Scientists: What can Exponential Growth tell us about the Bible?

by Caveat 9 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  Caveat

  Need help from all the scientists, statisticians and math gurus out there?(perhaps SNG?)

  Have you researched exponential growth and bible chronology?

  The Bible gives a time table that took mankind from 2 individuals to six billion in around 6,000 years with a ?bottleneck? of 3 couples at the time of the global flood?

  By strictly looking at the figures, do you see any evidence pro or against?

  Young earthies think numbers favor their position? others say numbers are inconclusive...

  Any thoughts?

  Caveat
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  Caveat

  Sorry I will repost for bigger font size:

  Need help from all the scientists, statisticians and math gurus out there?(perhaps SNG?)

  Have you researched exponential growth and bible chronology?

  The Bible gives a time table that took mankind from 2 individuals to six billion in around 6,000 years with a ?bottleneck? of 3 couples at the time of the global flood?

  By strictly looking at the figures, do you see any evidence pro or against?

  Young earthies think numbers favor their position? others say numbers are inconclusive...

  Any thoughts?

  Caveat
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  funkyderek

  By strictly looking at the figures, do you see any evidence pro or against?

  Strictly looking at the figures, no. It's inconclusive. It would be possible for a population to increase from 2 people to 6 billion within 6000 years.

  If we start looking at other evidence, though, it soon becomes apparent that such a belief is nonsense and the earth has been around for billions of years and humans for at least 100,000 years
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  Leolaia

  The real question is one of genetic diversity. How can the variation in the DNA of just two individuals give rise to all the variability in the human species seen today in just 330 or so generations?
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  The Leological One

  From: http://www.answersingenesis.org/tj/v17/i1/events.asp

  By comparing DNA from different humans around the world, it has been found that all humans share roughly 99.9% of their genetic material--they are almost completely identical, genetically. 7 This means that there is very little polymorphism, or variation. Much evidence of this genetic continuity has been found. For example, Dorit et al. 8 examined a 729-base pair intron (the DNA in the genome that is not read to make proteins) from a worldwide sample of 38 human males and reported no sequence variation. This sort of invariance
  

  '... likely results from either a recent selective sweep, a recent origin for modern Homo sapiens, recurrent male population bottlenecks, or historically small effective male population sizes ... any value of Q [lowest actual human sequence diversity] > 0.0011 predicts polymorphism in our sample [and yet none was found] ... . The critical value for this study thus falls below most, but not all, available estimates, thus suggesting that the lack of polymorphism at ZFY [a locus, or location] is not due to chance.'

  After citing additional evidence of low variation on the Y chromosome, they note in their last paragraph that their results 'are not compatible with most multiregional models for the origin of modern humans.' Knight et al. 9 have had similar research results:
  

  'We obtained over 55 kilobases of sequence from three autosomal loci encompassing Alu repeats for representatives of diverse human populations as well as orthologous sequences for other hominoid species at one of these loci. Nucleotide diversity was exceedingly low. Most individuals and populations were identical. Only a single nucleotide difference distinguished presumed ancestral alleles from descendants. These results differ from those expected if alleles from divergent archaic populations were maintained through multiregional continuity. The observed virtual lack of sequence polymorphism is the signature of a recent single origin for modern humans, with general replacement of archaic populations.'
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  AlanF

  Applying the notion of exponential growth to human population in as simple-minded a way as the young-earth creationists do is just plain stupid. Given ideal conditions, population could grow to six billion in about 500 years, so the argument about 6,000 years is irrelevant.

  The history of population growth shows that many factors besides idealized, exponential growth must be considered. In the tme of Christ, world population was about 100 million, and it remained fairly constant at that level for another 1000 years. I say fairly constant, because there occurred a number of major plagues that wiped out large fractions of humanity, so the population level went up and down by fits and starts. By about 1830, population had reached the one billion mark, and the rate of growth has been increasing ever since. It took until about 1920 to reach two billion, so the doubling time was 90 years. But it took only another 50 years to double again.

  The point is that YEC arguments about population growth fail to account for all the factors that affect it.

  AlanF
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  The Leological One

  AlanF,

  I was only replying to the post dealing with DNA. There is much more info out there regarding what you mentioned; that's not what I presented info on specifically. Peace.
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  Leolaia

  Leological One....Indeed, compared to other species, there is a remarkably high degree of homogeneity in Homo sapiens mtDNA. This is an indicator of the relative recency of the speciation event for H. sapiens compared to other species that may have been around longer (e.g. for millions of years). Thus, there is more genetic distance between two chimpanzees (our closest relative) than between two humans. But that is only half the story. There is genetic variability nonetheless in our species, there has to be in any viable species. The real question, as I already posed, is whether 6,000 years or 330 generations is enough time for that amount of mtDNA variation (or nuclear DNA variation, for that matter) to arise. According to Rebecca Cann and others, it took about 100,000 to 400,000 years -- or a minimum of 5,550 generations -- to result in modern H. sapiens genetic diversity. This is very young compared to species that may have been around for millions of years, hence the remarkable homogeneity. But it far exceeds the amount of generations possible with YEC scenarios.
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  Midget-Sasquatch

  As for all humans being 99.9% the same, well yes, but that doesn't take away from the point about the time needed to have the present genetic diversity....0.1% of about 3 billion base pairs is still about 3 million base pairs difference right? With all those factors taking away from the overall diversity of the gene pool, I think it does make a good point for there being more than 6000 years to garner that diversity. Unless you want to say there's some fantastically high rate of mutation going on for us.

  If you want to look at empirically observed rates of mutation for mtDNA, some recently pooled results have given rates about 5 times higher than what is derived from calibration with the fossil record. Even if we go with those numbers, you divide the currently bandied figures by five and you're then still talking over 20,000 years needed for that diversity...well past what a literal reading of Genesis will give YECs.
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  Amazing1914

  Caveat,

  Population growth has been increasing in the last 100 years due to significant advancement in modern medicine. We also have several limiting factors throughout history, such as war, plagues, and the fact that people did not live as long on average. For example, just about 150 years ago men lived about an average of 45 years. Today that average is in the late 70s.

  Noah's flood as a worldwide event could not and did not happen, so YEC analysis of this relative to population growth is irrelevant.

  Also, it has been proven time and again that humans have been on earth much longer than the time of Adam and Eve. The latest time frame is about 195,000 years. The evidence is that humans became nearly extinct several tens of thousands of years ago when they were forced to live along the coast of east Africa. They survived on fish, which contributed greatly to significant evolutionary advances in brain development.

  The entire YEC argument is based on fiction and misuses math to make their arguments appear scientific.

  Jim W.