fulltimestudent

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Posts by fulltimestudent

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  8

  The Winter festival in Harbin - piks of this year's ice constructions.

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. social
  2. current

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  fulltimestudent

  No reason to post this image, except I liked it and wanted to share it. It was photographed in China's far northern province of Heilongjiang and is part of a series on Yilehuli Mountain of the Olunchun people.

  
  
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  16

  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

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  fulltimestudent

  Off topic, but interesting.

  That Pewforum chart stated that 8% of Jehovah's witnesses support the idea that evolution is a better explanation for the origin of human life.

  Since this conclusion is based on surveys of some kind, I wonder who those (jws?) were?
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  16

  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

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  fulltimestudent

  And for an analysis of how religions (generally-grin) view evolution, this Pew research centre provides useful summaries.

  http://www.pewforum.org/2009/02/04/religious-groups-views-on-evolution/

  and another Pew Summary can be found at: http://www.pewforum.org/2009/02/04/religious-differences-on-the-question-of-evolution/

  which contains this chart:

  

  and you may note that in lumping Muslims together, I 'generalised' again. As the chart shows, the Pew researchers hold an opinion that 45% of Muslims agree that evolution poses the best explanation for the existence of life on earth.

  The 'special creationists' are indeed a minority.
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  16

  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

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  fulltimestudent

  Village Idiot : Your chart only included Turkey amongst Muslim nations and there was a big difference between the USA, 40% pro-evolution, and Turkey at 25%. Also, your title's mention of American Christians implies that most who identify themselves as such, about 85% of its population, hold on to that belief. It's fundamentalist Christians who are the focus, not liberal Christians and moderates who tend to believe in evolution and outnumber the Fundamentalists.
  Of course, the USA lags behind the secular minded Europeans because of its having a larger fundamentalist Christian presence but it is not fair to compare them to Muslim nations.

  Unfortunately, not 'my chart' V.I. but 'the chart.' I would love to have the facilities to produce such charts)

  Nonetheless, you are quite right. Both 'the chart' and my comments contained generalisations. The fact that Christianity is hopelessly divided on this (and, other topics) is a point I made in Shadow's thread, "What are the biggest holes in Evolution." This is the point I made, emphasising that relatively few Christians (a minority) refute evolution.

  Even more basic is that the question can be reduced to this, "How did humans come to exist on this planet?"
  Faith based Christian religions, a rather small minority of the 2.2 billion professed Christians* in the world insist that it is by special creation. If you ask the same questions that you suggest should be asked about evolutionary scientists, what answers do you think that you will get?

  I fail to see why it is 'unfair' to compare fundamentalist Christians to Muslim nations. Though of course, to speak of Muslims as a monolithic, homogenous bloc is also a generalisation. Not all Muslims are the same, not all are fanatical. Neither, are all Christians peace loving, are they? The point I wanted to make in the thread's title was that the beliefs of both groups on the topic of evolution are similar.

  But I accept your judgement that it may have been better to define the term, 'American Christians' more specifically to fundamentalist American Christians.

  
  
  
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  16

  Why do American Christians stand with Muslim Nations on the Question of Evolution?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  some statistics.

  this graph charts national responses to the statement, "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animal," and show some strange bedfellows.. .

  as you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form).

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
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  fulltimestudent

  Some statistics.

  This graph charts national responses to the statement, "Human Beings, as we know them, developed from Earlier Species of Animal," and show some strange bedfellows.

  

  As you see, a huge majority (70% and higher) of western Europe people surveyed, accept evolution (in some form). In East Asia only Japan* was surveyed, but their level of support for evolution is also at 80%. China was not surveyed, but since a big majority do not believe in any religion, we can expect that likely there is big majority that believe in evolution. Vietnam has a large Catholic population who are allowed to believe in evolution - adding that to 50 years of communist teachings means that likely support for evolution would be over 70%. In south Asia, India and similar cultures influenced by the religious system the west calls hinduism, also permits acceptance of evolution (See this Wikipedia entry for an overview: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_views_on_evolution )

  In eastern Europe with its strong orthodox Christian following, the level of support diminishes.

  In the USA though we find only 40% (according to this survey) acceptance of evolution, a percentage that is only matched by similar fundamentalist thinking in Turkey, which is more liberal in attitudes than other Islamic nations, which likely have an even lower level of acceptance.

  This chart was from a Wikipedia entry discussing the level of support for evolution.

  Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_support_for_evolution

  Footnote references 108,109 deal with the above chart.

  * Japan has a very small percentage of people that accept Christianity - around 1-2 %
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  8

  The Evolution of Humans

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tracing the evolutionary path of humans is complicated.

  simply because human and proto-human remains (including bones) are perishable.

  remains from the distant past are usually only preserved when some unique features exist that assist preservation.

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  fulltimestudent

  This next article from Nature discusses:

  New evidence on the earliest human presence at high northern latitudes in northeast Asia

  Nature 431, 559-562 (30 September 2004) | doi:10.1038/nature02829;
  

  In it the authors describe the finding of a range of stone tools in layers of sediment at Majuangou in north China. The stone tools are considered to be evidence of human activity.

  An interesting side point is the level of international co-operation in conducting this research.

  The researchers are listed as: R. X. Zhu1, R. Potts2, F. Xie3, K. A. Hoffman4, C. L. Deng1, C. D. Shi1, Y. X. Pan1, H. Q. Wang1, R. P. Shi1, Y. C. Wang1, G. H. Shi1 & N. Q. Wu1

  And the co-operating Institutions are:

  1. Paleomagnetism Laboratory, Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100029, China
  2. Human Origins Program, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC 20560-0112, USA
  3. Hebei Province Institute of Cultural Relics, Shijiazhuang 050000, China
  4. Physics Department, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, California 93410, USA

  The Abstract reads:

  The timing of early human dispersal to Asia is a central issue in the study of human evolution. Excavations in predominantly lacustrine sediments at Majuangou, Nihewan basin, north China, uncovered four layers of indisputable hominin stone tools. Here we report magnetostratigraphic results that constrain the age of the four artefact layers to an interval of nearly 340,000 yr between the Olduvai subchron and the Cobb Mountain event. The lowest layer, about 1.66 million years old (Myr), provides the oldest record of stone-tool processing of animal tissues in east Asia. The highest layer, at about 1.32 Myr, correlates with the stone tool layer at Xiaochangliang1, previously considered the oldest archaeological site in this region. The findings at Majuangou indicate that the oldest known human presence in northeast Asia at 40° N is only slightly younger than that in western Asia2, 3. This result implies that a long yet rapid migration from Africa, possibly initiated during a phase of warm climate, enabled early human populations to inhabit northern latitudes of east Asia over a prolonged period.

  Weblink: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v431/n7008/full/nature02829.html
  
  

  If early humans (or, even proto-humans) were in existence at the times indicated by the layers of sediment, how do we explain the ignorance of the author of Genesis?

  
  
  
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  8

  The Evolution of Humans

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tracing the evolutionary path of humans is complicated.

  simply because human and proto-human remains (including bones) are perishable.

  remains from the distant past are usually only preserved when some unique features exist that assist preservation.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
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  fulltimestudent

  A BBC overview covering evidence of early human and Neanderthal inter-breeding can be found at:

  http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33226416
  
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  8

  The Evolution of Humans

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tracing the evolutionary path of humans is complicated.

  simply because human and proto-human remains (including bones) are perishable.

  remains from the distant past are usually only preserved when some unique features exist that assist preservation.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
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  fulltimestudent

  • Mephis : Just away from Nature itself, a few other places which give you the ability to go to sources directly if you want to research something for yourself.
    JSTOR offers limited access to papers with a free account, for those without access to a decent library. It's only 3 articles every fortnight however. But better than a kick to the nether regions and it covers a crazy amount of academic journals.
    http://about.jstor.org/rr
    Plosone is becoming very fashionable to use. Open access, peer reviewed papers. Thehomo naledi papers were put up there, which caused quite a stir as usually one would expect it to take a few years from discovery to publication in a traditional journal.
    http://www.plosone.org/
    Academia.edu has a huge number of essays and articles put up by individual academics wanting to do open access. You may want to just create an account (free) to be able to browse through. Much goodness contained whether you're into science things or the humanities.
    https://www.academia.edu/

    Thanks for your very useful suggestions, Mephis. I'm sure other interested folk will find them useful.
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  8

  The Evolution of Humans

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tracing the evolutionary path of humans is complicated.

  simply because human and proto-human remains (including bones) are perishable.

  remains from the distant past are usually only preserved when some unique features exist that assist preservation.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  fulltimestudent

  Half banana : s ago
  FTS, the unilinear model i.e. a single evolving thread remains an idealistic notion which does not easily fit with the findings. Whereas 1992 is a long time ago in paleoanthropology, the phylogeny or positions in the family tree, are still constantly being reconsidered as new finds and new species are discovered. Since that date we have even had two completely new types of human species living simultaneously with our own namely the Denisovans in the Urals and the so called 'Hobbit', Homo floresiensis from Indonesia.

  We are in agreement, thanks for posting.

  Half Banana: Imagine the consequences of living with other species of humans.

  But (of course) its not what we may imagine, but what another proto-human species may have imagined. Currently, the evidence suggests that early humans did meet and intermingle (to an unknown extent) and even interbred, as we are reputed to carry some Neanderthal genetic material. Would they have 'thought' too much about another similar species? Would they have been able to communicate? Were they competing or co-operating? I doubt that we will ever be able to puzzle out answers to such questions.

  A 2004 letter printed in Nature discusses it, and I'm sure later material can be found in that Journal

  Here's some of that letter and the link:

  The genomic landscape of Neanderthal ancestry in present-day humans
  The genomic landscape of Neanderthal ancestry in present-day humans

  • Sriram Sankararaman,
  • Swapan Mallick,
  • Michael Dannemann,
  • Kay Prüfer,
  • Janet Kelso,
  • Svante Pääbo,
  • Nick Patterson
  • & David Reich

  Genomic studies have shown that Neanderthals interbred with modern humans, and that non-Africans today are the products of this mixture1, 2. The antiquity of Neanderthal gene flow into modern humans means that genomic regions that derive from Neanderthals in any one human today are usually less than a hundred kilobases in size. However, Neanderthal haplotypes are also distinctive enough that several studies have been able to detect Neanderthal ancestry at specific loci1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. We systematically infer Neanderthal haplotypes in the genomes of 1,004 present-day humans9. Regions that harbour a high frequency of Neanderthal alleles are enriched for genes affecting keratin filaments, suggesting that Neanderthal alleles may have helped modern humans to adapt to non-African environments. We identify multiple Neanderthal-derived alleles that confer risk for disease, suggesting that Neanderthal alleles continue to shape human biology. An unexpected finding is that regions with reduced Neanderthal ancestry are enriched in genes, implying selection to remove genetic material derived from Neanderthals. Genes that are more highly expressed in testes than in any other tissue are especially reduced in Neanderthal ancestry, and there is an approximately fivefold reduction of Neanderthal ancestry on the X chromosome, which is known from studies of diverse species to be especially dense in male hybrid sterility genes10, 11, 12. These results suggest that part of the explanation for genomic regions of reduced Neanderthal ancestry is Neanderthal alleles that caused decreased fertility in males when moved to a modern human genetic background.

  05 September 2013

  Accepted

  18 December 2013

  Published online

  29 January 2014

  507,

  354–357

  (20 March 2014)

  doi:10.1038/nature12961

  Reference: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v507/n7492/full/nature12961.html
  
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  25

  All shunning soon to end

  by poopie in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  this is just a first step clapping.

  it's like the fed one quarter bases point at a time.

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  fulltimestudent

  cofty : Shunning will never be revoked. It's how they control dissent.

  I agree! When I was young (in years, and the org) I was working H2H with an older brother whose experiences reached back to the 1920s. He suggested that programmed meetings and the later development of disfellowshipping were introduced mainly because of arguments over beliefs.

  But another perspective - these web-sites are anti-JW, but do not exist primarily because of JW beliefs. That sort of analysis and talk is a by-product of the main problem, which is that we have not been allowed to resign with dignity and with family ties intact.

  So what the witnesses see as a major problem, is self-inflicted. Change that practise and these web-sites will nearly all disappear.