Svante Pääbo was awarded a Nobel Prize on October 3 for his DNA
research on human fossils. It was touted as another proof of evolution.
However, an evaluation of his work shows it does not support evolution
at all, and, in fact, confirms just the opposite.
The Research
Pääbo’s team first sequenced Neanderthal mitochondria from a single
bone.
Then the team sequenced ancient DNA found in the nucleus from
three Neanderthal bone specimens.
The bone specimens came from the
Vindija cave in Croatia, and also from Neanderthals found in Germany,
Russia, and Spain. Eventually Pääbo sequenced the three billion base
pairs of the entire Neanderthal genome.
Then, Pääbo sequenced DNA from a
finger bone discovered in a cave in southern Siberia.
Success in completing these tasks were widely believed to be
impossible. Now, it is common. Pääbo’s success opened up a new field,
namely the now fiercely competitive field of paleogenomics, which concerns the analysis of ancient DNA. So far paleogenomics has complete genetic sequencing on almost 8,000 “ancient” individuals.
Date Estimates
My main concern was that the DNA obtained from the bone fragments
could not have been even close to 430,000 years old, a conclusion that
now appears likely from the research. The dating methods used were
partly because evolution demands an ancient age for Neanderthals in
order to fit into the orthodox human evolutionary scenario. This
scenario requires long ages to explain the many evolutionary changes
required to go from apes to modern humans. Pääbo thus achieved, using
“old, degraded and contaminated genetic material from our ancestors,”
what many experts thought “was an impossible challenge,” namely
sequencing old, degraded and contaminated DNA.
Relationships
The results of DNA comparisons with Neanderthals, most of whom once
lived in Europe and Western Asia, show that the Neanderthal DNA was
distinct from both modern-day humans and chimpanzees. Pääbo’s research
supported this view. It concluded that a chasm exists between human and
chimp DNA, not the two percent as is often claimed:
Despite the early discoveries of apparently high DNA
similarity between humans and chimps, large-scale DNA sequencing
projects began to present a different picture. In 2002, a large DNA
sequencing lab produced over 3 million bases of chimp DNA sequence in
small 50 to 900 base fragments that were obtained randomly from the
entire chimp genome. When these were matched with the human genome using
computer software, only two-thirds of the DNA sequences could be lined
up onto human DNA. While there were many short stretches of DNA that
were very similar to human DNA, this meant that more than 30% of the chimp DNA sequence was not similar to human DNA at all!
The finding that Neanderthal DNA was “distinct,” meaning different
from modern DNA, is not surprising. DNA tests can be done today to
determine one’s ethnic background because the different ethnic groups
have distinct DNA. This includes Neanderthal DNA compared to modern
human DNA. Pääbo also found that “comparisons between Neanderthal DNA
and humans from around the world showed their DNA was a closer match to
humans coming from Europe or Asia.”
Interbreeding of Neanderthals
and Modern Humans
The Neanderthal genome determined a major surprise at the time. DNA comparisons showed
that Homo sapiens had sex and children with
Neanderthalsafter migrating out of Africa around 70,000 years ago. They
are not a missing ling as believed for over a century. And you can
still see the legacy of that difference today. Between 1 and 4 percent
of modern human DNA comes from our Neanderthal relatives and this even
affects our body’s ability to respond to infection.
Thus Neanderthals could interbreed with modern humans, showing that
they were one species—one Genesis kind, the human species.
---They are not
a different species or missing link as evolutionists have attempted to
claim since Darwin’s time. Instead of providing “us with new insight
into the life of our African ancestors and the emergence of the modern
human,” the DNA analysis has shown, at most, that much variety existed
in the past as also exists in the present.
Arrows between different branches show mating that occurred.
Pääbo was also able to sequence a DNA sample of Denisovans, a people
group similar to Neanderthals. The DNA analysis showed that “Homo sapiens bred with Denisovans… In parts of South East Asia up to 6% of people’s DNA is Denisovan.”
‘The Half-Life of DNA Problem’
and the 430,000-Year Estimate
DNA decays with time,
casting doubt on the age estimates.
An article at The Scientist
about the Nobel award states, “DNA degrades relatively quickly, and so
researchers often struggle to purify and analyze fragments of the
molecule from remains” of a body. The decay rate of DNA depends on the DNA’s exposure to heat, water,
sunlight, oxygen, and especially radiation. If a body is left out in the
sun and rain, its DNA will be useful for analysis for only a few weeks.
Conversely, DNA frozen solidly deep in Antarctic ice may last a hundred
thousand years. The ideal preservation conditions are in a very dry,
hermetically sealed container protected from radiation and frozen solid
at about -80 degrees Celsius. Even then, ambient radiation will
eventually render the DNA unusable.
Much controversy exists about DNA longevity.
All of the DNA in living organisms constantly sustains damage, but it
is also constantly being repaired by the body’s elaborate repair system
which is accurate to the 99.9 percent level. This occurs because
Ionizing radiation interacts with matter by depositing energy in the target structure within about 10-19 to 10-14 seconds.
This energy deposition event is followed by radiochemical processes
leading to altered target molecules (DNA) which are the substrates for
subsequent enzymatic repair reactions, taking place in the time range of
seconds to days. These physical, chemical and biological processes
together determine the effect of radiation on unicellular and
multicellular organisms.
Pääbo’s team dealt with this concern by developing methods for
estimating the amount of DNA damage (caused by thousands of years of
exposure to background radiation and contamination). For this purpose,
they used sequences from microorganisms and modern humans.
Critique
My main concern is that the cave conditions where the ancient DNA
samples were found were, at best, poor for preserving the DNA.
To
conclude that it was 430,000 years old is very problematic.
DNA that old
would likely have very few genes that are even partly intact.
The
430,000-year-old date is not based on any evidence revealed in the DNA
or its environment, but rather from the long-age assumptions required to
explain the problems of evolution.
Summary
Put a suit on a Neanderthal and most people wouldn’t notice the difference.
I have no reason to question the validity of the results of the
sequences obtained. They conform to other comparisons showing that
Neanderthals and Denisovans were fully human, albeit part of other
people groups distinct from those alive today. They are part of the
human family as Genesis teaches – not evolutionary precursors. Other
so-called missing links, or primitive humans, were also part of the
human family. In an article about genomic comparisons between so-called
“primitive humans” at The Conversation on October 7, Princeton geneticist Joshua Akey said,
From the well-known Neanderthals and more enigmatic
Denisovans in Eurasia, to the diminutive ‘hobbit’ Homo floresiensis on
the island of Flores in Indonesia, to Homo naledi that lived in South
Africa, multiple hominins abounded.”
This variety is no different than the variety of humans seen today
which were once called “races.” They are more accurately referred to as people groups.
My major disagreement is about the age estimate for the bone
fragments used to extract DNA. The fossils were found in locations that
were far less than ideal for preservation. From what we know about DNA
deterioration rates, I find it hard to believe that the Neanderthal DNA
recovered is more than 3,000 years old, if even that old." CEH
Landslides in part of the country with more flooding.
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