In the Beginning...

[El_Machinae]

Unexplained is fine. We'll get there. The puzzle is sufficiently complete that we can see the picture even if there are holes not yet filled in.

That's the finer point. Even if you find something we don't know, we know where to look in the theory-space. The ToE is a broad-catchall "offspring is slightly different from the parents, and the environment causes some offspring to outbreed". We constantly find new mechanisms, some new epiphenomenon that we didn't predict but are perfectly coherent with underlying physical laws.

There's no such thing as a 'proven theory.'

Would just post , but not allowed to.

It's a bit of a tautology. If you think there's a "proven" "theory", then you're using a different definition of both proven and theory. Colloquially, we know what you mean. But it's technically incorrect. It's one of those things where the definitions are causing the disagreements more than anything.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

No such leap ever occurred.

Leap between apes and hominids.

Replacing "catch up" with "adapt" would render your statement nonsensical.

To change your standard is a form of adaptation within your enviroment.

I discard it as complete nonsense because of the way you're using the concept. Teleology doesn't "exist" in any sense except as a mental construct.
Evolution is not governed by chance, it's governed by what helps organisms reproduce. That's it; that's the long and short of it. There are no 'higher laws' that make the emergence of something like humans inevitable; there is no long-term 'direction' of evolution; humans are not the 'peak' or 'end' of evolution.

Every organism ever since the existence of virus have had its survival and reproductive ability reduced. That is in direct opposition to your theory.

 

[El_Machinae]

Every organism ever since the existence of virus have had its survival and reproductive ability reduced. That is in direct opposition to your theory.

Isn't it more likely you're just misunderstanding the theory?

 

[Lexicus]

Leap between apes and hominids.

Again, no leap, hominids are apes.

Every organism ever since the existence of virus have had its survival and reproductive ability reduced. That is in direct opposition to your theory.

It isn't "my theory" and both parts of this are untrue.

 

[abradley]

Collies and German Shepherds are dogs that humans bred; African wild dogs are what you get without that interference.

African wild dogs don't appear to be part of the wolf/dog tree.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_wild_dog

Not sure how everything ties together.

 

[abradley]

{Snip}

It's a bit of a tautology. If you think there's a "proven" "theory", then you're using a different definition of both proven and theory. Colloquially, we know what you mean. But it's technically incorrect. It's one of those things where the definitions are causing the disagreements more than anything.

Agreed.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

Isn't it more likely you're just misunderstanding the theory?

I believe not. The more complex organisms come with a price...

 

[Arakhor]

Given that viruses also evolve to suit their surroundings (the number one cause of failing antibiotics), the reason why any organism is adversely affected by a virus is because that virus is better specialised than they are. Viruses also adapt much faster than any other non-microbial organism.

 

[Sommerswerd]

Given that viruses also evolve to suit their surroundings (the number one cause of failing antibiotics), the reason why any organism is adversely affected by a virus is because that virus is better specialised than they are. Viruses also adapt much faster than any other non-microbial organism.

Small nitpick... Antibiotics are to combat bacteria, not viruses, and are AFAIK ineffective against viruses.

 

[Arakhor]

You're quite right. I was talking about microbial lifeforms in general and then mixed things up by using a specific example.

 

[timtofly]

So it's back to "Oh, the Babylonians totally had all this modern stuff we had, but the knowledge was suppressed so we had to start all over again" nonsense.

This first came up in another thread when I pointed out that the ancient Babylonians didn't have astronomical telescopes, that the first person known to use such a thing was Galileo, in the first decade of the 17th century. It was annoying then, and it's still annoying.

The Egyptians considered their Pharaohs to be divine. That doesn't mean they actually were divine.

That is not what I said. I am saying that it is wrong to assume they could not observe and centralize knowledge. I am not claiming to know what stuff they had. I am not even claiming to what level of knowledge they had. It seems to me that those who claim they were ignorant have to prove that claim.

Your claim of "suppression" to explain away how history apparently selectively runs in reverse has reached YouTube comment-levels of nonsense. Seriously. Time, at least as humans experience it, does not run backward. We don't possess time travel, and it's sheer nonsense to say that a civilization that lived thousands of before another civilization, and with whom there was NO contemporaneous overlap, copied the newer civilization's myths.

Perhaps suppress is not the right term, but lost is assuming they had knowledge that they may not have had. I am saying that what they knew has not been transferred onto the next generation, and that we assume today that they could not have had as much knowledge about things as we do.

I did not say that the earlier Sumerians copied from the Hebrews. I am saying that the Hebrews had access to knowledge that the Sumerians did not know. I suppose that the Sumerians may not have cared to convey in a meaningful way so as to be more accepted by future readers. When comparing the two accounts it seems that the Hebrew account is less exaggerated, and more closer to what happened, even though it allegedly came last. The more exaggerated account was not copied from a later account, that is impossible, but it did seem to be further away from the event, even if written much closer.

That is getting into the territory that things only exist because we discover them. The knowledge has always been there, but as mentioned it was "suppressed". Not every one has had the means to discover it. We have modern technology. Instead of admitting that modern technology gives a sense of arrogance, we just assume there is nothing supernatural in existence.

Nonsense. We've explained astrology, but people still cling to it even though there's not one shred of evidence that it works. Similarly, we've explained Santa Claus, but every year there are dozens of Santa-clad men roaming around shopping malls and street corners, kids write letters to Santa (there's actually a group of people at Canada Post who answer letters addressed to "Santa Claus, North Pole, H0H 0H0"), and some kids get confused over the concepts of praying to Jesus and writing to Santa, and they end up praying to Santa. We know that Santa is just a story told to kids and perpetuated because it's good for business, but people keep participating in it year after year.

So you are saying that there was never a St. Nicholas, in history and the Catholics made it up? It may be a feel good story now, but it has been different things in different countries for 1673 years. That is a longer time span, than the Akkadian empire which lasted from 2350 BC to 2050 BC. That is only 300 years, and we claim that the Church suppressed knowledge for a much longer period of time. There are school children today who do not even know what a VCR is. Some knowledge is just "suppressed" by the nature of how fast things advance. Technology and engineering seem more susceptible in that way.

Which came first: the ability to observe the stars, or to use them to predict the future?

Of course I would have those traits. I have no reason to believe that my family would treat me any differently if I'd been born in some other month, or a couple of weeks later in the same month.

I did not know that astrology was that specific. I was thinking abut a greater range in time frames, even years.

Education is a provincial responsibility in Canada, and in my province there are public schools, Catholic schools, private schools, and some kids are home schooled. Evolution is on the curriculum for every single one of these systems, or at least it's supposed to be, as it's part of the provincial science curriculum. Some teachers do their very best to tap dance around it, but all they're doing is short-changing the students and making it harder for them to succeed in science classes in high school, college, and university.

Is it a proven statistic that some teachers in Canada have made it difficult for some college students in biology, or is that a matter of opinion? If in Canada there is no choice in the matter, do a few teachers make that big of difference doing a tap dance? I have heard of some examples where a child never even heard about creation and Genesis who changed their mind as an adult and no longer accept the teachings of evolution they had as a child. They could be lying, but that is not just my opinion, but what I was told. So even teaching only evolution does not nullify the ability of some people to change their mind on the matter at a later time.

Already happened. ID, 'theory of creation' or how any such nonsense may be called is not scientific and is not part of any prescribed curriculum. Those are indeed 'just theories'. Which puts them in a different category from scientific theories. In plain English: anything outside of evolution is not science.

(By the way, how you 'feel' about evolution is neither here nor there. Nor does how countless people 'feel' about the Bible relate to any scholarship on the Bible. It's the difference between opinion and fact. The reason there are so many 'opinions' to be found on the internet is just the result of too many people unwilling to be bothered to check facts before voicing their 'feelings'. You may feel the theory of gravity is somewhat flawed. That doesn't alter the fact that if you trip you fall - not upwards but down to the greater mass. You may feel that relativity can use some improvement. That doesn't alter the fact that E=mc².)

A simple way to explain evolution is by 2 examples. You eat cereals? The grains they come from can't be found in the wild. They were genetically modified by humans. That's humans making use of genetic mutation. Do you have a dog? 100,000 years ago there were no dogs. They were bred from (most likely) grey wolves. That means that all dogs, from chihuahuas to great Danes, ultimately descend from the grey wolf. Same thing as with your cereals.

And the same applies to humans as well. A couple of million years ago we weren't around. Now we are. That's evolution.

Eating cereal and claiming that humans were not around a couple of million years ago is not the same thing. Yet you attribute both under the "heading" evolution. Who is claiming that humans lived millions of years ago? No one. How does that prove evolution? You have yet to prove that humans evolved from apes. In fact you cannot, because the excuse is that they had a common ancestor. Can we see the changes in humans over time? Yes we can, and evolution allows that. Have we observed a common ancestor? No, we can only assume that they ever existed. Even being able to dig up bones and do DNA test is not enough sampling to rule out margins of error. All it is, is a classification system of what can be observed today. Until humans can genetically alter primates and produce a new species and proclaim it viable will they prove that it may have happened in the past. Imagining it happened is more shaky, than proving what some one wrote about in ancient times. In fact some ancient writings tell of human-reptilian hybrids, human-bovine hybrids, and other mixture of species. Though that may seem weird to us, they believed in evolution on a far grander scale, than we even do today, because we can only prove what we can observe, and re-create ourselves. We just laugh off their observations as some pseudoscience or fiction and claim we are the superiors in human knowledge and understanding.

I would say that we have similar biology and DNA, because we all live and breathe on the same planet. That is something I can observe. When I start assuming that we all evolved from an amebae, that is something I cannot observe. If we are basing our methodology on what can be observed, why would we add in ideas that we can only assume? No one is going to take the trouble to do test to prove that apes can be modified and that more branches of the hominid tree can appear, that would be left up to nature. Or it may turn into some bizarre failed experiment. Would that prove evolution false? No; it may prove some assumptions about evolution false though.

When we claim that the assumptions can be verified and/or falsified, that may lead to the conclusion that they have been verified and/or falsified. You still have to observe the assumption to make it a fact. Observing it in one example does not automatically mean that it happens in every example. If that were the case, then we could say that if one written statement is true, then all written statements have to be true. An assumption may be believable, and even plausible, but it is not a fact until it is actually observed.

Yes there are examples all around that show things are evolving, that is not what the argument is about. We can observe that. The argument is that since we can observe it now, that it applies to every moment of historic time. That is not a given. Perhaps that is not an assumption but a hypothesis that we will test by ruling out what is not true. That does not leave us with the truth either, because contrary to popular notions, things happen that bring about drastic changes, and it is hard to pinpoint when those changes will and have occurred. I am not sure that even world wars, or the forming of National Treatise and breaking them, can give us enough of a sampling to say we have a handle on drastic change. Even the rapid changes in technology are not enough to really alter life. Even though technology has helped in prolonging life, it has also added effects that reduce the quality of life in other areas. To deny that any life changing events have never happened would be wrong. There are plenty of civilizations in the past that have seemingly been wiped away, before they were completely understood and knowledge that they had is seemingly no longer understandable.

Even if we focus on the aspect that evolution changes through natural selection instead of artificial evolution would that not be leaving out the observable part of the methodology. What you assume is not necessarily what I am going to believe or accept. You may call me wrong all you want, and the point would be mutual. We would both be wrong according to the way we view things. I would be wrong, because I do not accept your assumption. You would be wrong based on your assumption, that cannot be observed.

I have an explanation for natural selection, but it is thrown out as "supernatural". If one would say that I need a little more faith or knowledge, I doubt that is possible. It then begs me to accept things I cannot observe, which is the same thing as me asking another to accept something supernatural, that they cannot observe.

I could say there are millions of "supernatural" examples, and you would say I was wrong and then start to claim there is a natural reason for each one, and if you could not, would just say it was a coincidence or any other term you are comfortable with as long as it does not mean "supernatural".

 

[Sommerswerd]

Well, I don't 'know' if it's correct or not. Then again don't really 'believe' it's been proven ... but as I posted earlier it's the best explanation (so far) IMO.

So its "believe" then.

The problem here is that once in your environment you get a specie which "develops" totaly different kind of weapon/instrument such as human intellect as opposed to having subconscious and vital mind which we can suppose in other animal species you are no more extremely well adapted to your environment no matter what.

I see your point, but you are missing a really part of what is going on. With every single offspring there is variation. But the mutations occur on an individual level, not species-wide or even litter-wide. A orange tiger might have 4 cubs, and one has a genetic mutation to be albino. The other cubs have their own mutations, but these mutations are not as readily apparent. The albino can't hunt well because it can't hide so it dies, and does not sire anymore albinos. But that same mutation in another litter in a place that has a lot of snow produces an absolute killer hunter, because of the camouflage his white coat provides. He goes on to reproduce and his offspring are also albino and they move further into snowy lands where they are advantaged as hunters... however, their orange cousins continue to thrive to the south.

The act of an offering of a broccoli here represents an intelligent action and this is what seems to me is likely the actual cause of what we see as an evolution - some secret intelligence behind it.

It's fine with me if you want to attribute the unseen intelligent hand in the evolutionary process. You can even call it god if you want, doesn't offend me one bit as that's not the point. The point in my "kids meal" analogy is that tiny genetic variations/mutations are constantly being introduced, some work, some don't. No child is a precise copy of their parent.

 

[Berzerker]

That doesn't follow at all. The asteroid belt and Earth would have needed to be both in their place already for asteroids to bombard early Earth.

The Earth could have formed at the snow line over 4.5 bya and was later pushed here by a collision ~4 bya leaving behind a debris trail circling the sun - the asteroid belt. That would explain why our water and material matches up well with Vesta, both are products of the same collision(s).

The late heavy bombardment may be the event that led to plate tectonics ("dry land") and life. As of now the theory is (was) Jupiter prevented a planet forming at the snow line and this resulted in the asteroid belt. Then ~4 bya Jupiter flung a bunch of asteroids around and the planets and their moons took a beating and we got our oceans.

There are problems with this theory, the first being a competing theory called the grand tack. Now some researchers are claiming Jupiter formed very early and was dragged closer and then pulled away by an evolving Saturn. The result was an asteroid bombardment, a smaller Mars, and of course, our water.

A problem for both theories is the sequence of planetary formation, how does Jupiter get so big before planets closer to the sun can even form? Especially when the asteroid belt marks the snow line, a planet would form there before Jupiter and deprive Mars of material (well, the solar wind did that too).

I dont think Jupiter got really big until the collision at the asteroid belt. It was the beneficiary of gas and debris released when Heaven and Earth were created.

But this happened long before the late heavy bombardment, so are they telling us Jupiter made at least two migrations into the asteroid belt about a 1/2 billion years apart and each time produced a shower of asteroids?

Of course both theories suffer as the age of our water increases, we dont need Jupiter to deliver our oceans and it becomes unfeasible if our water preceded the lunar cataclysm. This planet was surrounded by water/vapor/ice when it formed, that didn't happen here.

There are clues as to the nature of the late heavy bombardment, while the Earth already had water it received an infusion of heavy elements. And whatever hit the Earth was big enough to plaster the Moon with debris.

The side facing us now was also facing the Earth when it was hit by God's "wind" (wind is how the Enuma Elish describes Marduk's weapons used to carve up Tiamat). Thats why the Moon's crust is so much thicker on the far side and littered with smaller craters while the near side was hit by objects large enough to thin the crust, produce lava seas and increase density - the side facing us is "heavier".

Apart from there being no evidence for that at all, this is also a misreading of Genesis 1:2, which merely speaks of a separation of the waters (the waters being separated into below and above). There are no 'waters' in space, there are only 'waters' in the sky and covering Earth's surface. (Of course the writers of Genesis couldn't really have known this, so they might have perceived heaven to be watery.)

The separation of waters occurred on the 2nd day when Heaven was placed between them, before that in Gen 1:2 the waters were together in darkness - tehom.

No, it doesn't. The 'debris trail' would be what currently is our moon. There would, in fact, not be a debris trail resulting from a giant impact; there would be plenty of debris, but not in a single trail.

If the Moon swept up the debris trail, how does that mean there was no debris trail? But that was just the main trail orbiting the Earth following the collision, there would have been debris scattered about our orbit too. The debris we do see leads us back to the asteroid belt and beyond.

Actually, within the context of Genesis, the heavens and the earth is what we call the universe. The writers of Genesis had no concept of universe, other than 'the heavens'.

If they had no concept then why should we replace their definitions of Heaven and Earth with our universe? They were talking about Earth's sky and what could be seen, they were not crediting God with the creation of the universe. The submerged Earth and darkness of Gen 1:2 preceded God and his wind and light.

The argument (Tim's etc) is that God created the universe in Gen 1:1... So what does that make the rest of the story? An account of God's 2nd creation of the universe? Gen 1:1 is not part of the story, it merely states what the following story will describe - the creation of Heaven and Earth.

We need to define Heaven and Earth to know if anything preceded God and his creation. Neither of those words means water, in fact both words have very limited meanings - Earth is the dry land that appeared on the 3rd day and Heaven was the firmament placed amidst the water on the 2nd. Which one of those is the universe?

The Earth as defined in Genesis is not even this planet, its just the dry land. The water receded into "Seas" for which God does receive credit, but nowhere does Genesis (or the Bible?) say God created the water.

They stars were not created, they were made. Right. So they weren't there before, they were made, but not created.

They were there before Heaven and Earth, they just weren't in Earth's sky - thats why they're assigned roles on the 4th day, the Earth didn't appear until the 3rd day. The Sun was present on the 1st day too, we dont have evening and day without it. But the Earth's sky had to wait for the Earth to appear first and the Earth was under water until the 3rd day.

So God made something firm, called it Heaven, but heaven was not made firm. That's illogical, captain.

The Middle Eastern metaphor for Heaven is a hammered out bracelet. The material used is firm before it is hammered out and it is firm afterward. God formed the bracelet but did not create the material, the impact(s) ~4 bya formed the asteroid belt.

 

[Birdjaguar]

African wild dogs don't appear to be part of the wolf/dog tree.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_wild_dog

Not sure how everything ties together.

Well, you might have to squint to see the connection.

The species' molecular genetics indicate that, although it is far removed from the genus Canis, it is nonetheless more closely related to it than to other canid lineages.[10] Phylogenetic studies place L. pictus and Cuon alpinus into a monophyletic clade alongside some members of the Canis genus, including C. simensis, C. aureus, C. latrans, and C. lupus, while the more basal C. adustus and C. mesomelas are excluded from it.[11](Fig. 10)

This was followed by an great figure.

But it makes my point anyway. Human breeding produces one result and untouched evolution produces something different.

 

[Berzerker]

I read your link.

What you and that link seem to be doing is trying to make a case that the Sumerians had knowledge of of the solar system and its creation that was far in advance of anyone else in ancient times or even today.

Creation myths from around the world show the knowledge wasn't limited to the Sumerians. But was that a product of a recent diffusion (like the Tower of Babel) or stories available to everyone at some distant point in the past like when we were in Africa with one tongue? I lean toward the latter, the universality of the myth comes with a diversity connoting a very ancient source.

You and the link's author are selecting mythological data and fitting the choicest pieces into a cosmological picture that appears to coincide with what we think we know today. All of the other Sumaerian data from their stories and tales is being ignored. Oh well.

The Enuma Elish is their creation epic, other stories deal with other subjects. They also have a creation story about us that claims the gods wanted primitive workers (the Adam's job was to maintain the Garden, there was no Adam to till the land, etc) so they mixed their blood with a creature roaming Enki's southern domain. The Zulu have a myth claiming their ancestors (the artificial ones) were at war with the apemen.

Putting such a puzzle together is both interesting and challenging. but it begs the real question. If what you have said about the Sumerians is true and they did know how the solar system was created, where did that knowledge come from? They certainly could not have figured it out using the scientific tools they had at hand. What is the source of this Sumerian knowledge? Without some evidence of how they knew such things, all you have is a cut and paste arrangement that just looks like it tells a complete story.

They gave credit to the anunnaki, the ant friends of the Hopi

The first Sumerian city, Eridu, dates back to about 5000 BCE, but wasn't particularly large until about 3000. If we accept their creation story as "true" do we also accept their king list as true? Do we accept that kings rules 30,000 years?

The Bible says the sons of God came down, mated with the daughters of mankind and had children - the nefilim. That could be the source of longevity we see in the bible and king's lists.

Without evidence of such a source we are left with: god told them or they just made it up. If they just made it up and it was passed down through the Babylonians to the Hebrews, then your story is just a clever cut and paste to fit. If god told them, then we are back to figuring out who is better at interpreting god.

Do you mean "what is God"? I dont get the impression from ancient texts and religions that God created the universe, manipulating the DNA of an apelike creature to produce slave labor seems rather self-centered and unnecessary for someone with the power to cause existence.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Thanks.

Creation myths from around the world show the knowledge wasn't limited to the Sumerians. But was that a product of a recent diffusion (like the Tower of Babel) or stories available to everyone at some distant point in the past like when we were in Africa with one tongue? I lean toward the latter, the universality of the myth comes with a diversity connoting a very ancient source.

Ok. That point is set at about 75,000 years ago when modern humans left Africa for southwest Asia. So you are saying that an oral tradition was maintained for 70,000+ years. That seems unlikely given that the written tradition from the Sumerians to the Hebrews was so changed in a mere 2,000 years.

The Enuma Elish is their creation epic, other stories deal with other subjects. They also have a creation story about us that claims the gods wanted primitive workers (the Adam's job was to maintain the Garden, there was no Adam to till the land, etc) so they mixed their blood with a creature roaming Enki's southern domain. The Zulu have a myth claiming their ancestors (the artificial ones) were at war with the apemen.

If it was a work force they wanted, they pretty much failed. You'd think that critters with space travel would be able to create a work force from such primitives.

They gave credit to the anunnaki, the ant friends of the Hopi

So we have a common memory event from 75,000 years ago that involved "the ant people" who would have to be non humans. The 75,000 year old name for these people was then retained all that time in at least two languages: Hopi and Sumerian. maybe Egyptian too. for the Hopi part to be true, the ant people heritage also worked through the Anazasi and pueblo peoples of the Southwest. How many other Hopi words show a direct connection to Sumerian ones? I would expect that if you are correct, that many of the words in their creation myth would tie back closely. Do they or have things been cherry picked to make it all fit?

The Bible says the sons of God came down, mated with the daughters of mankind and had children - the nefilim. That could be the source of longevity we see in the bible and king's lists.

So to make things work out you need space aliens to mate with humans.

Do you mean "what is God"? I dont get the impression from ancient texts and religions that God created the universe, manipulating the DNA of an apelike creature to produce slave labor seems rather self-centered and unnecessary for someone with the power to cause existence.

Space visitors may well have created humans and planted the seeds for universal mythology. It seems a bit strange to me that they would not have left any actual evidence behind though. If all they did was land in Ethiopia 75,000 years ago, screw the women and move on, then I'm not too impressed with them or their culture. It took 70,000 years for their leavings to learn to grow crops and build real houses. And you are saying that the only knowledge they left behind was how the earth was created 4 billion years earlier?

Mysterious space aliens is not a very satisfying answer for me.

 

[Berzerker]

Earth has acquired all kinds of stuff courtesy of various comets and meteors over the last 4.5 billion years. Are you going to claim this proves Earth formed in the Oort Cloud?

You're the one who believes in the Oort Cloud, not me... But no, Earth's water signature is a match for Vesta's and other asteroids so I'm claiming the Earth could have formed between Mars and Jupiter at the snow line, thats the most logical place in any solar system for a planet to form surrounded by condensing gases.

If the Oort Cloud exists and is home to trillions of comets their water signature is quite different from the Earth's, our water has a closer origin. Now researchers are measuring water from comets and finding some are a better match for Earth but they've also discovered a problem - they're not measuring water from the comets interior, just the stuff that gets blown off by the solar wind.

So we may be measuring water that comets have gathered on their trip around the Sun with long term comets acquiring a layered skin reflecting their varied distances from the sun.

Local comets would of course show a more local origin since they dont travel way out beyond the planets, or dont any more. So even long term comets might have an origin much closer to the sun and we've been looking at the water they've brought in from deep space rather than their ancestral/original supply of water.

What part of "the article you cited to prove that Earth was formed in the asteroid belt doesn't support your claim" is so hard to understand?

I didn't cite the article as proof the Earth formed at the asteroid belt, I cited it as evidence our water came from the asteroid belt. I've explained that maybe 5 times now and you're complaining about my lack of comprehension?

And you do realize that the ancient Babylonians didn't have modern instruments to figure out things that we, with our modern technology, have just been learning within the past century, right?

I know our science supports creation myths from around the world, that means the source of that knowledge figured things out and told people. And they either told them long ago when mankind was "one" or they told them after people migrated away from Africa. The Middle Eastern cosmology was so detailed and specific I'm inclined to think they were given a version of the story much more recently.

No? Of course, what was I thinking. Jumping up and down and repeating "but they COULD have!" is somehow scientific evidence.

The scientific evidence was already linked and posted in the thread, our water came from the asteroid belt. The thread is about the intersection of science and myth, you're confusing the two.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I know our science supports creation myths from around the world, that means the source of that knowledge figured things out and told people. And they either told them long ago when mankind was "one" or they told them after people migrated away from Africa. The Middle Eastern cosmology was so detailed and specific I'm inclined to think they were given a version of the story much more recently.

OK. So when and where were the Sumerians and Hopi last a single tribal entity? That could pin point the knowledge transfer.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I've done a bit of checking about the Hopi. Ant people or ant friends do not seem to appear as part of either the Hopi mythology or language. Spider woman is a major character in their creation story though.

Neither anu nor naki seem to be actual Hopi words.

The Hopi word for ant is qala.
The Hopi words for friend include 8 choices none of which even look like naki.

Source: English Hopi dictionary: https://en.glosbe.com/en/hop/friend

 

[Berzerker]

Thanks.

Ok. That point is set at about 75,000 years ago when modern humans left Africa for southwest Asia. So you are saying that an oral tradition was maintained for 70,000+ years. That seems unlikely given that the written tradition from the Sumerians to the Hebrews was so changed in a mere 2,000 years.

Your welcome... The Hebrews were monotheists so their changes were designed to hide the other gods, but they maintained the same theme - darkness and water give way to night and day, land and life. If this theme is found around the world, even in more isolated cultures, then the original humans had and maintained the story for eons.

If it was a work force they wanted, they pretty much failed. You'd think that critters with space travel would be able to create a work force from such primitives.

How did they fail? They taught us to be slave owners, even Adam was a slave.

So we have a common memory event from 75,000 years ago that involved "the ant people" who would have to be non humans. The 75,000 year old name for these people was then retained all that time in at least two languages: Hopi and Sumerian. maybe Egyptian too. for the Hopi part to be true, the ant people heritage also worked through the Anazasi and pueblo peoples of the Southwest. How many other Hopi words show a direct connection to Sumerian ones? I would expect that if you are correct, that many of the words in their creation myth would tie back closely. Do they or have things been cherry picked to make it all fit?

I believe the original myth is as old as we are, so 200k+ is possible. But the original version we shared as Africans went through many revisions and updates as peoples migrated around the world, and some were more recent.

But the Hopi myth of the ant friends saving them from cataclysms may not have come with an update, everybody already had the same basic myth anyway. I'm sure linguists would have already made headline news if they saw a connection between Hopi and Sumerian, but they do share a connection to the original storytellers.

So to make things work out you need space aliens to mate with humans.

Basically... But according to Sitchin these aliens were born from the same events that produced life here. And thats the biggest problem I have with his theory, it requires life on a planet that gets virtually no sunlight except when it visits the asteroid belt every ~3600 years. Not just life, but "human" life. I'd sooner believe they came on a spaceship from another system.

Space visitors may well have created humans and planted the seeds for universal mythology. It seems a bit strange to me that they would not have left any actual evidence behind though. If all they did was land in Ethiopia 75,000 years ago, screw the women and move on, then I'm not too impressed with them or their culture. It took 70,000 years for their leavings to learn to grow crops and build real houses. And you are saying that the only knowledge they left behind was how the earth was created 4 billion years earlier?

According to many myths we were instructed to live austere lives, "civilization" was taboo. The "gods" did not agree about how we should evolve, some wanted us wiped out when we showed signs of stepping on their toes and some wanted us to succeed.

Even the Bible reflects this disagreement, God tells the Adam to remain without the knowledge while the serpent informs Eve and God banishes them for fear of what they might achieve, especially if they partake from the tree of life. God sends the Flood to kill us off while saving a handful of people. And then we're told about the Tower of Babel, humans build a tower to reach the abode of God and are punished with dispersal.

I wonder if there are any myths out there of strangers being deposited in a new land occupied by other people. I remember a Ponca woman telling me her people and their dogs were brought here on great birds and left by the gods. Maybe the Aztec myth of emerging from a cave is related, the Egyptian duat and Dante's Inferno describe being underground before ascending the celestial realm.