Is Mitochondrial Eve proven or theory?

[William Gaatjes]

The problem I have with the rejection of the young earth theory is that the measures used to measure the age of the earth could possibly be inaccurate.

I'm not saying that I agree with the young earth theory, but there has to be a higher power, although I think that higher power was good, since I'm a Deist and since I believe in the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God. That higher power could just be the universe, I don't know. However, if the universe is the higher power (the creator transformed themself into the universe, which is Pan-Deism), then abiogenesis would have to have occurred, and I don't understand how life could've come from non-life.

I can share this : Seek the explanation by traversing the internet for clues.
If you believe or not, the universe and what it is made of, has certain rules and behavior. Self assembly is the basis of life.
When you take a lot of separate atoms from the same element, these will combine into a certain lattice, a formation of atoms. When you use different kinds of atoms (meaning different elements) you will still get a lattice formation but of course with different properties. The real secret is that the environment is important. Meaning the temperature and the amount of EM radiation and the amount of trace particles (for example like cosmic rays). Atoms need to combine. That is what gravity is for. Electricity and magnetism is what is needed to set the behavior of the atoms and the sub particles these are made of. A lot of scientists are going to curse me, but i do not care for they are no different than the liars who preach for their own fortune.
The thing is, the whole connection from start of the universe universe to formation of life anywhere in the universe is layered. It is structured. Although what is happening in the universe can be perceived as chaotic, when using a macro view, the chaos is the driving force, it is the force behind creation on a smaller scale such as solar systems. But in reality, there is no chaos. For us humans it seems chaos because it is so hard to grasp and keep track of everything. If you try, you might end up finding the answer without being able to share it. It is best to to postpone such an inevitable event. ^_^.
Life did not start on the earth when there was a magnetic field to shield everything. It started when there was not a magnetic field to shield life as we have now. Life started on planets without a shield. The energetic solar wind is needed to jump start life. And life started in space in the comets traveling around the young sun. Eventually these comets crashed into the planets or into the sun itself(to bad ). The earth was a habitable planet. A planet where cold and heat where never extreme enough that energetic molecules could not interact while powered by the radiation of the sun. Superatoms have been discovered a few years ago. These are clusters of certain atoms from an element A that exhibit (IIRC)chemical and electrical properties of element b. Proteins are no different. Proteins allow life to mimic energetic elements momentarily when needed. Energetic elements can be a poison. Unless you know how to control them. Another tool in the toolbox of life is to mimic energetic elements. And proteins do that. Life is all about self assembly, replication. The same mechanism that allowed for self assembly to start with are used by life to sustain itself once life exist. Life uses an molecular language. Every element has a certain set of rules. These rules apply when gravity is weak enough. This is the case in the larger part of the universe.

We humans need constant power because our bodies (body cells and bacteria) are buzzing with activity. When we could completely shut down that activity and lock the atoms in our body into a stable fixed position( not xyz, but in every way) , we would not age(truly not age). But that would be as for us to live in an energetic void. No temperature, no EM, no gravity ripples(modulation). Nothing to draw power from. In the end we would collapse.

Single celled organism come close to being able to completely shutdown and come to life when the environment is suitable. But even bacteria, cannot with stand an energetic void : 0K temperature, No EM, No gravity modulation. No virtual particles. Nothing. The perfect void. There have been tests done with bacteria and small creatures that are able to withstand pressures vacuums, radiation levels and temperatures that would destroy every complex man made device or structure ever build up to some time into the future.

For example the tardigrades.
These critters have very special features.
http://www.space.com/5817-creature-survives-naked-space.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade

These 8 legged little guys do look kind of cute.

The water bears, known formally as tardigrades, have an ability similar to brine shrimp (also known as Sea Monkeys), which are familiar to many children for their ability to come to life after being sent to homes by mail-order. Tardigrades are speck-sized things, less than 1.5 millimeters long. They live on wet lichens and mosses, but when their environment dries out, they just wait for a return of water. They also resist heat, cold and radiation.

The radiation resistance was most surprising to scientists.

The tardigrades were aboard the FOTON-M3 spacecraft launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in September 2007 and were exposed to open space conditions, the scientists reported today. They were examined upon return to Earth.

Most survived exposure to the vacuum and cosmic rays, and some even survived the exposure to the deadly levels of solar UV radiation, which are more than 1,000 times higher than on the surface of the Earth.

The survivors "could reproduce fine after their space trip," according to a statement released today by Cell Press, the journal that published results of the test.

How the post-flight tardigrades could do it "remains a mystery," the researchers write.

When dehydrated, water bears enter into a dormant state in which the body contracts and metabolism ceases. In this death-like dormant state, water bears manage to maintain the structures in their cells until water is available and they can be active again.

UV rays consist of high-energy light particles that cause severe damage to living tissue, as is evident when you get a sunburn. But more so, they can also damage cells' genetic material, causing skin cancer, for example. The radiation, in wide-open space, also is thought to be sterilizing.

The work was led by K. Ingemar Jonsson of Kristianstad University in Sweden.

Jonsson suspects that even the water bears that got through the space trip without any trouble may in fact have incurred DNA damage, but that the animals managed to repair this damage. Figuring out how they did that could inform medical research.

Wiki quote :

Tardigrades are able to survive in extreme environments that would kill almost any other animal. Some can survive temperatures of close to absolute zero (−273 °C (−459 °F)),[6] temperatures as high as 151 °C (304 °F), 1,000 times more radiation than other animals,[7] and almost a decade without water.[8] In September 2007, tardigrades were taken into low Earth orbit on the FOTON-M3 mission and for 10 days were exposed to the vacuum of space. After they were returned to Earth, it was discovered that many of them survived and laid eggs that hatched normally.[9][10] In May 2011, studies involving tardigrades were included on STS-134, the final flight of Space Shuttle Endeavour.[11][12]

The scientology church are a bunch of crackpots. But if god is to be found anywhere, do not seek god on the earth or in space. If you need a god, then that god is everywhere around you. Show some love for all that you are and surrounds you. Instead of having faith. Faith is a path to get lost. Love is as the anchor to keep a ship at the desired location in violent water.
It works a whole lot better. Faith can be corrupted, love just is or is not.

 

[Gigantopithecus]

Seems like fact to me (it makes me disbelieve in creationism even though neither evolution nor creationism have been proven false).

Creationism can't be proven false. Many specific/specialized/niche evolutionary theories have been proven false, but the basic tenets of the theory are as sound as any other scientific idea.

I think it's fact because all humans have MtDNA. However, what I don't understand in relation to Mitochondrial Eve is how everyone alive today has mtDNA that is said to be descended from her, yet she wasn't a neanderthal (some people are more neanderthal than Cromagnon).

The Mitochondrial Eve theory was doomed from the start because it assumed that the history of one genetic locus (the mitochondria) was the same as the history of a population (all living humans).

It was a reasonable idea when it was articulated (late 80s), but we now know it is flat-out false. Other loci are much older (some as old as the earliest vertebrates 100s of millions of years ago, shared across say, all living mammals, including humans), while other loci are much younger (like OCA2, the gene that blue-eyed people have a mutation of that's only about 9/10,000 years old). None of these loci by themselves equal the history of living humans.

Also, there are no living humans who are more Neanderthal than Cro-Magnon. What the Eve Theory asserted is that there are no people who are the least bit Neanderthal - which we know is wrong.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

The problem I have with the rejection of the young earth theory is that the measures used to measure the age of the earth could possibly be inaccurate.

The picture your mind paints of the reality around you every moment "could possibly be inaccurate." You could be a single solitary brain in a vat on the counterspace of the laboratory of an Evil Genius.

Lots of things "could possibly be." Science deals with what is reasonable. "Proof," as they say, is for mathematics and beverage alcohol.

I'm not saying that I agree with the young earth theory, but there has to be a higher power.

Very few, and possibly no things "have to be."

...although I think that higher power was good, since I'm a Deist and since I believe in the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God. That higher power could just be the universe, I don't know.

If the "higher power" is the universe, then what exactly is it "higher" than?

However, if the universe is the higher power (the creator transformed themself into the universe, which is Pan-Deism), then abiogenesis would have to have occurred, and I don't understand how life could've come from non-life.

You, like many people who haven't spent a lot of time thinking about the subject, assume that there must have been a beginning of existence. There doesn't need to be one, and none of the evidence suggests that there was one.

 

[DrPizza]

All the reasons we think anything is of a certain age are not necessarily accurate. There are too many variables to affect such things that we can't actually know any of it is true.

You're implying that maybe the science is wrong and it's still a possibility that the Earth is only about 6000 years old. NO. It is NOT 6000 years ago. There's more than enough evidence to know this beyond any doubt. "Not necessarily accurate" is NOT going to make a difference of over 4 billion years to the age of the Earth.
Continental drift,
fossils
radiological dating
stalactite/stalagmite formations
erosion
and on and on - all of these point to a much older Earth, and all are in pretty good agreement with each other.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

You're implying that maybe the science is wrong and it's still a possibility that the Earth is only about 6000 years old. NO. It is NOT 6000 years ago. There's more than enough evidence to know this beyond any doubt. "Not necessarily accurate" is NOT going to make a difference of over 4 billion years to the age of the Earth.
Continental drift,
fossils
radiological dating
stalactite/stalagmite formations
erosion
and on and on - all of these point to a much older Earth, and all are in pretty good agreement with each other.

Science has proven these things far beyond any reasonable doubt. Religious doubts are not among the reasonable ones.

 

[Gibsons]

So go on, Malak. Please tell me which variables you are referring to that make tree rings inaccurate. I'll wait right here.

Maybe 5,000 years ago there were 20 seasons per year, and trees grew twenty times as fast.

With the right pasta, and a generous dose of alfredo, all things are possible.

al dente, ramen.

 

[beginner99]

while other loci are much younger (like OCA2, the gene that blue-eyed people have a mutation of that's only about 9/10,000 years old). None of these loci by themselves equal the history of living humans.

What does this have to do with mitochondrial DNA? Exactly nothing.

 

[zinfamous]

My thought has always been that people are too fundamentally different culturally and physically to have all come from a single mother.

and your theory is a pile of horseshit.



one doesn't really have to prove mitochondrial eve, it is simply a mathematical certainty by virtue of how mitochondrial DNA is inherited--only through the mother. Take modern humans back enough generations, our line goes back to a single female's mitochondria.

All that means is this is where our mitochondrial DNA was derived--not that we are all direct descendants. Neanderthal has nothing to do with it. We didn't evolve from neanderthal--I seriously hope you weren't thinking such a thing. A recent, very famous project sequencing the Neanderthal genome has provided strong evidence that we do carry a bit of neanderthal DNA; simply meaning that we interbred in the past. Mitochondrial eve is more of the time period of afarensis, I believe (Lucy), which would pre-date the migration of lines that lead to neaderthal and cro-magnon.


Same for men and the Y chromosome, which can only be passed down from father to son, obviously--the modern Y chromosome has a single Y donor.

 

[Anarchist420]

What does this have to do with mitochondrial DNA? Exactly nothing.

I didn't get what he was saying either. I appreciate his reply though

 

[Gigantopithecus]

What does this have to do with mitochondrial DNA? Exactly nothing.

Would you like me to forward you the chapter I wrote on this exact topic for the forthcoming volume on human evolution, Origins of Modern Humans? It explains gene genealogies, including the mitochondrial locus, and how individual loci can't be used to infer population history.

 

[Malak]

If you believe or not, the universe and what it is made of, has certain rules and behavior. Self assembly is the basis of life.

Incorrect. It has general guidelines that are not always followed.

 

[Malak]

You're implying that maybe the science is wrong and it's still a possibility that the Earth is only about 6000 years old. NO. It is NOT 6000 years ago. There's more than enough evidence to know this beyond any doubt. "Not necessarily accurate" is NOT going to make a difference of over 4 billion years to the age of the Earth.
Continental drift,
fossils
radiological dating
stalactite/stalagmite formations
erosion
and on and on - all of these point to a much older Earth, and all are in pretty good agreement with each other.

We have no actual record of the continental drift, when those fossils weren't fossils, causes of erosion, etc... It has been shown that sometimes drastic events can mimic the effect of years in a day. In a vacuum, all that stuff sounds neat and gives you details that seem accurate. We don't live in a vacuum.

Just because something happens the same way over the course of 50 years doesn't mean it has always done that. We simply do not have any knowledge of the plethora of variables to determine what happened thousands of years ago, let alone millions or billions.

 

[Gigantopithecus]

I didn't get what he was saying either. I appreciate his reply though

The mitochondrial genome is but a single genetic locus. There are many, many, many other singular genetic loci, including nuclear DNA loci, and the male equivalent of mtDNA, the (non-recombining) part of the Y-chromosome.

Each of these genetic loci has a different history. That is, if you look at the coalescence of any individual locus, it will be at a certain time and a certain place. Most loci have their deepest roots in Africa. That is, there is more diversity of most genetic loci in living African populations than elsewhere in the world.

However, to be able to tell how old these loci are, we have to make an assumption: that they evolve at a constant rate, and that they are not subject to selection. In other words, we have to assume that there is one mutation per thousand base pairs per generation (this is an example, the actual mutation rate is much lower). This is a poor assumption to make for more regions of the genome, and for mitochondrial DNA in particular (there is a lot of evidence that mtDNA is subject to strong selection, which throws off the dating calculations). However, the inference that the oldest mtDNA sequences are African is much more sound.

Comparing Mitochondrial Eve to Y-chromosome Adam, there is more diversity in mtDNA than there is in Y chromosomes. Hence, the mtDNA coalescence is deeper in time than the Y-chromosome coalescence. The point of my previous post is that other loci have wildly variable coalescence times - some are very, very old, while others are very, very young.

The main problem with Mitochondrial Eve theory, as I said, is that the history of one single genetic locus DOES NOT equal the history of an entire population. A population has one real history. The human genome has many histories - and while it's increasingly easy to figure out the history of a single locus - seeing the forest is really hard even if you can see lots of individual trees.

This (reconstructing population histories from genetics) is one of the hottest topics in not just human evolution, but evolutionary biology in general.

 

[William Gaatjes]

Incorrect. It has general guidelines that are not always followed.

You can always elaborate your view if you please.
What are these general guidelines you speak of and when and why is it not always followed ?

 

[alkemyst]

The whole 6000 year old thing is not one any real biblical leader stands behind other than that is the time of Man.

In most 'books' of religion, there is talk of a base trible that expanded and moved on in the world.

 

[GodlessAstronomer]

We have no actual record of the continental drift, when those fossils weren't fossils, causes of erosion, etc... It has been shown that sometimes drastic events can mimic the effect of years in a day. In a vacuum, all that stuff sounds neat and gives you details that seem accurate. We don't live in a vacuum.

Just because something happens the same way over the course of 50 years doesn't mean it has always done that. We simply do not have any knowledge of the plethora of variables to determine what happened thousands of years ago, let alone millions or billions.

This, my friends, is willful ignorance in action.

 

[AbAbber2k]

The problem I have with the rejection of the young earth theory is that the measures used to measure the age of the earth could possibly be inaccurate.

I'm not saying that I agree with the young earth theory, but there has to be a higher power, although I think that higher power was good, since I'm a Deist and since I believe in the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God. That higher power could just be the universe, I don't know. However, if the universe is the higher power (the creator transformed themself into the universe, which is Pan-Deism), then abiogenesis would have to have occurred, and I don't understand how life could've come from non-life.

First bold: No, there doesn't "have to" be a higher power.
Second bold: Lacking understanding in events doesn't mean you should automatically ascribe supernatural context to them.

 

[William Gaatjes]

I should rectify something.

I mentioned comets only in my text above.
But included must be as well : Asteroids and meteors.


A nice movie from nasa about the asteroid vesta. Diameter around 530km or 330 miles.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/video/index.cfm?id=1020

Do not be surprised if there has been done some editing of the raw photo / video material.

 

[Caveman]

What people call "Christianity" is not that at all... Christ opposed pagan traditions like Christmas, Easter, etc... If anything we see in professing world of Christianity has any roots in Christ's teaching, it's completely coincidental.

Real Chritianity is much closer to what people would think of as "Jewish". That said, Jewish pharisees distorted God's laws into nearly unrecognizable traditons of their own.

Re creation: The bible language addresses a creation and a REcreation. The REcreation (as backed by science, oral tradition, secular writings, and bible history) appears to have to have occurred ~6k years ago. The bible does not give any details about the creation of earth aside from the wording leaving it open to have occurred trillions of years ago (with dinosaurs, Neanderthal's, etc.)... Perhaps earth was a training ground for other beings and/or a staging ground for us that became "without form and void"?

In the context of a purpose to build character and move to a higher plane of existence, the detail of when the original creation happened isn't germaine.

When someone says the bible doesn't back up science or secular history, it's almost always because of ignorance what the bible says.

The bible does not indicate how the races came about either... That said, is it so much of a leap to imagine a creator giving Eve the capability to have multi-racial offspring? There are a lot of interesting questions that the book of Genesis broaches... How about lifespans? It appears there were folks living nearly 1000 years before the flood. The bible indicates there were no rainbows before the flood and that there was a layer dome of water surrounding the earth (a type of atmosphere that would block out free-radical producing radiation, hence extending life). The bible also hints that before the flood, animals were not eaten as food. Lots of things to ponder... A fairy tale? I can see how many would think that...

 

[Nik]

My thought has always been that people are too fundamentally different culturally and physically to have all come from a single mother.

Micro evolution, something that exists with irrefutable proof, supports the macro evolutionary theory to a T.

Everything just suddenly coming into being with some invisible god that NOBODY HAS EVER SEEN IN THE HISTORY OF THE HUMAN RACE just speaking it into existance?

bwuahahahahaha...

 

[Nik]

Perhaps earth was a training ground for other beings and/or a staging ground for us that became "without form and void"?

You're playing a semantics game with a book that's been translated an infinite number of times over thousands of years.

One single word alluding to a half-assed still-impossible bullshit solution to a still-impossible bullshit story is STILL bullshit.

 

[Nik]

That said, is it so much of a leap to imagine a creator giving Eve the capability to have multi-racial offspring?

You stupid nitwits don't even know anything about the book you're arguing against.

Word to the wise: LEARN about it if you're going to bash it because you look like a fucking retarded tool.

Eve didn't have the ability to give birth to multiple races, you moron. Eve gave birth to ONE race.

Tower of Babel, anyone?

Actually READ the Bible first, pl0x.

 

[Nik]

This, my friends, is willful ignorance in action.

Yep, it's typical Malak bullshit. Malak is like the SixOne of Offtopic.

 

[Jeff7]

Micro evolution, something that exists with irrefutable proof, supports the macro evolutionary theory to a T.

Everything just suddenly coming into being with some invisible god that NOBODY HAS EVER SEEN IN THE HISTORY OF THE HUMAN RACE just speaking it into existance?

bwuahahahahaha...

Plenty of people have seen this stuff.

It usually just happens to involve insanity, severe sleep deprivation, brain damage, or hallucinogenic compounds.

 

[Nik]

Haha