You’re reading about a cowboy. . .which leads you to Wyoming. . .which leads you to a house made purely of fossils. . .which leads you to animal
extinction. . .which led me to something called a genetic bottleneck.
I’d never heard of such a thing.
Here’s the definition of a genetic bottleneck. (It has NOTHING to do with cowboys) A genetic bottleneck is a significant reduction in the size of a population that causes the extinction of many genetic lineages within that population, thus decreasing genetic diversity.
Now what tickled in the back of my brain was endangered species. If there are very, very few of the animals left they tend to all be related. You start running into trouble like you would if a. . .oh. . .a male dog had puppies with one of it’s own daughters. There are tendencies for birth defects, the same reason cousins are forbidden to marry.
So, though I wasn’t familiar with the term, as I read I realized I was familiar with the concept.
Did you know there is a genetic bottleneck for people? Huh? Huh?
Humans have remarkably little genetic diversity, especially in comparison to our closest living relative, the chimpanzee. I read that online. I’d never heard that humans were more or less genetically diverse than other creatures. What does that even mean?
The genetic bottle neck brings me to creatures like Neanderthal Man, troglodytes, to use a more generic–and no doubt incorrect–term. Cave men.
All of the ‘human-like’ cave men come BEFORE a genetic bottle neck in human history.
NOW YOU JUST KEEP READING. I SWEAR THIS IS INTERESTING. TRUST ME.
Here’s one of the more popular theories about why there aren’t human-like creatures on the earth besides humans. The Toba supereruption occurred between 69,000 and 77,000 years ago in Indonesia, and it is recognized as one of Earth’s largest known eruptions. The related catastrophe theory holds that this supervolcanic event plunged the planet into a volcanic winter, which resulted in the world’s human population being reduced to as few as 1,000 breeding pairs. This created a bottleneck in human evolution.
Okay, now think about it. This is SIXTY-NINE THOUSAND YEARS AGO.
We read all the time about earth history being millions and millions of years old. And yet here they’re saying that about. . .oh. . .70,000 years ago, a drop in the bucket of earth’s history, there might have been as few as 1000 ‘breeding pairs’ (let’s go ahead and humanize this and call them PEOPLE. . .MARRIED PEOPLE) on the planet.
Another place used FIFTY THOUSAND years ago. Another said Neaderthal Man vanished THIRTY THOUSAND years ago.
Okay, now we’re getting down to a very imaginable number because honestly it’s impossible to think of one million and not just be overwhelmed by it.
So, I’ve just got a question.
If the ‘genetic bottleneck’ proves that whatever men survived grew into the current population of the earth. And they’re theorizing a catastrophe of some sort, the Toba supereruption being one possibility. . .I’d like to submit my own theory of why, suddenly as recently as 30,000 years ago human life on earth became SMALL and very genetically similar–sort of like FAMILY. Now I’m no scientist. Not a paleontologist or biologist, but I am a THINKER.
How about (brace yourself) ………..CREATION!
How about if that was the point in the creation of the earth when God made man.
Or (brace yourself again) how about a Great Flood. Noah and his family. . .now there’s a genetic bottleneck for you.
I’m just saying–all these scientific theories–well, I get it. I get that they’re trying to explain earth history without including miraculous intervention by God. That’s their job. “If God didn’t do it, then how did it happen? Maybe this, what if that…?”
But just once in a while, like when I’m looking at muddy water, I wonder–How long would I need to stare before LIFE would come crawling out. And if it did, how long would I have to stare at a one-celled mud slug before it evolved into a kangaroo and a Swedish Ivy plant?
Think about the land around you, the spectacular spring blooms and the magnificent trees and the Grand Canyon and the sweeping plains of Nebraska and Kansas and buffalo and mountain lions and alligators and carrots and watermelons and bumblebees and cockroaches, ask yourself, if this all did come from some one celled critter crawling out of a prehistoric mud hole, then isn’t that a BIGGER miracle than God just saying, “Let there be light!”
And I’d also like ONE example from anyone of one living creature that, in recorded history, has evolved. Seriously, I mean I know these things take a long time but c’mon, one thing. One time a chicken laid an egg and a baby was born that could…breathe under water. I can think of some animals that have adapted… adapting is very different from evolving. Where a black and white moth changed to more black than white when London became sooty. But there’s no genetic difference there.
Either way, out of supposedly millions of years of earth history, i think we can make three statements.
1) Humans only appear in their current form a few thousand years ago.
2) Nothing has evolved since we’ve started paying attention–an no, going extinct doesn’t count.
3) The world around us is a miracle.