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Ape-Human Split Moved Back By Millions Of Years
E++99 writes in to let us know about a development in paleo-anthropology. It seems that up until now, scientific consensus has placed the divergence of man from the ape line five to six million years ago (based on "genetic distances"). But newly discovered fossils in Ethiopia place the divergence at least twice as far back, and perhaps as long ago as 20 million years. They also largely put to rest any doubts that man and modern apes both emerged from Africa. From the article: "The trail in the hunt for physical evidence of our human ancestors goes cold some six or seven million years ago... Beyond that... fossils of early humans from the Miocene period, 23 to five million years ago, disappear. Fossils of early apes especially during the critical period of 14 to eight million years ago were virtually non-existent — until now... [T]he new fossils, dubbed 'Chororapithecus abyssinicus' by the team of Japanese and Ethiopian paleo-anthropologists who found them, place the early ancestors of the modern day gorilla 10 to 10.5 million years in the past, suggesting that the human-ape split occurred before that."
Last I checked, "apes" were actually paraphyletic—that is, humans and chimpanzees actually forma a clade, and gorillas split off some time earlier (and orangutans before that, and gibbons even before that). So it should really say that the split between gorillas and Hominini (chimps and humans) was earlier than previously thought. The discovery gives no information at all about when humans and chimpanzees split.
Ask yourself why.
With our schools being under attack from the creationists who want to indoctrinate our children in their superstitious fairy tale, it's not surprising at all. We of no faith don't have to turn the other cheek, but are morally free to kick back. So we do.
Butt kicking for goodness!
If we're created in the image of your god, does he have a tail bone and an appendix?
If not, why didn't he fix that in us? Did something go wrong?
If he does, why? They only serve negative purposes for humans.
No, evolution and a belief in men created in the image of god just doesn't mix. If anything, that's less believable than what the creationists hawk. At least they can say that god created everything to look like there had been an evolution, for purposes we don't understand. Ridiculous as it is, it's at least theologically possible, while the view that evolution has led to humans in the image of god just doesn't fly.
However, Occam's razor tells me that the simpler explanation is true: God was created in the image of humans.
Depends on what you mean by "attacks". If I tell you that I believe my cat can fly, are you not free to say "wow, what a ridiculous thing to believe". Does that count as an attack? Are you supposed to say, "yes I respect your beliefs very much and lets include them in the school curriculum and here is some money and tax breaks for you"
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
I called myself agnostic until someone posed the question if I was agnostic in my the belief in Santa Claus, the tooth fairy and the flying spaghetti monster.
At that point I realized that calling oneself agnostic because there is a very tiny possibility that a god exists is just playing with the definition of the word agnostic. For all practical purposes I am an atheist.
Othwerwise, I agree with what you said.