But what does get passed down from one generation to the next is knowledge. I think it was the development of language that allowed the effective transmission of knowledge and it’s consequent increase as time goes by. This might be the trigger for the GLF, but it doesn’t leave any traces until first art and then written texts come on the scene.
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I fully agree. Language would have played a large part, as would hands on training. In other apes we see mother chimps teaching their offspring how to fashion rudimentary tools and use them, and there are different types of tools in different populations of chimps. Even in the absence of advanced language you can still have ideas passed on through the generations, but not to the level needed for the types of technologies that emerged in human populations.
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[quote=“T_aquaticus, post:122, topic:36985”]
I fully agree. {[Bill II: "(Language) might be the trigger for the GLF, but it doesn’t leave any traces until first art and then written texts come on the scene.} (T.a.again) Language would have played a large part, as would hands on training. In other apes we see mother chimps teaching their offspring how to fashion rudimentary tools and use them, and there are different types of tools in different populations of chimps. Even in the absence of advanced language you can still have ideas passed on through the generations, but not to the level needed for the types of technologies that emerged in human populations.
I agree with both @Bill_II and @T_aquaticus, but that still leaves my ‘scenario’ with the thorny problem that the GLF may not be swift enough so that generations of (or isolated pockets of) ‘gifted’ Homo sapiens would still be considered in a ‘Limbo’ between ‘mostly animal’ and ‘truly human’. Can we learn something from the ‘thorny problem’ that Darwin described with the Feugians he first sent to England and later transported ‘back home’? Upon first contact they were so uncivilized that Darwin could hardly consider them ‘truly human’. But Jeremy Buttons quickly learned the English language and customs, so there can be no doubt that he was truly human earlier in his native environment. And despite the fact that on return to his homeland, he readily re-embraced that society and did not try to ‘evangelize’ his people to civilization as Darwin had hoped.
I don’t know enough about the native Tasmanians to judge whether their case was different. Apparently the sea level rise that isolated Tasmania from mainland Australia (~40K yrs BP?) cut them off from the mainland aboriginal society, and they quickly forgot many of the advances that the larger society had made. If so, does this indicate that their brains had lost some of the original ‘programming’ or that some ‘bug’ had crept in? So were they in some sort of ‘Limbo Humanity’ when they were so ruthlessly slaughtered?
I am not sure my Original Blessing scenario gives me any satisfactory insights into this problem. I surely hope that it would not give any support whatsoever to the idea of racial superiority justifying slavery or genocide!
Al Leo
First I found Dawkins’s idea of meme’s in “The Selfish Gene” interesting as it appears to me it allows for the rapid spread of behavior changes that are not based strictly on genetics.
Second I did a little Wikipedia surfing and found that human language is unique in that it doesn’t depend on the method used. We can use sound, sight, or touch in language. No other animal has this flexibility.
So here we are coming out of Africa with the tools for language that would aid in the formation of a culture that can be transmitted to new members of the group. This culture would shape the behavior of the members and might lead to the development and transmission of new knowledge. Could this lead to the GLF? Who knows.
For your Tasmanians it could be that the transmission of knowledge was broken. Perhaps there was an epidemic or other widespread disaster that “broke the chain.”
[quote from Al Leo]
Apparently the sea level rise that isolated Tasmania from mainland Australia (~40K yrs BP?) cut them off from the mainland aboriginal society, and they quickly forgot many of the advances that the larger society had made.
I have speculated that in the case of a primitive society that has not yet developed a written language and must orally pass on any useful inventions, the operation of their society may be compared to an atomic pile: it requires a ‘critical mass’ to attain and maintain a sustainable output of energy. The death of just one ‘Der Alte’, who had held a crucial part of an invention in his memory, could result in its permanent loss, since there was no ‘library’ to which the younger members could refer to reactivate it.
Wasn’t it Donne who said: “No man is an island”? And, to some real but un-mesureable extent, isn’t our degree of humanness (whatever that may be) a reflection of the society in which we grew up and now live in? The noogenes (ideas, or memes, if you prefer) that produce and sustain organisms in the Noosphere (societies, governments, etc) can be toxic, as is illustrated by ISIS–just as cancerous genes (i.e. brac2 mutant) is toxic in biospheric organisms.
Make sense?
Al Leo
Or we could also respect their theology as essentially fixed, putting aside whatever we feel about the details, and show how Adam and Eve could be the first human couple, de novo created, and ancestor of all humanity (as they understand in Scripture). It does not take ANE to get here, just textual analysis and accurate science.
Though I know it is fun to argue about Genesis and play with Sumerian myths, this could be a more respectful way forward.
@aleo this comes up in almost all your posts. Why not engage the scientific work out there? Scientists call the GLF the emergence of behaiviorally modern humans. There are several articles on this at ASA. Most anthropologists I know, for the moment reject the notion this was as sharp a transition as you argue, though there does appear some debate.
There is quite a bit of science and evidence to engage in addition to putting out your preferred, and interesting, theory in abstract terms alone.
Less than 10,000 years ago. Though this was not likely total isolation.
England measures in 130,395 km², meaning Tasmania is just a little over two thirds of the size. It is hard to imagine isolation of any species in a land mass larger than many European countries.
Although I certainly appreciate and respect your approach of inclusion for fellow brothers and sister in Christ, does your experience tell you that YEC proponents are willing to discard a literal interpretation of Genesis for the other days as long as they can scientifically maintain that Adam and Eve could be the first genealogical pair? My experience suggests that most YEC would be unwilling to consider anything other than a literal account for ALL of the days of creation. I don’t think the special creation of mankind would be their only hurdle to clear.
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My experience with YECs is that this stimulates their imagination. It also builds real trust; demonstrating that I care about their concerns and am being honest with them about the science. It also raises questions about why others have not told them this.
And, because it does not take ANE to get here, this is a literal interpretation of genesis. So they do not need to abandon a literal interpretation of Genesis. As far as ALL the days of creation being literal, this is not nearly as difficult to deal with as you might think.
Most YECs are “traditionalists.” This is both an emotional and theological position; and I put myself in this view theologically. Put most coherently, the God I find by Jesus exists, is good, and wants to be known. Therefore, I have high confidence that this God, who rose Jesus from the dead to reveal himself, has power and motive to preserve His message to us in history. For this reason, I place high value on Church tradition like the selection of the Biblical cannon, even though this was very messy at the time (not unlike evolution). I also place high value on historical creeds: Althasian, Nicine, Apostles, and more. I also believe that the essential doctrinal commitments have been preserved in constancy over the last 2,000 years, and deviations from this constancy are usually as sign of error. Diversity in tradition is a sign that it is not an essential commitment.
Knowing something of that view of the world, my problem with YEC scientific creationism is not that it is too “traditional,” but that it is not traditional enough. It is a grand innovation (and therefore likely in error) to simultaneously restrict interpretation of (1) Genesis 1 days to 24hrs, (2) ignore literal textual support for gap theory, (3) ignore traditional flexibility in Genesis, (4) look to science over the Resurrection as proof for God, (5) ignore textual/literal support for evolution in Genesis 1, (6) blatantly eisegesis of fallible creation science into Scripture etc. etc. etc. None of this dogmatism is valid from a traditional point of view, but is justified ultimately by an extra-Scriptural anti-evolution worldview. The only way to consider this a “traditional” view of Genesis is to ignore tradition entirely.
My problem with YEC (in creation science form) is not that it is too traditional, but their proposal it is too grand an innovation. They are not traditional enough. Traditionally, we root our faith, community, and testimony in the historicity of Jesus and the Resurrection, not anti-evolutionism, which totally misrepresents the Gospel of Jesus as dependent on creation science.
Regarding literalism too, as is well known, every literist is a selective literalist. It is impossible to be 100% literal, especially about Genesis. “literal” interpretation is just about degrees. I’ll point out that the most common objection I get from BioLogos is that a genealogical Adam allows for a “literal” interpretation of Genesis, which is not the correct hermeneutic. That should be a good indicator, and it is, that there is room for a literal interpretation of Genesis that makes sense in evolutionary science.
Most literalists recognize what I am doing here as making room for literalism. They appreciate it, because this is how they believe the Bible should be interpreted. They, for theological reasons, reject Walton’s approach to hermeneutics as a slipper slope. However, their scholars do engage him, and some have even adopted the Temple Inauguration interpretation (see here https://www.amazon.com/Erosion-Inerrancy-Evangelicalism-Responding-Challenges/dp/1433502038 thanks to Ken Keathley).
The way literalism is discussed on the forums is a caricature of the real position, usually as a reducto ad absurdum. It is nothing like what we read, for example, in the Chicago Statements (there are 3).
A literal interpretation that supports evolution is actually fairly well known among literalists. The more informed critics of BioLogos often point this out. They clarify they have a problem with BioLogo’s theological commitments and approach, not evolution itself. This usually comes down to BioLogos’s general approach of being “anti-” or “non-” (depending on your experience) against concordism, literalism, and traditionalism. I have no problem against any individual being “non-” these things, but being “anti-” these things is certainly not required by the science.
Moreover, misrepresenting science as if it required a move away from literalism, traditionalism, and concordism is not upfront or accurate. It might even be dishonest in many cases.
Exactly. They also care about traditionalism, concordism, and literalism. Adam, often, is merely a proxy for these things. But all these things are consistent with evolution too. If @Eddie was around he might agree. Certainly @Jon_Garvey will too.
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Maybe here is the place to introduce a series I’m doing on The Hump of the Camel, taking recent work in Evangelical Old Testament scholarship, notably by John Sailhamer and Seth Postell, and applying it to how it is likely the Old Testament authors themselves might have viewed the Genesis origins texts in the context of their authorial intentions. So although I’m taking into account ANE comparisons, I’m attempting to apply the findings to the possibilities of science, rather than impose the science on the text. I’m not aware that this approach has been taken before.
FWIW the Genealogical Adam hypothesis, to my mind, becomes more plausible, rather than less, if this is done. I have a couple more to do, but links to the series are here, here, here and here.
I agree with Joshua that there is no generic Young Earth Creationist. The Fundamentalist anti-intellectuals exist, but so do serious thinkers.
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Thx for sharing, enjoying what I have read so far, along with the comments.
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I think that in some sense I am agreeing with you.
Humanity is more than genes. God created home sapiens using genes, but creation did not end there.
God continued creating humans as they continued to grow in culture and thinking, until they became conscious,. responsible beings who were able to make the4 choice that Adam and Eve were4 able to make and we all make.
Thereby sin came into being in God’s Creation and humans have the existential experience of good and evil.
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