hinder the end result of your thesis if in fact it is true.
What proof is there that melanin was lost in whites because of migration? If homo-sapiens only been on the earth for 20,000 years as stated in your thesis should we not see the coming of changes in modern man and woman since there are millions of humans that have been systematically relocated by way of slavery and or choice? What in science suggest that Dark skin men and women could not survive in Europe or any part of the Earth and the only way to survive was to have lighter skin, blond hair and blue eyes?
I will stop their and wait for a response, While some of what you say make sense I believe for the sake of white people being unable to explain their existence this whole idea of migration causing skin pigmentation loss was created, but so many questions are still unanswered? If nappy hair as found commonly on the head of Black men and women is unable to survive outside of Africa, shouldn't we see signs of change on our heads? but wait not all Africans have nappy hair, just look at men and women from Somalia. They are as Black as any African but their hair is curly. For your thesis to hold true, skin, hair and eye change must be explained and I do not believe that is possible but I was wrong one time so maybe the second time is near!
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
The whole idea of genetic change due to migration is still a thesis and has not been proven and I believe can not be proven; it is merely guess work or a projection of what would happen if what is believed to make it happen is true. While migration in your thesis Melesi causes skin to loose its pigmentation and melanin, does this migration also cause Blue eyes and Blond hair? What acclimatized behavior is expressed in the changing of hair and eye color? What benefit is their in having those things in areas outside equatorial Africa?
Medicines have existed for years of course not in the degree to which they exist today but there have always been medicines, so why do you believe the medicines of today would hinder such changes as expressed in your thesis? Is it that our medicines today are stronger? While human transportation exceed transportation of old, the segment of modern population that is migrating between hemispheres is not so great that modern transportation and travel should hinder the end result of your thesis if in fact it is true.
What proof is there that melanin was lost in whites because of migration? If homo-sapiens only been on the earth for 20,000 years as stated in your thesis should we not see the coming of changes in modern man and woman since there are millions of humans that have been systematically relocated by way of slavery and or choice? What in science suggest that Dark skin men and women could not survive in Europe or any part of the Earth and the only way to survive was to have lighter skin, blond hair and blue eyes?
I will stop their and wait for a response, While some of what you say make sense I believe for the sake of white people being unable to explain their existence this whole idea of migration causing skin pigmentation loss was created, but so many questions are still unanswered? If nappy hair as found commonly on the head of Black men and women is unable to survive outside of Africa, shouldn't we see signs of change on our heads? but wait not all Africans have nappy hair, just look at men and women from Somalia. They are as Black as any African but their hair is curly. For your thesis to hold true, skin, hair and eye change must be explained and I do not believe that is possible but I was wrong one time so maybe the second time is near!
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Faheem,
Adaptation is not always easy to imagine, partly because of the way that it is sometimes taught by people who don't quite understand it themselves to people who have no need to study it extensively. As a result, it sometimes puzzles us.
Genetic adaptation is the result of what looks like trial and error changes in the gene. Everything living has come to its state and condition by a long process of change. Since "DNA makes RNA makes protein" (and since protein runs everything in our bodies) is the oversimplified but basically correct way of understanding how our genetics works on the molecular level, DNA is very important to understand.
We show much of the past in our genes. We all have a great number of genes that no longer work, genes that have just "turned off" and do nothing but just hang around in our DNA. These genes are called "introns" and everything living has them. We have a bunch. When experimenting with the introns of hornbills some years ago, scientists "turned on" some of these old genes in embryonic hornbills, and the birds were hatched with small teeth and scaly-feathery tails.
I wonder what would happen if some of ours were turned on?
Anyway, the point here is that we are all the product of a great deal of genetic change, and the characteristics of these changes have not changed. We still mutate genetically. Most mutataions are crippling or dangerous or even lethal to us, and so these changes often are not passed on to our children, since these people most of the time do not have any.
But other changes go on all the time, just extremely slowly.
What were we like "originally"?
We don't know. Who is the "original" one? An Eve has been postulated, and it makes sense that an Eve and an Adam existed. Since we can genetically trace European and Asian lineages back to seven women, it makes sense that we could continue the look back in tme to discover the common mother of us all. I don't know that we have actually done that, however. It would be very hard to do.
But as I say, I think it most likely that she would have been a little hominid, probably quite hairy and most likely dark skinned, though not neccessarily. Chimps, as I pointed out, are not (they are light skinned), and they are very closely related to us, having split off from the line that became us about 6 million years ago. Gorillas, also closely related to us, are not.
So what did we look like "originally"? No one knows.
Does it really matter? If you think it does, why do you think so?
Genetic change due to migration may still be a thesis, but it's a very strong and reasonable one. Since we can trace Asio-European mitochondrial DNA to seven women, who fanned out across the continent over a period of thousands of years--from it appears an African origin--there really is no other explanation but genetic change due to environmental pressures. Since we know that genetic adaptation happens--diseases arise and bacteria become resistant to antibiotics--I don' tsee the problem with thinking that it happens in us, too. We are not different molecularly from the other creatures on this planet. We even share 25% of our DNA with daffodils. It isn't mere migration that causes people to lose their melanin, it's migration and then long living in an environment of less sun than exists in the motherland. That is an environmental pressure that kills off the dark-skinned. As for blond hair and blue eyes, I said that genetic adaptation is not commonsensical. It looks random. What we do know is that in northern climates light-skinned people--often but not always with light hair and eyes, too--predominate, and it is a useful condition. Light-skinned people in Africa die off without folic acid or at least coverings. Dark-skinned people in northern places die off without vitamin D.
Medicine is not at all as it was once upon a time. We know so much more and can treat so much more precisely. Where would a light-skinned person in Central African Republic find enough folic acid to bring to birth all healthy children? Where would a Somali find enough vitamin D to keep her children healthy in Germany? Yet all they have to do now is to take a pill. That couldn't be done 10,000 years ago.
We can keep alive people who would have died from genetic causes--the state of an immune system is often determined by genetics--and thus keep them alive long enough to pass on the genes because we can control the symptoms those genes cause.
Our medicine is good enough now to change the course of human adaptation. It will go on, but in a way different from the way it has up to now always done.
I did not mean to say that homo sapiens has been around only for 20,000 years. I mistyped that. It should have been 120,000 years. We haven't changed a great deal in that time, the majority of the change coming in Europe because of the Ice Age that those descendants of ours went through. Noticable change occurs slowly.
As a result (please remember that adaptation occurs when it keeps kids alive, and the genetic characteristic that has themost kids who make it to adulthood to have their own kids is the line that becomes predominant), we would not see many changes in our short history of 5000 years (that's how long we humand have been writing).
This is not the idea of whites desperate to justify their existence. It's just plain fact. We change. We adapt. Some adapted to dark skin and some adapted to light. That's the way the world works.
Adaptation is not always easy to imagine, partly because of the way that it is sometimes taught by people who don't quite understand it themselves to people who have no need to study it extensively. As a result, it sometimes puzzles us.
Genetic adaptation is the result of what looks like trial and error changes in the gene. Everything living has come to its state and condition by a long process of change. Since "DNA makes RNA makes protein" (and since protein runs everything in our bodies) is the oversimplified but basically correct way of understanding how our genetics works on the molecular level, DNA is very important to understand.
We show much of the past in our genes. We all have a great number of genes that no longer work, genes that have just "turned off" and do nothing but just hang around in our DNA. These genes are called "introns" and everything living has them. We have a bunch. When experimenting with the introns of hornbills some years ago, scientists "turned on" some of these old genes in embryonic hornbills, and the birds were hatched with small teeth and scaly-feathery tails.
I wonder what would happen if some of ours were turned on?
Anyway, the point here is that we are all the product of a great deal of genetic change, and the characteristics of these changes have not changed. We still mutate genetically. Most mutataions are crippling or dangerous or even lethal to us, and so these changes often are not passed on to our children, since these people most of the time do not have any.
But other changes go on all the time, just extremely slowly.
What were we like "originally"?
We don't know. Who is the "original" one? An Eve has been postulated, and it makes sense that an Eve and an Adam existed. Since we can genetically trace European and Asian lineages back to seven women, it makes sense that we could continue the look back in tme to discover the common mother of us all. I don't know that we have actually done that, however. It would be very hard to do.
But as I say, I think it most likely that she would have been a little hominid, probably quite hairy and most likely dark skinned, though not neccessarily. Chimps, as I pointed out, are not (they are light skinned), and they are very closely related to us, having split off from the line that became us about 6 million years ago. Gorillas, also closely related to us, are not.
So what did we look like "originally"? No one knows.
Does it really matter? If you think it does, why do you think so?
Genetic change due to migration may still be a thesis, but it's a very strong and reasonable one. Since we can trace Asio-European mitochondrial DNA to seven women, who fanned out across the continent over a period of thousands of years--from it appears an African origin--there really is no other explanation but genetic change due to environmental pressures. Since we know that genetic adaptation happens--diseases arise and bacteria become resistant to antibiotics--I don' tsee the problem with thinking that it happens in us, too. We are not different molecularly from the other creatures on this planet. We even share 25% of our DNA with daffodils. It isn't mere migration that causes people to lose their melanin, it's migration and then long living in an environment of less sun than exists in the motherland. That is an environmental pressure that kills off the dark-skinned. As for blond hair and blue eyes, I said that genetic adaptation is not commonsensical. It looks random. What we do know is that in northern climates light-skinned people--often but not always with light hair and eyes, too--predominate, and it is a useful condition. Light-skinned people in Africa die off without folic acid or at least coverings. Dark-skinned people in northern places die off without vitamin D.
Medicine is not at all as it was once upon a time. We know so much more and can treat so much more precisely. Where would a light-skinned person in Central African Republic find enough folic acid to bring to birth all healthy children? Where would a Somali find enough vitamin D to keep her children healthy in Germany? Yet all they have to do now is to take a pill. That couldn't be done 10,000 years ago.
We can keep alive people who would have died from genetic causes--the state of an immune system is often determined by genetics--and thus keep them alive long enough to pass on the genes because we can control the symptoms those genes cause.
Our medicine is good enough now to change the course of human adaptation. It will go on, but in a way different from the way it has up to now always done.
I did not mean to say that homo sapiens has been around only for 20,000 years. I mistyped that. It should have been 120,000 years. We haven't changed a great deal in that time, the majority of the change coming in Europe because of the Ice Age that those descendants of ours went through. Noticable change occurs slowly.
As a result (please remember that adaptation occurs when it keeps kids alive, and the genetic characteristic that has themost kids who make it to adulthood to have their own kids is the line that becomes predominant), we would not see many changes in our short history of 5000 years (that's how long we humand have been writing).
This is not the idea of whites desperate to justify their existence. It's just plain fact. We change. We adapt. Some adapted to dark skin and some adapted to light. That's the way the world works.
Melesi, again I must say that much of what you are saying sound like guess work and has no foundation in actual facts. You admit that genetic change due to migration is still a thesis but yet you offer it up as if it is actual fact and I am simply expressing to you my belief that such a belief is incomplete and false at best based on its inability to answer several question which you in turn just push to the side as an anomaly as it relate to the way which mutation happen. It also appears that much of your thesis and belief is founded in the idea of evolution that man gradually evolved from "chimps". This again have far to many holes in it to be any closer to the truth than your belief that migration of humans is what caused the loss of pigmentation and the anomalistic change in hair and eye color.
Ponder this, this is something I wrote in a debate of old on TBWT... names have been changed to fit this discussion.
There are as many holes in the idea of evolution as those who believe in it claim are in Creationism. "A severe problem for evolutionists is the absence of transitional forms in the fossil record. By transitional forms, we mean intermediate forms of life appearing in the fossil record that are "in-between" existing types of organisms found today or in the past." If we are to believe evolution existed as you (Melesi) appears to believe, then we should be able to find fossil record to back your claim up. The transitional period that evolution is based on can not be substantiated and has no fossil record. "If slow, gradual evolution occurred, you would expect to observe a continuum of change in the fossil record. After all, if life took millions of years to arrive at its' present state of development, the earth should be filled with fossils that could be easily assembled into a number of series showing minor changes as species were evolving." Some evolutionists are a bit more extreme then others. I do not know the extremity of your evolutionary thinking Melesi but many who believe in evolution also believe all insects and birds evolved into flying creatures and have not flown since they appeared on the earth. Consider this: "The primates - lemurs, monkeys, apes and man appear fully formed in the fossil record. The proverbial "missing link" between man and ape remains elusive and periodically changes with the thinking of the day. And finally, dinosaurs, there is the absence of transitional series leading to these giants"
"Sometimes evolutionists suggest that the transitional forms haven't been found because there have not been enough fossils unearthed to accurately portray life as it existed long ago. However, since Darwin's time there has been a hundred-fold increase in the number of fossils found and a systematic problem still remains. There are fewer candidates for transitional forms between major divisions of life than for minor divisions, the exact reverse of what is expected by evolutionary theory."
In summary, instead of getting a phylogenetic "tree" in the fossil record, you get vertical patterns indicative of creation, conflicting with the notions of gradual evolution and supporting the creationist position."
You seem pretty versed in what it is you are expressing here Melesi but I do not believe what you have expressed here can be substantiated and is guess work that will continue to change with the thinking of the day. It is far to easy to push off the unexplainable as an anomaly but the truth in my assessment is that those who originated the school of thought expressed in your thesis has an agenda and telling the truth and saying "We just don't have the answers" is not part of their agenda..
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Ponder this, this is something I wrote in a debate of old on TBWT... names have been changed to fit this discussion.
There are as many holes in the idea of evolution as those who believe in it claim are in Creationism. "A severe problem for evolutionists is the absence of transitional forms in the fossil record. By transitional forms, we mean intermediate forms of life appearing in the fossil record that are "in-between" existing types of organisms found today or in the past." If we are to believe evolution existed as you (Melesi) appears to believe, then we should be able to find fossil record to back your claim up. The transitional period that evolution is based on can not be substantiated and has no fossil record. "If slow, gradual evolution occurred, you would expect to observe a continuum of change in the fossil record. After all, if life took millions of years to arrive at its' present state of development, the earth should be filled with fossils that could be easily assembled into a number of series showing minor changes as species were evolving." Some evolutionists are a bit more extreme then others. I do not know the extremity of your evolutionary thinking Melesi but many who believe in evolution also believe all insects and birds evolved into flying creatures and have not flown since they appeared on the earth. Consider this: "The primates - lemurs, monkeys, apes and man appear fully formed in the fossil record. The proverbial "missing link" between man and ape remains elusive and periodically changes with the thinking of the day. And finally, dinosaurs, there is the absence of transitional series leading to these giants"
"Sometimes evolutionists suggest that the transitional forms haven't been found because there have not been enough fossils unearthed to accurately portray life as it existed long ago. However, since Darwin's time there has been a hundred-fold increase in the number of fossils found and a systematic problem still remains. There are fewer candidates for transitional forms between major divisions of life than for minor divisions, the exact reverse of what is expected by evolutionary theory."
In summary, instead of getting a phylogenetic "tree" in the fossil record, you get vertical patterns indicative of creation, conflicting with the notions of gradual evolution and supporting the creationist position."
You seem pretty versed in what it is you are expressing here Melesi but I do not believe what you have expressed here can be substantiated and is guess work that will continue to change with the thinking of the day. It is far to easy to push off the unexplainable as an anomaly but the truth in my assessment is that those who originated the school of thought expressed in your thesis has an agenda and telling the truth and saying "We just don't have the answers" is not part of their agenda..
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Faheem,
Sometimes it depends on what we're looking for, because we only see what we already recognize. How we already classify animals and plants determines in large part how we think about them. This goes for the transitional forms, too.
Now, there are two errors we can commit about the fossil record, and they are that 1. the fossil record is so well known and complete that we know all the details of its history, and 2. the fossil is so fragmentary as to be of no use.
Neither is true.
However, we can learn a lot about our history from the fossil record, even though it is quite fragmentary. How many fossil examples of Archeopteryx are there, seven? And of those, only two or three are essentially complete? So how many Archeopteryx lived compared to how many have been preserved as fossils?
How many phyla of marine animals are there? And how many examples of each are preserved in the fossil record? Of all the worms in the sea (14 different phyla--a very rich assortment--only one phyla has any representation in teh fossils, the Annelids. So you see, the record really is fragmentary. But there is much to learn from it.
There are deposits--like the Green River Shale and the Burgess Shale--that have many fossils in them and give us a kind of picture of a moment in the past.
Here we can see changes in the teeth of the little weasel-like mammal Hypsodus. The teeth change over the long period of the early Eocene Epoch (part of the Cenozoic Era, 55 to 34 million years ago) and show that these little creatures were slowly changing into different species within the genus. We can see the same thing happening to Vivveravus, another little carnivorous mammal, at the same time.
These are transitional forms.
So is the horse, from Hyracotherium to Equus.
I mentioned to you about the hornbills. They show that they underwent transition from reptiles to birds, for they carry reptile genes in their genome. And that makes Archeopteryx a transitional form, too. While not a direct ancestor of modern birds, it was one of many transitional forms on the way from dinosaurs to birds and shows us how that happened.
Now, this shows that we talk about transitions and transitional forms in two different ways:
1. As general transitions between older phyla and different, much younger phyla (dinosaurs to birds, for example), and
2. Between individual species (like the Hypsodus or the Vivveravus)
In the first case, we have many specimens of animals that are colsely related to the direct ancestors. We have gaps in which we can find few if any (and sometimes we have none) of the direct ancestors of the newer phyla but we can find the relatives of the direct ancestors and trace their lineage for a time. If the uncles and cousins were changing, why not the parents, too?
In the second case, we have many fossils that show a change from one species to another. For me, one of the most interesting is that horses and whales share a common ancestor that we know of.
But let's talk about humans since we were concentrating on us to begin with. We know a great deal about this fossil record from the Eocene onward.
Before the Eocene, in the Paleocene, lived a little creature called the Palaechthon
http://www.angellis.net/Web/DFG-mam/Palaechthon.htm
is a drawing of our ancestor.
NB: I have sometimes wondered why those of us so interested in "who was first" and the "original humans," meaning of course that we AAs don't get the respect we deserve for being the first, why these people don't go all the way back to these little creatures, the beginners of all primates.
Well, from there the fossils show us that this tree-climber (is that why boys like to climb trees?) developed into Cantius (about 12 species of Cantius) in the early Eocene. This form of the old Palaechthon was more like a lemur than it did before. It had grasping hands, for example.
The Tarsiers and lemurs split off from this group, as did some of the monkeys, and they continued on their way of developing into the primates we know them today.
Amphipethicus developed around now, in the late Eocene. It was a primate with a larger brain and the eyes were clearly developing into ape and human-like eyes.
Now, there is a gap here, the well-known "Oligocene Gap," but it still has some information in it.
By the way, try this site:
http://anthro.palomar.edu/earlyprimates/first_primates.htm
A pretty good introduction to the issue of evolution and adaptation.
Anyway, the fossil record shows connections between and devolpments into the next line of primates,
Parapithecus
Propliopethecus
Aegyptopithecus
Limnopethecus
Dryopithecus
Kenyapithecus
are all shown in very good detail.
Then there is another gap. But when we go into the gap at 14 million years ago we see these primates, and when we come out of the gap at 4 million years ago we see primates that are very similar to them.
We do find the australopthecenes here, though--
Australopethicus ramidus
afarensis ("Lucy")
africanus
all becoming more and more like humans. The brain was enlarging, the build becoming less ape-like and more human, and in fact the africanus is probably the perfect transitional form, combining both human and ape characteristics, but much more sleder than the apes with teeth that are approaching the modern human's.
Then comes
Homo habilis, with its early stone tools
Homo erectus, with fire and better tools
Homo sapiens (about 500,000 years ago), bigger brain, smaller teeth, more slender bone structure
and then
Homo sapiens sapiens, Cro-Magnons and the rest of us.
This is a very good fossil record even given the gaps, and it shows that there are transitional forms, even if Duane Gish does not want to admit them.
I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss the evolutionist point of view as "not wanting to know the truth" or as "having an agenda."
As you know, I am a Christian, and I am firmly convinced that God is the Creator and that he sent his Son to be our Savior. However, to be Christian does not mean that I dismiss the evidence before my eyes. There it is, and we must deal with it, not explain it away. If this is how God created the world and us, why should that be a problem?
Sometimes it depends on what we're looking for, because we only see what we already recognize. How we already classify animals and plants determines in large part how we think about them. This goes for the transitional forms, too.
Now, there are two errors we can commit about the fossil record, and they are that 1. the fossil record is so well known and complete that we know all the details of its history, and 2. the fossil is so fragmentary as to be of no use.
Neither is true.
However, we can learn a lot about our history from the fossil record, even though it is quite fragmentary. How many fossil examples of Archeopteryx are there, seven? And of those, only two or three are essentially complete? So how many Archeopteryx lived compared to how many have been preserved as fossils?
How many phyla of marine animals are there? And how many examples of each are preserved in the fossil record? Of all the worms in the sea (14 different phyla--a very rich assortment--only one phyla has any representation in teh fossils, the Annelids. So you see, the record really is fragmentary. But there is much to learn from it.
There are deposits--like the Green River Shale and the Burgess Shale--that have many fossils in them and give us a kind of picture of a moment in the past.
Here we can see changes in the teeth of the little weasel-like mammal Hypsodus. The teeth change over the long period of the early Eocene Epoch (part of the Cenozoic Era, 55 to 34 million years ago) and show that these little creatures were slowly changing into different species within the genus. We can see the same thing happening to Vivveravus, another little carnivorous mammal, at the same time.
These are transitional forms.
So is the horse, from Hyracotherium to Equus.
I mentioned to you about the hornbills. They show that they underwent transition from reptiles to birds, for they carry reptile genes in their genome. And that makes Archeopteryx a transitional form, too. While not a direct ancestor of modern birds, it was one of many transitional forms on the way from dinosaurs to birds and shows us how that happened.
Now, this shows that we talk about transitions and transitional forms in two different ways:
1. As general transitions between older phyla and different, much younger phyla (dinosaurs to birds, for example), and
2. Between individual species (like the Hypsodus or the Vivveravus)
In the first case, we have many specimens of animals that are colsely related to the direct ancestors. We have gaps in which we can find few if any (and sometimes we have none) of the direct ancestors of the newer phyla but we can find the relatives of the direct ancestors and trace their lineage for a time. If the uncles and cousins were changing, why not the parents, too?
In the second case, we have many fossils that show a change from one species to another. For me, one of the most interesting is that horses and whales share a common ancestor that we know of.
But let's talk about humans since we were concentrating on us to begin with. We know a great deal about this fossil record from the Eocene onward.
Before the Eocene, in the Paleocene, lived a little creature called the Palaechthon
http://www.angellis.net/Web/DFG-mam/Palaechthon.htm
is a drawing of our ancestor.
NB: I have sometimes wondered why those of us so interested in "who was first" and the "original humans," meaning of course that we AAs don't get the respect we deserve for being the first, why these people don't go all the way back to these little creatures, the beginners of all primates.
Well, from there the fossils show us that this tree-climber (is that why boys like to climb trees?) developed into Cantius (about 12 species of Cantius) in the early Eocene. This form of the old Palaechthon was more like a lemur than it did before. It had grasping hands, for example.
The Tarsiers and lemurs split off from this group, as did some of the monkeys, and they continued on their way of developing into the primates we know them today.
Amphipethicus developed around now, in the late Eocene. It was a primate with a larger brain and the eyes were clearly developing into ape and human-like eyes.
Now, there is a gap here, the well-known "Oligocene Gap," but it still has some information in it.
By the way, try this site:
http://anthro.palomar.edu/earlyprimates/first_primates.htm
A pretty good introduction to the issue of evolution and adaptation.
Anyway, the fossil record shows connections between and devolpments into the next line of primates,
Parapithecus
Propliopethecus
Aegyptopithecus
Limnopethecus
Dryopithecus
Kenyapithecus
are all shown in very good detail.
Then there is another gap. But when we go into the gap at 14 million years ago we see these primates, and when we come out of the gap at 4 million years ago we see primates that are very similar to them.
We do find the australopthecenes here, though--
Australopethicus ramidus
afarensis ("Lucy")
africanus
all becoming more and more like humans. The brain was enlarging, the build becoming less ape-like and more human, and in fact the africanus is probably the perfect transitional form, combining both human and ape characteristics, but much more sleder than the apes with teeth that are approaching the modern human's.
Then comes
Homo habilis, with its early stone tools
Homo erectus, with fire and better tools
Homo sapiens (about 500,000 years ago), bigger brain, smaller teeth, more slender bone structure
and then
Homo sapiens sapiens, Cro-Magnons and the rest of us.
This is a very good fossil record even given the gaps, and it shows that there are transitional forms, even if Duane Gish does not want to admit them.
I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss the evolutionist point of view as "not wanting to know the truth" or as "having an agenda."
As you know, I am a Christian, and I am firmly convinced that God is the Creator and that he sent his Son to be our Savior. However, to be Christian does not mean that I dismiss the evidence before my eyes. There it is, and we must deal with it, not explain it away. If this is how God created the world and us, why should that be a problem?
At this point Melesi if we go any further with this discussion it would be your sources against my sources. Both sides make interesting points and those who are from the school of thought on both sides are firm in their beliefs and neither you nor me can out do the number of books that have been written from both sides. Essentially much like religion the student of both sides will believe that which works best with all other things that they believe and because this belief have allowed them to get through life to this point, the gaps and missing answers in ones belief are ignored and dismissed as irrelevant or unimportant. With that said thanks for the info and time and I hope the readers of this thread can take from it that which will help them stand firm in their beliefs regardless of which school of thought they are from.
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
-------------------------
"We got to organize ourselves, We got to mobilize and there can't be no confusion in our collective solution, If not for ourselves, then for our kids, because we know who our enemy is!"
DPZ "for the hood"
More to come later!
Your Brother Faheem
Faheem,
I thank you for your reason and your willingness to disagree without anger. I respect your position because of it.
Can we go in a slightly differnet direction for a bit, then?
I would be interested in knowing just how you see this issue. Once upon a time--it seems a long time ago and far away, now--I was a thoroughgoing creationist. I was convinced that evolution was not true, that it was too full of holes and gaps and contradictions to be taken too seriously.
But over the next several years I began to study it more closely and realized that much of what passed for creation research was not very good science, relying on intuition ("it doesn't seem right") rather than on the facts. As I studied evolution and adaptation more, I came to the conclusion that it really is the way that the world works. It doesn't militate against the idea of God (interestingly, the first person that I know of who raised that concern was Charles Darwin's sister in a letter to him), it only changes our understanding of him, and not for the worse.
He is not one of us only bigger. He's quite different. He would have to be, since he is higher. We just don't always think of that.
HIs world is quite different from our commonsense concept of it, too. It is stranger and more beautiful than we think.
And that means that his people are, too.
That's one of the reasons that I like to talk about these issues. I encounter minds that are different from mine, and they make me think, more than those who disagree with me at any one time believe that I do, I'm quite sure. The mind of another can be beautiful and very pleasing to meet. Yours is, and I appreciate teh way that you have given your time and thought to this conversation.
If you would be willing, I would be interested in hearing your thoughts and position on this issue of evolution and adaptation. You have said some things about it---your belief that too much supposition is used to fill in the glaring and crucial gaps in the record and the theory, for example--but I would be interestd in hearing more from you about it if you would care to.
At any rate, thank you for the time.
I thank you for your reason and your willingness to disagree without anger. I respect your position because of it.
Can we go in a slightly differnet direction for a bit, then?
I would be interested in knowing just how you see this issue. Once upon a time--it seems a long time ago and far away, now--I was a thoroughgoing creationist. I was convinced that evolution was not true, that it was too full of holes and gaps and contradictions to be taken too seriously.
But over the next several years I began to study it more closely and realized that much of what passed for creation research was not very good science, relying on intuition ("it doesn't seem right") rather than on the facts. As I studied evolution and adaptation more, I came to the conclusion that it really is the way that the world works. It doesn't militate against the idea of God (interestingly, the first person that I know of who raised that concern was Charles Darwin's sister in a letter to him), it only changes our understanding of him, and not for the worse.
He is not one of us only bigger. He's quite different. He would have to be, since he is higher. We just don't always think of that.
HIs world is quite different from our commonsense concept of it, too. It is stranger and more beautiful than we think.
And that means that his people are, too.
That's one of the reasons that I like to talk about these issues. I encounter minds that are different from mine, and they make me think, more than those who disagree with me at any one time believe that I do, I'm quite sure. The mind of another can be beautiful and very pleasing to meet. Yours is, and I appreciate teh way that you have given your time and thought to this conversation.
If you would be willing, I would be interested in hearing your thoughts and position on this issue of evolution and adaptation. You have said some things about it---your belief that too much supposition is used to fill in the glaring and crucial gaps in the record and the theory, for example--but I would be interestd in hearing more from you about it if you would care to.
At any rate, thank you for the time.