Recent origin of species
New DNA study challenges evolution’s story
A major study of 5 million ‘DNA barcodes’ on mitochondria has given some controversial results that fit well with the Bible’s history in Genesis.
All complex1 organisms have mitochondria, which are the power-generating factories inside cells. In addition to the regular DNA which makes up the chromosomes in the cell’s nucleus, each mitochondrion has its own loop of DNA. The ‘barcode’ is the sequence of one particular gene on this mitochondrial DNA. The barcodes were compared across the spectrum of life.
It’s an interesting piece of research, and the authors are clearly aware of the controversial nature of their findings for the evolutionary big picture; they provide extensive discussion of the implications.2
The researchers concluded that, no matter what the organism, human or animal, almost all the current populations have “…expanded from mitochondrial uniformity within the past 200,000 years.”
In other words, each organism began with only one form of the barcode gene, and all the diversity has developed within that period. They write as evolutionists and make evolutionary assumptions to get this extended timeframe, which is, however, still a long way short of evolution’s ‘millions of years’. Why would all organisms converge on the same timeframe? It just does not add up for the evolutionary story. They tentatively suggest that the last ice age might explain this pervasive pattern, but that would not affect all creatures. For one thing, large parts of the world, including the tropical rainforests and oceanic coral reefs that thrived during this time, remained free of ice.
With some slightly different assumptions about mutation rates, the data would fit neatly with the creation of all organisms about 6,000 years ago.3
The authors also acknowledge that, regarding modern humans:
More approaches have been brought to bear on the emergence and outgrowth of Homo sapiens sapiens (i.e., modern humans) than any other species including full genome sequence analysis of thousands of individuals and tens of thousands of mitochondria, paleontology, anthropology, history and linguistics.
The congruence of these fields supports the view that modern human mitochondria and Y chromosome originated from conditions that imposed a single sequence on these genetic elements between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago. Contemporary sequence data cannot tell whether mitochondrial and Y chromosomes clonality occurred at the same time, i.e., consistent with the extreme bottleneck of a founding pair, or via sorting within a founding population of thousands that was stable for tens of thousands of years. As [science philosopher Thomas] Kuhn points out unresolvable arguments tend toward rhetoric.4
So much for those who claim that modern genetics does not support the existence of Adam and Eve—the data are “consistent with the extreme bottleneck of a founding pair”.
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References and notes
- I.e. virtually all those which have a cell nucleus (called eukaryotes)—unlike bacteria (prokaryotes) which don’t. Return to text.
- Stoeckle M.Y. and Thaler, D.S., Why should mitochondria define species? Human Evolution 33(1–2):1–30, 2018; DOI: 10.14673/HE2018121037. Return to text.
- Wieland, C., Mitochondrial Eve and biblical Eve are looking good: criticism of young age is premature, J. Creation 19(1):57–59, 2005; creation.com/eve3.
- Stoeckle and Thaler, ref. 2, p.22. Return to text.
Readers’ comments
Adam and Eve are obviously the "founding pair" and God created everything 6000 years ago.
I swear I think even if they saw w/their own eye's Jesus Christ walking out of His own tomb after He was CONFIRMED dead by Rome they would still try to come up w/an excuse as to how this would happen. Come to think of it they have already come up w/many excuses about how that event took place.
It is unwise to limit The Power and Glory of The True and Living God Creator of Heaven and Earth and everything in it. He even had the power to enter into humanity to pay the price for our sins.
"Who is like The Lord, from everlasting to everlasting He is God, and there is no other".AMEN.
Excellent piece of information for everyone! =).
Thank you! =).
"Note added by authors December 4, 2018: This study is grounded in and strongly supports Darwinian evolution, including the understanding that all life has evolved from a common biological origin over several billion years. This work follows mainstream views of human evolution. We do not propose there was a single "Adam" or "Eve". We do not propose any catastrophic events."
It seems that the authors have been stung by creationists using their results, and found it necessary to 'fly the flag' to assure the evolutionary establishment that they have not left the fold (future careers are at stake!). My article acknowledges that the authors are evolutionists and are operating from an evolutionary perspective. However, anyone reading their article can see their consternation over their results, which do not fit their evolutionary expectations!
I find their caveat that "We do not propose there was a single 'Adam' or 'Eve'." to be a bit duplicitous. Note what they said, which I quoted, in the original paper: "Contemporary sequence data cannot tell whether mitochondrial and Y chromosomes clonality occurred at the same time, i.e., consistent with the extreme bottleneck of a founding pair, or via sorting within a founding population of thousands that was stable for tens of thousands of years." [emphasis added]. As I said in my commentary, their data is consistent with an Adam and Eve, so while they did not mention Adam and Eve, propose a single Adam and Eve, they admitted that their data were consistent with such.
Also, of course they don't propose any "catastrophic events" (such as the global Flood of Noah); including such a thing would be sure to get the paper rejected, even if they were inclinded to consider the notion. However, they do identify an extreme genetic bottleneck, which is again consistent with what would have happened as a result of the Flood.
Thanks for all the hard work!
However, I will argue with you that I have not taken a quote out of context, because I provided the context! :-)
He hasn't accepted Christ yet, but now he openly acknowledges a recent Creator. Now it's just a matter of the Creator revealing Himself. Pray for my father for me. God bless you folks for your work.
This article is a blatant lie as written...
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