Modern humans may have inherited some Neanderthal genes

So, Neanderthals were not human beings and contamination was not an issue. Glad that's finally settled. Now the real fun can start.

Did Neanderthals have the same chromosome complement as chimpanzees, or did they have the same fusion seen in humans? Their mitochondrial DNA is intermediate between chimps and humans as is their nuclear DNA, but how many SINE insertions do they share in common with humans? Can the Neanderthal nuclear DNA found to be introgressed into modern humans be used to study human adaptation and migration? How will this compare to the mitochondrial and Y chromosome data? What regulatory changes were important in the evolution of human morphology and which occurred before the split with Neanderthals? Can mitochondrial and nuclear sequencers be obtained from even older hominid fossils and how will they compare to the Neanderthal sequence? How are the creos ever going find a way to spin this that doesn't make them look bad? They must live in constant fear of things like this being discovered.

This discovery is additional confirmation of the "Out of Africa" migration hypothesis, since Africans lack traces of the Neanderthal genome (Current Africans were not part of the migration out of Africa which allowed Homo sapiens to populate Europe, Asia, and eventually, Australia and the Americas.). This discovery also confirms possible skeletal evidence of hybridizations between Homo sapiens and Homo neandertalensis in the Middle East, where their skeletons have been found, often in the same sedimentary strata.

Not surprisingly, Carl Zimmer has an especially lucid account of this discovery, made primarily by Swedish geneticist Svante Paabo and his team at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2010/05/06/skull-caps-and-genomes/

So this explains the Tea Party!

I thought that earlier mitochondrial DNA analysis ruled out the interbreeding hypothesis?

Diogenes said: So this explains the Tea Party!

Wheels said: I thought that earlier mitochondrial DNA analysis ruled out the interbreeding hypothesis?

Wheels said: I thought that earlier mitochondrial DNA analysis ruled out the interbreeding hypothesis?

DS said:

Wheels said: I thought that earlier mitochondrial DNA analysis ruled out the interbreeding hypothesis?

No, It did not rule it out. It only provided evidence that there was no extensive hybridization involving female Neanderthals mating with human males. That certainly did not preclude the possibility of low levels of hybridization, especially between human females and Neanderthal males. This evidence seems to indicate that some low level of introgression of Neanderthal genes happened in Europe after modern humans started coming out of Africa and before they colonized the rest of the world. That is certainly consistent with all of the other genetic data.

John Kwok said: Probably more likely in the Middle East, since some fossilized hominid remains indicate hybridization between both species. To the best of my knowledge, that's the only region where there may be paleobiological evidence of hybridization:

DS said:

Wheels said: I thought that earlier mitochondrial DNA analysis ruled out the interbreeding hypothesis?

No, It did not rule it out. It only provided evidence that there was no extensive hybridization involving female Neanderthals mating with human males. That certainly did not preclude the possibility of low levels of hybridization, especially between human females and Neanderthal males. This evidence seems to indicate that some low level of introgression of Neanderthal genes happened in Europe after modern humans started coming out of Africa and before they colonized the rest of the world. That is certainly consistent with all of the other genetic data.

This is truly amazing to me, since neanderthals have 24 pairs of chromosomes and we have 23. This shows a lot more ability to breed when there are differences between genomes. Have they said anything about how this sheds light on when and how our chromosomes fused together?

detailed discussion of the paper here: http://johnhawks.net/weblog; also see http://dienekes.blogspot.com for a skeptical perspective

Gary said: This is truly amazing to me, since neanderthals have 24 pairs of chromosomes and we have 23. This shows a lot more ability to breed when there are differences between genomes. Have they said anything about how this sheds light on when and how our chromosomes fused together?

Small and outbreeding ethnic groups of homo sapiens are going extinct these days (mostly indigenous peoples). But are they truly going extinct when their DNA is still around? The idea that neanderthals didn't shuffle off without leaving a mark on us really appeals to me, in that I have an emotional need to see slivers of hope in the Holocene Extinction.

Within my species I'd like to see a similar project: Find DNA from extinct Indian tribes, isolate any unique areas of it, and compare to living people in the USA. Did they leave a mark?

Another point of curiosity as an artist with an interest in the cosmetic differences of race - Could the genes responsible for neanderthal skeletal features be discovered, then compared against modern groups that look similar? Example: Many French and Chinese people receding chins, which is a classic neanderthal feature. Did they inherit them from our extinct cousins?

Given what I've seen of the study (I'll need to read it more deeply, time permitting), it's safe to assume most white people are part neanderthal. That's fun to know about oneself, really.

This is all very unscientific and useless reflection, so apologies to anyone annoyed by it. Carry on.

Malchus and Gary--

PZ Myers has a really good post explaining how two individuals with different numbers of chromosomes can produce offspring. See his post "Basic: How Can Chromosome Numbers Change?" April 21, 2008, on Pharyngula.

The gist of it is, two individuals with different numbers of chromosomes have reduced fertility, but reduced fertility doesn't mean no fertility.

CS Shelton said: Within my species I'd like to see a similar project: Find DNA from extinct Indian tribes, isolate any unique areas of it, and compare to living people in the USA. Did they leave a mark? Another point of curiosity as an artist with an interest in the cosmetic differences of race - Could the genes responsible for neanderthal skeletal features be discovered, then compared against modern groups that look similar? Example: Many French and Chinese people receding chins, which is a classic neanderthal feature. Did they inherit them from our extinct cousins?

I was reading this study last night. The problem here is that unsavory origins of Westerners is in conflict with the overwhelming evidence of good performance, health outcomes, scientific progress, etc., from the West. In fact, if we come from Neanderthals, how did we ever get where we are? An ancillary question arises: If we have these defective genes, how did we ever figure it out?

NS

Why do you think that Neanderthals were "unsavory" or "defective"? Or that the "west" is representative of modern Homo sapiens, or of what is "savory" or not "defective"?

notedscholar said: I was reading this study last night. The problem here is that unsavory origins of Westerners is in conflict with the overwhelming evidence of good performance, health outcomes, scientific progress, etc., from the West.

In fact, if we come from Neanderthals, how did we ever get where we are? An ancillary question arises: If we have these defective genes, how did we ever figure it out? NS

Notedtroll: The problem here is that unsavory origins of Westerners is in conflict with the overwhelming evidence of good performance, health outcomes, scientific progress, etc., from the West. In fact, if we come from Neanderthals, how did we ever get where we are?

Stanton said:

notedscholar said: I was reading this study last night. The problem here is that unsavory origins of Westerners is in conflict with the overwhelming evidence of good performance, health outcomes, scientific progress, etc., from the West.

The only person here saying that Westerners having an unsavory origin is a problem is you. If this is the conclusion you have come to, it appears that you have extremely poor reading comprehension skills. The gist of the report can be neatly summarized in the title of this blog post. A less concise version would be "The ancestors of modern Caucasians apparently interbred with Neanderthals prior to the Neanderthals' extinct." Nothing about racial inferiority or racism in general.

In fact, if we come from Neanderthals, how did we ever get where we are? An ancillary question arises: If we have these defective genes, how did we ever figure it out? NS

The answer is quite simple: either the genes we humans inherited from Neanderthals were not defective, or they were defective in a way that doesn't bother us at all. Either way, given as how Homo sapiens has been able to persist for thousands upon thousands of years after the extinction of H. neanderthalensis strongly suggests that your concerns that we inherited "defective genes" from them are foolish and irrelevant.

notedscholar said: I was reading this study last night. The problem here is that unsavory origins of Westerners is in conflict with the overwhelming evidence of good performance, health outcomes, scientific progress, etc., from the West. In fact, if we come from Neanderthals, how did we ever get where we are? An ancillary question arises: If we have these defective genes, how did we ever figure it out? NS

wikipedia Neanderthals: Neanderthal cranial capacity is thought to have been as large as that of Homo sapiens, perhaps larger, indicating that their brain size may have been comparable as well. In 2008, a group of scientists made a study using three-dimensional computer-assisted reconstructions of Neanderthal infants based on fossils found in Russia and Syria, showing that they had brains as large as ours at birth and larger than ours as adults.[10]

So this explains the Tea Party!

I was reading this study last night. The problem here is that unsavory origins of Westerners

is in conflict with the overwhelming evidence of good performance, health outcomes, scientific progress, etc., from the West.

In fact, if we come from Neanderthals, how did we ever get where we are?

An ancillary question arises: If we have these defective genes,

Malchus said: Why do you say that Neandertals had 24 pairs of chromosomes? Presumably, for a viable hybrid to prove viable, the chromosome number must be the same? 23?

harold said:

notedscholar - An ancillary question arises: If we have these defective genes,

There is no scientific rationale for labeling Neanderthal genes "defective".

Wasn't this documented in Clan of the Cave Bear with Daryl Hannah?

The news doesn’t surprise young-earth creationists, who predicted overlap between modern human and Neanderthal genomes. Based on Scripture, creationists consider Neanderthals to have been fully human, descendants of Adam and Eve (through Noah), and therefore they would have lived in the same time and place as other humans. But factors related to both the dispersion at Babel and environmental pressures afterward resulted in people groups with different physical characteristics, including humans with “Neanderthal” characteristics. Liberty University cell biologist (and creationist) David DeWitt called the research an “amazing feat” of science that supports creationist expectations. “Finding Neanderthal DNA in humans was not expected by evolutionists, but it was predicted from a creation standpoint because we have said all along that Neanderthals were fully human: descendants of Adam and Eve, just like us,” he told News to Note. DeWitt also pointed to research on mitochondrial DNA several years earlier that had boldly claimed that Neanderthals were not our ancestors, based on the genetic results at that time. “We really have to be careful with scientific conclusions and data,” DeWitt explained. “Now, with a more thorough analysis, we have the exact opposite conclusions.” While Neanderthals remain something of a mystery even to creationists, the new research reminds us of the reality of what the Bible teaches: Neanderthals were neither ape-men nor inferior to other humans. Rather, as with all humans, Neanderthals were part of the one blood of humankind (Acts 17:26), and therefore carried the image of God (Genesis 1:27). * As to why the percentage of Neanderthal DNA found in modern humans is relatively small, we note the following. Neanderthal fossils are from individuals who have been dead for hundreds to thousands of years. Since that time, there have been selection pressure, genetic drift, and population bottlenecks (such as the bubonic plague that struck Europe, episodes of “ethnic cleansing,” etc.). These all have impacts on the gene pool, as does relative population size. Humans alive today have come through that, while the Neanderthals did not.

Here's the link by the way:

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2010/05/08/news-to-note-05082010

Me Neanderthal. Me have protruding nose; occipital bun, hair around chin and throat... well okay, that's all. But as a Caucasian living in Asia (and a reader of a lot of stuff), I have made a few observations. Caucasians are anomalous. All humans (except "us") have brown skin, wide noses, black hair (except a few blond aborigines), brown irises and hairless skin; weak or absent facial hair. Consider (particularly) European Caucasians: pale skin; narrow, protruding noses; hair color from ash blond to black with excursions into red; irises ranging from gray through blue to violet and a large range of 'browns' from pale to deep; many (myself excluded) with thick body hair.
Consider a migrant from Africa: as "black" as any modern African. Consider the disadvantages of this type in an environment with weak sunlight and cold air.
Pale skin (associated with pale irises?): an advantage in the sunlight-poor northern latitudes (vitamin D; folate); protruding noses: efficient heat and moisture exchangers; body hair: glaciation. Consider that Neanderthals had evolved for more than half a million years in this environment. Genes from such a pool would have abetted the invasion of the newbies.
Me Neanderthal. Me name Thag.

Why do you say that Neandertals had 24 pairs of chromosomes? Presumably, for a viable hybrid to prove viable, the chromosome number must be the same? 23?

wikipedia wild horses: Genetically, the pre-domestication horse, Equus ferus ferus, and domesticated horse, Equus ferus caballus, form a single homogeneous group (clade) and are genetically indistinguishable from each other.[4][11][12] [13] The genetic variation within this clade shows only a limited regional variation, with a notable exception of the Przewalski's Horse.[4][11][12][13] The Przewalski's Horse has several unique genetic differences that distinguishes it from the other subspecies, including 66 instead of 64 chromosomes,[2] [14] unique Y-chromosome gene haplotypes, [15] and unique mtDNA haplotypes. [16

Genet Res. 2005 Dec;86(3):171-83. Epub 2005 Nov 23. Links Chromosomal phylogeny of Robertsonian races of the house mouse on the island of Madeira: testing between alternative mutational processes.Britton-Davidian J, Catalan J, da Graça Ramalhinho M, Auffray JC, Claudia Nunes A, Gazave E, Searle JB, da Luz Mathias M. Institut des Sciences de l'Evolution, UMR 5554, Laboratoire Génétique et Environnement, CC65, Université Montpellier II, France. The ancestral karyotype of the house mouse (Mus musculus) consists of 40 acrocentric chromosomes, but numerous races exist within the domesticus subspecies characterized by different metacentric chromosomes formed by the joining at the centromere of two acrocentrics. An exemplary case is present on the island of Madeira where six highly divergent chromosomal races have accumulated different combinations of 20 metacentrics in 500-1000 years. Chromosomal cladistic phylogenies were performed to test the relative performance of Robertsonian (Rb) fusions, Rb fissions and whole-arm reciprocal translocations (WARTs) in resolving relationships between the chromosomal races. The different trees yielded roughly similar topologies, but varied in the number of steps and branch support. The analyses using Rb fusions/fissions as characters resulted in poorly supported trees requiring six to eight homoplasious events. Allowance for WARTs considerably increased nodal support and yielded the most parsimonious trees since homoplasy was reduced to a single event. The WART-based trees required five to nine WARTs and 12 to 16 Rb fusions. These analyses provide support for the role of WARTs in generating the extensive chromosomal diversification observed in house mice. The repeated occurrence of Rb fusions and WARTs highlights the contribution of centromere-related rearrangements to accelerated rates of chromosomal change in the house mouse.

Peter Henderson said: Here's the link by the way: http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2010/05/08/news-to-note-05082010

But as a Caucasian living in Asia (and a reader of a lot of stuff), I have made a few observations.

Caucasians are anomalous. All humans (except “us”) have brown skin, wide noses, black hair (except a few blond aborigines), brown irises and hairless skin; weak or absent facial hair. Consider (particularly) European Caucasians: pale skin; narrow, protruding noses; hair color from ash blond to black with excursions into red; irises ranging from gray through blue to violet and a large range of ‘browns’ from pale to deep; many (myself excluded) with thick body hair.

Consider a migrant from Africa: as “black” as any modern African. Consider the disadvantages of this type in an environment with weak sunlight and cold air. Pale skin (associated with pale irises?): an advantage in the sunlight-poor northern latitudes (vitamin D; folate);

protruding noses: efficient heat and moisture exchangers;

body hair: glaciation.

Consider that Neanderthals had evolved for more than half a million years in this environment. Genes from such a pool would have abetted the invasion of the newbies.

Peter Henderson said: First reactions from AiG:

* As to why the percentage of Neanderthal DNA found in modern humans is relatively small, we note the following. Neanderthal fossils are from individuals who have been dead for hundreds to thousands of years.

DS said: So, Neanderthals were not human beings and contamination was not an issue. Glad that's finally settled. Now the real fun can start.

DS said: Did Neanderthals have the same chromosome complement as chimpanzees, or did they have the same fusion seen in humans?

John Kwok said: Not even remotely close:

Diogenes said: So this explains the Tea Party!

If you want an explanation for the Tea Party Movement, then read Brown University historian Gordon Wood's excellent histories (which, I am sure, Ken Miller would endose immediately, since he has done so already in his "Only A Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul"), or read the original material from the likes of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and their fellow Founding Fathers.

John Kwok said: If you want to discuss politics, then please do so elsewhere. Your comment isn't informative, especially as it pertains to the Science articles cited by Matt Young.

SWT said:

Peter Henderson said: First reactions from AiG:

* As to why the percentage of Neanderthal DNA found in modern humans is relatively small, we note the following. Neanderthal fossils are from individuals who have been dead for hundreds to thousands of years.

Am I the only one who laughed out loud at the part I bolded above? It seems to me that if there were Neanderthals around a few hundred years ago, we'd have some historical record of them ... especially if there was some interbreeding.

It seems to me that if there were Neanderthals around a few hundred years ago, we’d have some historical record of them … especially if there was some interbreeding.

Gary said: This is truly amazing to me, since neanderthals have 24 pairs of chromosomes and we have 23. This shows a lot more ability to breed when there are differences between genomes. Have they said anything about how this sheds light on when and how our chromosomes fused together?

AIG: Neanderthal fossils are from individuals who have been dead for hundreds to thousands of years.

raven said: ...this is never going to end unless (creationists) gain control of our society, kill the scientists, and burn the libraries.

TomS said: Why do you think that Neanderthals were "unsavory" or "defective"? Or that the "west" is representative of modern Homo sapiens, or of what is "savory" or not "defective"?

One thing I noticed is that the point of comparison are the human accelerator genes not found in chimps are used in order to establish how related humans and Neanderthals are. By using chimps as a baseline, isn't that enough to declare the study bogus in the eyes of Creationists, since they can say it relies on a question-begging evolutionary assumption of human-chimp relatedness?

Hey Harold: you take me too seriously. I use the term "caucasian" only because it is in common use (and less offensive/more accurate than "white"). My point was that European caucasians (excluding caucasians currently living in India, who have been selected for darker skin -- carcinomas and such) are starkly different from, shall I say, "typical" humans. The characteristics that I listed MAY result from Neanderthal introgression. Sincerely, Thag Simmons.

Did Neanderthals die out before or after the flood? Were they at the Tower of Babel? Was Abraham a Neanderthal or any of the other biblical figures?

My last intensive read-up of our understanding of Neandertals told me that they were obligate carnivores.

If this be true, then, in combination with the fact that they were perhaps the most horrifyingly efficient predator in their size range for a very long time, it gives us a fairly good set of possible reasons why we replaced them.

They would have had to live in small, geographically dispersed groups. This is nearly always characteristic of efficient carnivores. Our ancestors, being a bit less locked in to a single mode of acquiring nutrition, had no such limitations. If the Neandertals, even being considerably larger than we, were only encountered in groups of a dozen or so, but we could show up with a couple hundred or more, marginalization of Neandertals, followed by extinction, would have been inevitable.

I have often wondered whether the legends of "giants" in some social traditions represent a memory of encounters with Neandertals -- large, strong, solitary, cannibalistic, lacking in speech facility, likely to steal your cattle...

My last intensive read-up of our understanding of Neandertals told me that they were obligate carnivores.

It is like they aren’t even trying anymore. Did Neanderthals die out before or after the flood? Were they at the Tower of Babel? Was Abraham a Neanderthal or any of the other biblical figures?

— raven

FYI, some recent research findings,
Ancient DNA Reveals Surprisingly Few Differences In Human and Neanderthals,5/6/2010, HHMI News
http://www.hhmi.org/news/hannon20100506.html

raven said: I doubt they were any more obligatory carnivores than the Eskimos. Depends on where you live more than what your physiology can handle. Someone once pointed out that Eskimos, despite having a high animal fat diet, didn't die of artherosclerosis at high rates. And someone else pointed out that this was because they all died in their 40s from kidney failure due to a high protein diet. These days none of this is likely happening due to acculturation.

Who said I'm a liberal? Apparently you haven't heard of my "affection" for a certain American president and two of his closest aides, who, unfortunately, are fellow alumni of our high school.

Anyway I was concerned that this thread might digress into more political baiting that's occurred elsewhere here at PT, and thought that given the historic importance of this report on the "rough draft" of the Neanderthal genome, didn't want to see any similar incidents here.

djlactin said: Me Neanderthal. Me have protruding nose; occipital bun, hair around chin and throat... well okay, that's all. But as a Caucasian living in Asia (and a reader of a lot of stuff), I have made a few observations.

Bobsie said: FYI, some recent research findings, Ancient DNA Reveals Surprisingly Few Differences In Human and Neanderthals,5/6/2010, HHMI News http://www.hhmi.org/news/hannon20100506.html

David Fickett-Wilbar said: Am I the only one to note that apparently Neanderthal guys got it on with modern women, but not the other way round? What, Cro Mag chicks dig those eyebrow ridges, but those ridges don't do a thing for the guys?

John Kwok said:Who said I'm a liberal?

Paul Burnett said:

raven said: ...this is never going to end unless (creationists) gain control of our society, kill the scientists, and burn the libraries.

That's their ultimate goal - the Theocratic States of America. Look up Christian Reconstructionism, or see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominionism. This was even a staple of science fiction a few decades ago. Some of Robert Heinlein's and Andre Norton's dystopian novels had that as a subject.

And someone else pointed out that this was because they all died in their 40s from kidney failure due to a high protein diet.

djlactin -

The article clearly says that modern European and Asian populations both show overlap with the Neanderthal genome. As I mentioned, people with physical traits that we would class as "Asian" live successfully in all climates (actually, so do all types of people).

I'm not trying to give you a hard time; I thought your comment was kind of interesting.

David Fickett-Wilbar said: Am I the only one to note that apparently Neanderthal guys got it on with modern women, but not the other way round? What, Cro Mag chicks dig those eyebrow ridges, but those ridges don't do a thing for the guys?

Shebardigan said:

David Fickett-Wilbar said: Am I the only one to note that apparently Neanderthal guys got it on with modern women, but not the other way round? What, Cro Mag chicks dig those eyebrow ridges, but those ridges don't do a thing for the guys?

Depends upon how much importance you might place on one person being 0.5 to 1.0 meters taller and 100 kg more massive than the other, as far as amorous relationships (voluntary or involuntary) are concerned.

harold says, in part: ...people with physical traits that we would class as “Asian” live successfully in all climates (actually, so do all types of people).

Dave Luckett said: All humans can now live comfortably in practically any environment Earth affords, with the exception, perhaps, of the calderas of volcanoes and the like, but this has been accomplished by technology, not natural adaptation. It does not mean that all humans are adapted to live in all climates. I cannot prove this, and I have seen no research on the question, but I would imagine that Inuit people would be intensely uncomfortable in, say, Arabia, unless refrigeration were available. I would imagine that people from the Congo would find life in Lapland difficult to cope with unless vitamin D supplements and thermal underwear plus central heating were available. And even given these technologies, they would still be to some extent restricted in their ability to manage the environment.

By using chimps as a baseline, isn’t that enough to declare the study bogus in the eyes of Creationists, since they can say it relies on a question-begging evolutionary assumption of human-chimp relatedness?

— Andrew Stallard

Andrew Stallard said: By using chimps as a baseline, isn't that enough to declare the study bogus in the eyes of Creationists, since they can say it relies on a question-begging evolutionary assumption of human-chimp relatedness?

I cannot prove this, and I have seen no research on the question, but I would imagine that Inuit people would be intensely uncomfortable in, say, Arabia, unless refrigeration were available.

I would imagine that people from the Congo would find life in Lapland difficult to cope with unless vitamin D supplements and thermal underwear plus central heating were available. And even given these technologies, they would still be to some extent restricted in their ability to manage the environment.

TomS said:

Dave Luckett said: All humans can now live comfortably in practically any environment Earth affords, with the exception, perhaps, of the calderas of volcanoes and the like, but this has been accomplished by technology, not natural adaptation. It does not mean that all humans are adapted to live in all climates. I cannot prove this, and I have seen no research on the question, but I would imagine that Inuit people would be intensely uncomfortable in, say, Arabia, unless refrigeration were available. I would imagine that people from the Congo would find life in Lapland difficult to cope with unless vitamin D supplements and thermal underwear plus central heating were available. And even given these technologies, they would still be to some extent restricted in their ability to manage the environment.

What about people who live at extremely high altitudes, in the Andes and Himalayas? Are they genetically adapted to these altitudes?

TomS said:

Andrew Stallard said: By using chimps as a baseline, isn't that enough to declare the study bogus in the eyes of Creationists, since they can say it relies on a question-begging evolutionary assumption of human-chimp relatedness?

If this were intended as a demonstration of human-chimp relatedness. If this were the only evidence for human-chimp relatedness. Human-chimp relatedness has been established by a vast amount of evidence, so that studies now are only (1) determining details of the relationship or (2) checking whether new evidence remains consistent with the relationship. Actually, human-chimp relationship is so well established that (2) is really a check on the new evidence, rather than a check on the relationship - in this case, as setting a baseline for understanding the modern-neanderthal relationship. The most that one can say is that if there were something amiss with our understanding of human-chimp relationship, it would show up by producing anomalous results in a study like this. Rather like surveying depends upon the earth being round, but when surveying is done, it is not for the purposes of "proving" that the earth is round, but for finding out something else. If the earth were not round, then surveying would turn up anomalous results. The fact that surveying doesn't turn up anomalous results is confirmation that the earth is round, as if confirmation were needed. One might say that the comparison between modern and neanderthal is a matter of "complex specified information", something which is extremely improbable to happen by "random chance", and which therefore must be due either to (a) natural regularity (such as common descent) or else (b) was deliberately, purposefully, intelligently "designed" to be that way. The comparison between two genomes is more "complex" than the structure of a single genome, and much of the comparison has been predicted in advance (would it ever be a surprise to find major differences!), and was thus really "specified in advance" more so than anything that the "analogy of design" has been.

Andrew Stallard said: Yes, I am aware of all of this, but, as a former creationist myself it appears their "methodology" has changed. They don't even challenge other people's conclusions anymore but only claim that "Our theory can accommodate this too." or "Our theory predicted this as well."

Yes, I am aware of all of this, but, as a former creationist myself it appears their “methodology” has changed. They don’t even challenge other people’s conclusions anymore but only claim that “Our theory can accommodate this too.” or “Our theory predicted this as well.”

harold said: I defend this as a fairly good description of creationist behavior. I don't claim that this method of understanding them gives me insight into their private thoughts, just that it allows me to predict them.

Lenny Flank: The creationists are quite open in their belief that evolutionary theory, even theistic evolution, is, quite literally, the work of the Devil: "Behind both groups of evolutionists one can discern the malignant influence of 'that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world'." (Morris, 1963, p. 93) Indeed, one of the founders of the modern creationist movement, Dr. Henry Morris, has declared that evolutionary theory was given to Nimrod by Satan himself, at the Tower of Babel: "Its top was a great temple shrine, emblazoned with zodiacal signs representing the hosts of heaven, Satan and his 'principalities and powers, rulers of the darkness of the world' (Ephesians 6:12). These evil spirits there perhaps met with Nimrod and his priests, to plan their long-range strategy against God and his redemptive purposes for the post-diluvian world. This included especially the development of a non-theistic cosmology, one which could explain the origin and meaning of the universe and man without acknowledging the true God of creation. Denial of God's power and sovereignty in creation is of course foundational in the rejection of His authority in every other sphere. . . . If something like this really happened, early in post-diluvian history, then Satan himself is the originator of the concept of evolution. "One question remains. Assuming Satan to be the real source of the evolutionary concept, how did it originate in his mind? . . . A possible answer to this mystery could be that Satan, the father of lies, has not only deceived the whole world and the angelic hosts who followed him--he has even deceived himself! The only way he could really know about creation (just as the only way we can know about creation) was for God to tell him! . . . . He refused to believe and accept the Word of God concerning his own creation and place in God's economy . . . He therefore deceived himself into supposing that all things, including himself and including God, had been evolved by natural processes out of the primordial stuff of the universe. . . ." (Morris, Troubled Waters of Evolution, 1974, pp 74-75). Thus, concludes Morris, "The entire monstrous complex was revealed to Nimrod at Babel by demonic influences, perhaps by Satan himself . . . Satan himself is the originator of the concept of evolution." (Morris, Troubled Waters of Evolution, 1974, pp 74-75)

raven said: The most common creationist tactic hasn't changed a bit. They lie. Morris claims that evolution was invented by Satan and handed to Nimrod at the Tower of Babel. What is odd is that nothing that he claims is in the bible is actually in the bible. He just made it all up. One of the striking things about creationism is that it forces people to be evil and lie a lot. I suppose it isn't surprising that a few of them like Hovind have ended up in prison.

harold said: Andrew Stallard -

Yes, I am aware of all of this, but, as a former creationist myself it appears their “methodology” has changed. They don’t even challenge other people’s conclusions anymore but only claim that “Our theory can accommodate this too.” or “Our theory predicted this as well.”

I have noticed this from some creationists. A lot of times an emphasis on attacking hypotheses of abiogenesis, rather than the theory of evolution, is part of this approach.

However, older styles live on. I have no idea whether Casey Luskin has ever strongly stated his true beliefs in public, but he cranks out "contradict every finding in biomedical science that gets into the media" stuff endlessly. The classic creationist approach - make inaccurate attacks on science, implying the false dichotomy that "creationism must win" if mainstream science is attacked. As a former creationist, perhaps you can comment on this... I have learned to interpret the behavior of the unrepentant creationists as follows. I take them as basically being authoritarians who think in terms of "winning". I don't see them as caring about the objective truth, almost in the way that a born deaf person doesn't care about (external) music. I don't conjecture as to how they got this way, but it seems that to them, evidence is a tactic. The only test of truth is whether the person who advocates a position can "win", whatever methodology is used. All assertions are equal; you choose the social/religious/political reality you prefer and then deny any fact or theory that seems to be remotely at odds with it, using any denial tactics whatsoever. Tactics that can be used trivially include - hiding or even denying your full underlying agenda if you think that will help, using arguments that you know have been disproved in another forum, repeating disproved arguments right back at the person who disproved them, using massive numbers of weak arguments in a short period of time to make full rebuttal very difficult, constantly creating straw man versions of your opponents' true positions, and always using loaded language. Eg. http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=54083

I defend this as a fairly good description of creationist behavior. I don't claim that this method of understanding them gives me insight into their private thoughts, just that it allows me to predict them.

harold said: I have noticed this from some creationists. A lot of times an emphasis on attacking hypotheses of abiogenesis, rather than the theory of evolution, is part of this approach. However, older styles live on. I have no idea whether Casey Luskin has ever strongly stated his true beliefs in public, but he cranks out "contradict every finding in biomedical science that gets into the media" stuff endlessly. The classic creationist approach - make inaccurate attacks on science, implying the false dichotomy that "creationism must win" if mainstream science is attacked. As a former creationist, perhaps you can comment on this...

They have adopted the tactic of reciting almost word-for-word the very accusations that have been leveled against them and redirecting them at the science community.

You are wrong if you think they don’t believe in objective truth. They have absolute certitude that they have the perfect and complete truth.

As far as Luskin and the rest of the ID crowd goes, I really can’t tell what is driving them. Although I suspect some of them in their hearts, believe in God about as much as Richard Dawkins does.

Nevertheless, they want to promote religion among the working classes because they think unless “the masses” fear divine retribution they will rape, kill, pillage, and burn everything in sight.

Peter Henderson said: First reactions from AiG: snip While Neanderthals remain something of a mystery even to creationists, the new research reminds us of the reality of what the Bible teaches: Neanderthals were neither ape-men nor inferior to other humans. Rather, as with all humans, Neanderthals were part of the one blood of humankind (Acts 17:26), and therefore carried the image of God (Genesis 1:27).

harold, I was not denying anything you said. I was questioning the power of natural selection in the case of humans only. The question, to my mind, is not whether adaptations to environment exist among humans - of course they do - but what is their power relative to the unique human capability of technology?

The Neanderthals were naturally adapted to a subarctic environment - Europe and western Asia in the Wurm and earlier ice ages - as far as it is possible for a hominid to be. They had in fact speciated under selection pressure, as the DNA studies show.

Nevertheless, they were rapidly displaced and then became extinct across their entire range (save for some arguable relict genes they may have passed to modern humans) when they came into contact with H. sapiens, a species apparently less well-adapted to the cold than they. It is difficult to attribute this to purely environmental factors, because it happened during the last ice age, when Europe was as cold as it had ever been. When the ice receded, beginning about twelve thousand years ago, the Neanderthals were already gone, and H sapiens - probably already the sole remaining hominid - was about to begin the slow development of agriculture and the climb (if it be a climb) to civilisation.

Positing that this summary is a roughly correct (as always, I stand ready to be corrected), it poses a conundrum. In what ways was H sapiens more fit for the environment of Europe in the ice age than H neanderthalis? And what does this tell us about ourselves?

My father died in 1974. He always used to say I was a neanderthal. Guess he was ahead of his time

A lesson here is also that once again the textbooks must be rewritten because what was concluded before had no science behind it. It can't. Origin issues are not scientific ones as the great creationist Henry Morris said.
Next week, I predict, they will find fully genetic Neanderthals living in New York city.
Probably voting Democratic.

raven asked: Did Neanderthals die out before or after the flood?

AIG states: Based on Scripture, creationists consider Neanderthals to have been fully human, descendants of Adam and Eve (through Noah), and therefore they would have lived in the same time and place as other humans.

As was demonstrated by a poster above, another creationist mantra is that science is continually changing its conclusions, therefore none of it is right.

The ability to adapt to new evidence is, of course, the basis and great strength of science. But in this case, as in many others, the amount that science actually changed its conclusions is largely in the minds of newspaper headline writers. Everyone working in the field seemed to be aware that the lack of Neanderthal genes in modern human mitochondria didn't necessarily mean there were no Neanderthal genes in modern human nuclear DNA. So this study wasn't so much correcting an error as refining a somewhat fuzzy picture.

Points in favor of AiG's accommodation: Dornier Pfeil earlier reminded us of the Nephilim, quite consistent with possible interbreeding occurring in the middle east. And don't forget Lilith, Adam's first wife and later Dembski's nemesis.

djlactin said: My point was that European caucasians (excluding caucasians currently living in India, who have been selected for darker skin -- carcinomas and such) are starkly different from, shall I say, "typical" humans.

I don't like the species name Homo Sapiens, for those who may not know, it means wise man,a bit arrogant to call ourselves that, with plenty of evidence to the contrary. Anyway "Homo Sapiens" were only one of several human sub-species that co-existed in the past.

Genetic studies on sub-saharan Africans has found significent archaic homonoid genetic insertions that are not found in other populations. Unfortunately climatic and topographic issues in Africa do not provide a good envoirment for the preservation of ancient dna bearing remains.So it is impossible in the present to genetically reconstruct this African ancestor[s].There is also a very strong morphological case for a large imput from Asian Homo Erectus in modern East Asians. Hopefully antropology will come to a rational consensus between the two extremes ,out of africa and multi-regional emergence.

The Neanderthals were naturally adapted to a subarctic environment - Europe and western Asia in the Wurm and earlier ice ages - as far as it is possible for a hominid to be. They had in fact speciated under selection pressure, as the DNA studies show. Nevertheless, they were rapidly displaced and then became extinct across their entire range (save for some arguable relict genes they may have passed to modern humans) when they came into contact with H. sapiens, a species apparently less well-adapted to the cold than they.

It is difficult to attribute this to purely environmental factors, because it happened during the last ice age, when Europe was as cold as it had ever been.

Indeed, we don't know what the genetic barriers, if any, were for hybridization between the hominid species we recognize almost solely on the basis of bone morphology.

In fact, although I suppose it's highly unlikely, a scenario in which the H. sapiens population was 25 to 100 times that of the Neanderthal population, and there was total hybridization, would equally explain the current genetic observations.

DS said: Did Neanderthals have the same chromosome complement as chimpanzees, or did they have the same fusion seen in humans? Their mitochondrial DNA is intermediate between chimps and humans as is their nuclear DNA, but how many SINE insertions do they share in common with humans?

Genetic studies on sub-saharan Africans has found significent archaic homonoid genetic insertions that are not found in other populations.

There is also a very strong morphological case for a large imput from Asian Homo Erectus in modern East Asians.

Robert Byers said: A lesson here is also that once again the textbooks must be rewritten because what was concluded before had no science behind it.

Aagcobb said:

DS said: Did Neanderthals have the same chromosome complement as chimpanzees, or did they have the same fusion seen in humans? Their mitochondrial DNA is intermediate between chimps and humans as is their nuclear DNA, but how many SINE insertions do they share in common with humans?

I didn't see anyone else respond to this, so I just wanted to point out that Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA is not intermediate between Chimps and Homo Sapiens. Neanderthals were as different from chimps genetically as we are. In fact, this new evidence strongly indicates that Neanderthals are not a separate species from us because we could produce fertile offspring together, but rather a subspecies. Thus they would be Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis, and we would be Homo Sapiens Sapiens.

You. Moron. ... Idiot.

Ann Gibbons Science News Focus The team also used the Neandertal DNA like a probe to find the genes that make us modern. Even though the genomes of humans and Neandertals are 99.84% identical, the researchers identified regions that have changed or evolved since our ancestors and Neandertals diverged sometime between 270,000 and 440,000 years ago—their new, slightly younger estimate of the split.

Ever notice the similarity of characteristics between AIG and the Taliban? (Speech, tactics, insistence on inerrancy [they are the judge of what's inerrant and what's not; they will interpret the Bible for me], need for indoctrination in schools, fighting Satan)

Scary, isn't it?

Robert Byers said: A lesson here is also that once again the textbooks must be rewritten because what was concluded before had no science behind it. It can't. Origin issues are not scientific ones as the great creationist Henry Morris said.

No geological difficulties, real or imagined, can be allowed to take precedence over the clear statements and necessary inferences of Scripture.

When science and the Bible differ, science has obviously misinterpreted its data.

Matt Young said:

You. Moron. ... Idiot.

No more than one response each to Mr. Byers, please, and keep them civil. Further responses will find themselves on the Bathroom Wall.

Natman said: Fundamentalism is stuck in the past, adhering to outdated and flawed belief systems with no rational basis

TomS said:

Natman said: Fundamentalism is stuck in the past, adhering to outdated and flawed belief systems with no rational basis

Fundamentalism would like to believe that it is stuck in the past, but it is rather a modern reaction to the modern, with its own novelties.

Stanton said:

TomS said:

Natman said: Fundamentalism is stuck in the past, adhering to outdated and flawed belief systems with no rational basis

Fundamentalism would like to believe that it is stuck in the past, but it is rather a modern reaction to the modern, with its own novelties.

Indeed, fundamentalists want to return to their own idealized image of what they think is the past, so that they can either achieve a lifestyle where they can be as pious as they assumed their ancestors were, but with all the creature comforts of the present, or that they can somehow live like their ancestors did, but ignore all the downsides of living like a peasant (i.e., working from dawn till dusk, chronic bad hygiene, poor diet, being ignorant of how diseases are spread, etc.)

It’s kind of funny, but I had a girl tell me that I would like to live back in the 1870s or 1880s.

raven said:

It’s kind of funny, but I had a girl tell me that I would like to live back in the 1870s or 1880s.

The average American lifespan in 1900 was 47, 30 years less than today. I have no idea what it was in 1870 but it wasn't higher. A lot of that mortality was children dying of common childhood diseases of the time. But there is nothing stopping that girl from adopting an 1870 lifestyle or even a stone age one. It is a free country. The Amish do so, although many of them take advantage of modern medicine. Or she could just move to Afghanistan, Somalia, or a few other backward parts of the world.

raven said: It’s kind of funny, but I had a girl tell me that I would like to live back in the 1870s or 1880s.

stevaroni said:

raven said: It’s kind of funny, but I had a girl tell me that I would like to live back in the 1870s or 1880s.

I guess she doesn't feel the need to have a right to vote (not till 1919 in the US).

Thanks to Andrew Stallard for trying to explain why Biblical literalists think this way. Of course, Glenn Morton is another ex-YEC, helpful in understanging them. Still, I can't entirely understand the *why*.

Andrew Stallard tells us that they believe in objective reality. OK... so then *why* do they lie? *Why* are they so willing to ignore truckloads of data? Does data mean nothing to them?

*Why* did Duane Gish lie about the protein that was more similar between humans vs. bullfrogs, than between humans vs. chimps? *Why* after copying the fake "monkey quote" (about how Java Man/Homo erectus was "monkey-like") and then getting caught, *why* could he not just admit that Homo erectus is not monkey-like at all? Would it kill Gish to admit he was wrong?

*Why* did Henry Morris lie in his infamous misquote of Ross and Rezak re: Lewis Overthrust (where he dropped the "millions" out of "million years" and made other ridiculous changes of meaning)?

*Why* did William Dembski repeatedly claim that his probability calculations in "No Free Lunch" were probabilities of evolutionary processes--when they were calculations of totally random combinations of amino acids? And he absolutely knows those numbers differ by hundreds of orders of magnitude.

Why? My theory:

Scientists are "bottom up." Get every little fact straight. Build your small theories from those facts, build your big theories from small confirmed theories and more facts. Then, and only then, decide how you feel about it. Is it wondrous or terrifying that space is so vast and empty and full of galaxies? Decide that only *after* you get every small detail right.

Creationists are "top down." First, begin with a feeling: moral and economic terror. If there's no micromanager God providing us with a literally-correct Bible, then we can't tell what's right and wrong. Then the "rational" thing to do is to go about a-killing and a-raping each other. This is scary, therefore there must be a micromanager God providing us with a literally-correct Bible. Facts? Data? Experimental results? All those small data points are unimportant, pick-n-choose them only according to whether it will help relieve the emotional state you started out with: moral and economic terror.

Am I right or wrong about this?

Of course, creationists flip it and say evolutionists are "top down": evolutionists start out assuming there's no God so... blah blah.

DS said:

Aagcobb said:

DS said: Did Neanderthals have the same chromosome complement as chimpanzees, or did they have the same fusion seen in humans? Their mitochondrial DNA is intermediate between chimps and humans as is their nuclear DNA, but how many SINE insertions do they share in common with humans?

I didn't see anyone else respond to this, so I just wanted to point out that Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA is not intermediate between Chimps and Homo Sapiens. Neanderthals were as different from chimps genetically as we are. In fact, this new evidence strongly indicates that Neanderthals are not a separate species from us because we could produce fertile offspring together, but rather a subspecies. Thus they would be Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis, and we would be Homo Sapiens Sapiens.

Actually, both Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA and nuclear DNA are intermediate between humans and chimps, even though it is closer to human than chimp.

Well well,
I am not a biologist or a geneticist, and I misspoke. I do recall reading about neanderthals having 24 pairs of chromosomes, but I have no idea where the source was. I also thought it would be simple to determine when we examined samples of DNA. Guess they still have not determined this yet?
As for neanderthals being closer to chimps than us, I would assume that humans and neanderthals have the same latest common ancestor with chimps, so the divergence would be about the same. Perhaps our DNA from 30,000 years ago had the same divergence from chimps as the 30,000 year old neanderthal fossils we found, but current human DNA has a little more divergence because of 30,000 more years of mutations.

Well well, I am not a biologist or a geneticist, and I misspoke. I do recall reading about neanderthals having 24 pairs of chromosomes, but I have no idea where the source was. I also thought it would be simple to determine when we examined samples of DNA. Guess they still have not determined this yet?

www.evolutionpages All great apes apart from man have 24 pairs of chromosomes. There is therefore a hypothesis that the common ancestor of all great apes had 24 pairs of chromosomes and that the fusion of two of the ancestor's chromosomes created chromosome 2 in humans. The evidence for this hypothesis is very strong. The Evidence Evidence for fusing of two ancestral chromosomes to create human chromosome 2 and where there has been no fusion in other Great Apes is: 1) The analogous chromosomes (2p and 2q) in the non-human great apes can be shown, when laid end to end, to create an identical banding structure to the human chromosome 2. (1) 2) The remains of the sequence that the chromosome has on its ends (the telomere) is found in the middle of human chromosome 2 where the ancestral chromosomes fused. (2) 3) the detail of this region (pre-telomeric sequence, telomeric sequence, reversed telomeric sequence, pre-telomeric sequence) is exactly what we would expect from a fusion. (3) 4) this telomeric region is exactly where one would expect to find it if a fusion had occurred in the middle of human chromosome 2. 5) the centromere of human chromosome 2 lines up with the chimp chromosome 2p chromosomal centromere. 6) At the place where we would expect it on the human chromosome we find the remnants of the chimp 2q centromere (4). Not only is this strong evidence for a fusion event, but it is also strong evidence for common ancestry; in fact, it is hard to explain by any other mechanism.

Aagcobb said:

DS said: Actually, both Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA and nuclear DNA are intermediate between humans and chimps, even though it is closer to human than chimp.

I would like to know your source for this claim. According to the talkorigins page on this subject, Nenderthal mtdna is as different from chimp mtdna as ours is.

Gary said: Well well, I am not a biologist or a geneticist, and I misspoke. I do recall reading about neanderthals having 24 pairs of chromosomes, but I have no idea where the source was. I also thought it would be simple to determine when we examined samples of DNA. Guess they still have not determined this yet? As for neanderthals being closer to chimps than us, I would assume that humans and neanderthals have the same latest common ancestor with chimps, so the divergence would be about the same. Perhaps our DNA from 30,000 years ago had the same divergence from chimps as the 30,000 year old neanderthal fossils we found, but current human DNA has a little more divergence because of 30,000 more years of mutations.

The reference I was referring to was this one:

Cell 134(3):416-417 (2008)

It shows pairwise comparisons between humans, Chimps and Neanderthals for the entire mitochondrial genome. It shows that humans and chimps have on average about 1,500 differences while Neanderthals and humans have on average about 200 differences. The human Neanderthal comparison is outside the range of human variation.

I was also referring to Figure 2 in the first Science paper which shows that Neanderthals are genetically distinct from modern humans and intermediate between humans and Chimps.

Thanks to Vaughn for the reference.

As for the chromosome number, yes, it seems like it should be easy to determine this based on the entire sequence. But, as Vaughn points out, this type of data might still leave some unanswered questions. I cannot find any definitive statement about this, but I have not read all of the papers yet. One would certainly presume that Neanderthals have the fusion, but either way it should prove to be very interesting.

as Raven points out, the telomeres have unique DNA sequence - but given the repetitive nature of telomeric sequence, the problems of assembling such repetitive elements into a complete and accurate sequence in undegraded DNA, the problems of getting multiple pass coverage of the full Neanderthal genome (degradation and contamination issues), in contrast to Raven, I am very skeptical that we will ever know the karyotype of an “average” Neanderthal. I would, however, love to be proved wrong. :-)

evolutionpages.com: (6) At the place where we would expect it on the human chromosome we find the remnants of the chimp 2q centromere (4).

Our own species may have survived a few bottlenecks itself.

Actually, both Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA and nuclear DNA are intermediate between humans and chimps, even though it is closer to human than chimp.

John Kwok said: Who said I'm a liberal? Apparently you haven't heard of my "affection" for a certain American president and two of his closest aides, who, unfortunately, are fellow alumni of our high school. Anyway I was concerned that this thread might digress into more political baiting that's occurred elsewhere here at PT, and thought that given the historic importance of this report on the "rough draft" of the Neanderthal genome, didn't want to see any similar incidents here.

W. H. Heydt said:

Paul Burnett said:

raven said: ...this is never going to end unless (creationists) gain control of our society, kill the scientists, and burn the libraries.

That's their ultimate goal - the Theocratic States of America. Look up Christian Reconstructionism, or see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominionism. This was even a staple of science fiction a few decades ago. Some of Robert Heinlein's and Andre Norton's dystopian novels had that as a subject.

In Heinlein's _Future History_ universe, the fundie takeover came with the election of Nehemiah Scuder in...2012.

Diogenes said: Thanks to Andrew Stallard for trying to explain why Biblical literalists think this way. Of course, Glenn Morton is another ex-YEC, helpful in understanging them. Still, I can't entirely understand the *why*. Andrew Stallard tells us that they believe in objective reality. OK... so then *why* do they lie? *Why* are they so willing to ignore truckloads of data? Does data mean nothing to them?

amyc said: Most creationists don't believe they are lying. The ones you talk about are the famous ones: they write books and give speeches and such. These people know what they are doing, and are called liars (rightly so). ...Some "civilian" creationists (as I like to call them) don't even realize they are creationists or label themselves as such. ...I don't believe that "civilian" creationists are liars, because they truly don't know any better. They are "inadvertent liars."

Ecclesiastes 7:10 Do not ask why the old days were better than the present; for
that is a foolish question

But it’s the “generals” I don’t understand. They know they’re making stuff up.

John Kwok said: I decided that the best course would be trying to ignore him as much as possible and would advise others to follow in my wake:

Matt Young said:

You. Moron. ... Idiot.

No more than one response each to Mr. Byers, please, and keep them civil. Further responses will find themselves on the Bathroom Wall.

raven said: Well, I see your point about repetitive sequence and the short length of old DNA. The diagnostic sequence would be telomere---reversed telomere as part of fusion sequence, (pre-telomeric sequence, telomeric sequence, reversed telomeric sequence, pre-telomeric sequence). It might be possible to see that fragment.

raven said: There is also another diagnostic sequence for the fusion. The end to end joining gave 2 centromeres. There is some evidence that when this happens one gets suppressed, in this case "2q". Since it isn't being used, it diverges in sequence. It might be informative to see if there are "remnants of the chimp 2q centromere" type of sequence in Neanderthal chromosome 2.

raven said:

But it’s the “generals” I don’t understand. They know they’re making stuff up.

For a lot of the leaders, it is all about power and money. Their cults and themselves. How hard is it to just lie a lot and make stuff up? Most creationists are also xian Domininionists. The financier of the DI is Howard Ahmanson, a disciple of Rushdooney, the psychopathic theologian who founded the ideology. The DI itself is straight xian Dominionist. These people aren't hiding anything. They hate the USA, democracy, secularism, the Enlightenment, among other things. They would destroy the USA if they could. Creationism is just a means to an end, a dark end.

The human telomere is a hexamer (TTAGGG) repeated thousands of times. and I am a cumulonimbus of doubt that centromere sequence can be obtained from Neanderthal remains.

evolutionpages.com: The telomere sequence is highly conserved in different groups of organisms. For example vertebrates have the sequence TTAGGG repeated many times. (In primates the sequence is repeated 500 to 3500 times). Adjacent to the telomere, are regions with other DNA repeats (known as Telomere Associated Repeats) but these regions, rather than being highly conserved, are highly polymorphic - that is they have many variations even within the same species. Nevertheless the pretelomeric region can be easily recognised in closely related species. Occasionally genes are found in the pretelomeric region.

amyc said:

John Kwok said: Who said I'm a liberal? Apparently you haven't heard of my "affection" for a certain American president and two of his closest aides, who, unfortunately, are fellow alumni of our high school. Anyway I was concerned that this thread might digress into more political baiting that's occurred elsewhere here at PT, and thought that given the historic importance of this report on the "rough draft" of the Neanderthal genome, didn't want to see any similar incidents here.

I think he meant libertarian. How are you doing tonight john?

utidjian said:

John Kwok said: I decided that the best course would be trying to ignore him as much as possible and would advise others to follow in my wake:

Matt Young said:

You. Moron. ... Idiot.

No more than one response each to Mr. Byers, please, and keep them civil. Further responses will find themselves on the Bathroom Wall.

John, You leave a wake? I hadn't noticed ;) -DU-

Diogenes said:

amyc said: Most creationists don't believe they are lying. The ones you talk about are the famous ones: they write books and give speeches and such. These people know what they are doing, and are called liars (rightly so). ...Some "civilian" creationists (as I like to call them) don't even realize they are creationists or label themselves as such. ...I don't believe that "civilian" creationists are liars, because they truly don't know any better. They are "inadvertent liars."

Yeah, I get the distinction between "civilians" who know little science and can't be blamed, and "generals" who know some science, cherry-pick data, ignore contrary evidence, and make stuff up. I get that. Of course I have "civilians" in my family, close to me. I was indirectly informed I am no longer godfather to my niece and nephew. But it's the "generals" I don't understand. They know they're making stuff up. Would it kill Duane Gish to admit the bullfrog protein didn't exist? *Why* did William Dembski lie about the probabilities he calculated in "No Free Lunch"? What are they so scared of? I mean, they all worship the Bible, literally. Like it's so great, you have to worship it, twist facts if you have to to defend it, lie, whatever. What's the appeal? Is the Bible that great? Right now I'm involved in a back-and-forth argument with a creationist blogger about whether rape and sex slavery are sanctioned in the Bible. Oh, they say they believe in a literal interpretation, but heaven forbid you should point out the literal descriptions of genocide, rape, infanticide, and slavery. Then they'll fight tooth and nail. So what motivates this visceral desire to defend Biblical literalism? Two theories: A. Is it just moral terror? The fear that without God giving us his word in book form, the rational thing to do would be to go about a-killing and a-raping? B. Is the observation that there are people different from myself-- who listen to music I don't like, vote for politicians I don't like, dress in ways that I don't like-- and there must be a cause for all this-- that they don't share my religious beliefs? So if I convert everybody to my religion, no longer will there be human behaviors I can't figure out, because they'll all act like me.

it's understood that the civilians lie inadvertently; they don't know what's true and they aren't exactly encouraged to develop the thinking skills to work it out.

in the case of people who should know better, it's noteworthy that lying carries different moral values for the two sides in this case. it was previously mentioned that creationist belief is top down. in a bottom up system, true statements are links in a theoretical structure, and a mistaken fact poisons the whole structure and the conclusions. so in the science world,it's rather disgraceful to risk being mistaken. but in the top down world, a wrong claim might still be performing the honorable function of convincing people of the truth. a trial and error approach is ok because you're searching for anything that sticks ... it's the (moral) responsibility of the "complainers" to cut away arguments that don't work.

I don't think the human-bullfrog thing started out as a lie. I think there really was a very early study where bullfrog DNA was contaminated by DNA from one of the research team. But the scientists corrected the mistake at least a quarter of a century ago.

Somehow the creationists can convince themselves they're not "really" lying if they quote something a biologist or paleontologist said once--no matter how far the statement is from current scientific thought.

Genome Res. 2007 Oct;17(10):1420-30. Epub 2007 Sep 4. Biased clustered substitutions in the human genome: the footprints of male-driven biased gene conversion. Dreszer TR, Wall GD, Haussler D, Pollard KS. Department of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95064, USA. Abstract We examined fixed substitutions in the human lineage since divergence from the common ancestor with the chimpanzee, and determined what fraction are AT to GC (weak-to-strong). Substitutions that are densely clustered on the chromosomes show a remarkable excess of weak-to-strong "biased" substitutions. These unexpected biased clustered substitutions (UBCS) are common near the telomeres of all autosomes but not the sex chromosomes. Regions of extreme bias are enriched for genes. Human and chimp orthologous regions show a striking similarity in the shape and magnitude of their respective UBCS maps, suggesting a relatively stable force leads to clustered bias. The strong and stable signal near telomeres may have participated in the evolution of isochores. One exception to the UBCS pattern found in all autosomes is chromosome 2, which shows a UBCS peak midchromosome, mapping to the fusion site of two ancestral chromosomes. This provides evidence that the fusion occurred as recently as 740,000 years ago and no more than approximately 3 million years ago. No biased clustering was found in SNPs, suggesting that clusters of biased substitutions are selected from mutations. UBCS is strongly correlated with male (and not female) recombination rates, which explains the lack of UBCS signal on chromosome X. These observations support the hypothesis that biased gene conversion (BGC), specifically in the male germline, played a significant role in the evolution of the human genome.

hoary puccoon said: As was demonstrated by a poster above, another creationist mantra is that science is continually changing its conclusions, therefore none of it is right. The ability to adapt to new evidence is, of course, the basis and great strength of science. But in this case, as in many others, the amount that science actually changed its conclusions is largely in the minds of newspaper headline writers. Everyone working in the field seemed to be aware that the lack of Neanderthal genes in modern human mitochondria didn't necessarily mean there were no Neanderthal genes in modern human nuclear DNA. So this study wasn't so much correcting an error as refining a somewhat fuzzy picture.

eric said:

djlactin said: My point was that European caucasians (excluding caucasians currently living in India, who have been selected for darker skin -- carcinomas and such) are starkly different from, shall I say, "typical" humans.

Here's one possible explanation for it. Short summary: the Atlantic gulf stream makes it possible to grow grains in high European latitudes. This is a great benefit in terms of food availability, but a grain-based diet does not provide much vitamin D, so paler skin becomes more of an advantage. Without the gulf stream, no grain. Without the grain, scandinavians etc...would probably have the skin tone of inuit. Or so the web site says. Its not a peer-reviewed publication but sounds like a reasonable hypothesis to me.

Here it is the wee small hours of the morning over most of Canada, and here's Byers, regurgitating nonsense again. Do the voices in his head keep him awake, or something?

Dave Luckett said: Here it is the wee small hours of the morning over most of Canada, and here's Byers, regurgitating nonsense again. Do the voices in his head keep him awake, or something?