by LunaFing 26 Replies latest jw friends
The DNA evidence is quite clear - a different hominid species.
Modern Human DNA is said to carry about 3% similar sequences to Neanderthal DNA, and about 5% similarity to the Denisovan species, another early hominid.
Watchtower will have quite some shuck and jive to explain around that - most likely they will just ignore the issue.
*** w64 10/1 pp. 588-589 pars. 21-23 The Bible and Creation in the Light of Modern Science ***
22 As the lower animals were created suddenly, so was man. He was given a high mental capacity that the animals lacked. This is just what science corroborates, and not a slow ascent from a mud puddle. In the book New Discoveries in Babylonia About Genesis the author states: “It was expected that the more ancient the period, the more primitive would excavators find it to be, until traces of civilization ceased altogether and aboriginal man appeared. Neither in Babylonia nor Egypt, the lands of the oldest known habitations of man, has this been the case. When civilization appears it is already full grown. . . . In the face of these facts, the slow progress of early man is a disproved assumption, and the idea that an infinitely prolonged period elapsed before civilization appeared cannot be maintained.”
23 But what of those so-called “prehistoric” men one frequently hears about? Some of such fossil remains are not human at all, but are animal. Others are simply varieties of the human family who were living at the same time “modern-type” man was, just as today there are many sizes and shapes in different living peoples. The Neanderthal man was at one time regarded as “prehistoric,” an ancestor of modern man in the evolution scale, but note what an encyclopedia now says: “Neanderthal man cannot be regarded as an ancestor of modern man. Neanderthal man and men of the modern type . . . must be looked upon as descendants of a common ancestor.”
I'm still not sure if they believe neanderthal man is us or not!
What does any high control religious organization expect to say about evolution ?
If fear and ignorance keeps people in subjective control and financial support toward that structured organization,
to teach anything objectively would essentially weaken that said control.
This is the reason why many religious organizations demean higher education or knowledge thats outside of their own teachings.
The WTS./JWS is just one of those religious organizations.
Re: What does the society have to say about neanderthal man?
They look up to him - he is called Don Alden Adams.
Why don't they cite sources in some way. A book is so meaningless. Another book is hardly illuminating. It is easy to see why higher ed appals them.
What does the society have to say about neanderthal man?
Gladiator: They look up to him - he is called Don Alden Adams.
Great line, Glad. Hope alls well with you way over yonder.
In the pale blue colored "Evolution" book of the mid-1960s, the WTS insisted that Neanderthal Man and Cro Magnon Man were not ancestors of Modern Man:
- rather, they strongly suggested that these were in fact just "degenerate" forms of Modern Man.
i.e. with limbs and vertebrae badly deformed from athritis, so as to give them an "Ape-Man" appearance.
I can even recall giving a speech while at high school, in which I cited these hitherto unknown gems of wisdom:
- unwittingly entering myself in the Damn Fool of the Year contest!
Bill.
Thus, the evidence is clear that belief in “ape-men” is unfounded
So misleading. Science doesn't teach that they were 'ape-men' although it would not be inaccurate. It would not be inaccurate to call homo sapien ape man either. *eye roll*
Since then, many Neanderthal fossils have been found, confirming that he was not much different from modern humans
Oh, but he WAS different! There is an ongoing debate within academia as to how "advanced" he was---and that is expressed in the sentences that followed. However we have mapped their genome---they are different---and they were symbolic thinkers that buried their dead.
NEANDERTHAL MAN is also one of the better-known parts of the so-called evolutionary chain
And yet they are not our ancestors---though we share a common ancestor. Evolution isn't a chain--it's a tree with many branches.
One encyclopedia now says that they were “completely human, fully erect.”
Yes, they were completely human. homo neanderthalis. Some scientists think a better classification would be homo sapien neanderthalis and modern human should be homo sapien sapien. This proves nothing except we aren't the only humans in history.
It is true that when fossils were originally found, Neanderthal was portrayed as a not-so-erect ape man. But this is because the findings were interpreted by people that could not accept that another, viable, and somewhat advanced human species (or sub species) existed. They still were under the notion that we were very unique, and no other species could come close. Later findings and understandings have really smashed this image.
Thanks guys for all the info. Seems like the WT doesn't have anything recent to say about this topic. I was hoping to ambush my Mom or one of my sisters and see what they had to say. They have hounded me to come back to "the truth" for a long, long, time....*sigh* I want to corner them on a subject they know nothing about and watch them squirm!
Luna
I like that some scientists think they could and did breed with early humans, totally messes with Adam and Eve.
