Rachel Edwards
answered on 14 Mar 2025:
last edited 14 Mar 2025 14:19
This is more theology – the bible says that God created Adam and Eve as the first people. Most scientists believe in evolution – which is about how we slowly change and adapt, and humans evolved from different early primates.
There is the idea in science of Mitochondrial Eve and Y-Chromosome Adam – the most recent people from whom all women descend and all men descend.
Mitochondrial DNA is passed from mother to child, so you can trace back the female lines to the person all women descended from. At the moment Mitochondiral Eve is thought to have lived in Africa around 150,000 years ago. She was made in the usual way we’re all made, the latest in a long line back to the last common ancestor or all life and beyond. With good luck she may have known her mother, her grandmother, her great grandmother. She might have had sisters and aunts. She wasn’t alone. There would have been many other women around who we also descend from, but her’s is the only unbroken line of mothers and daughters. The other lines at some point either had no children or only sons. As time passes some of the lines of her daughters will die out and so who she is, and perhaps where she is from, will change and move forward in time.
Y-Chromosome Adam is also thought to have lived somewhere in Africa, but perhaps 250,000 to 300,000 years ago. The Y-chromosome is unique to men, so through it you can trace father-son relationships to the most recent father of all men. He too wouldn’t have been alone, and we descend from the other men of the species around at the same time, but he is the most recent one to which there is an unbroken line of fathers and sons to the present, at least for now. Who he is will also one day change as the lines of his sons break.
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Andrew M commented on :
There is the idea in science of Mitochondrial Eve and Y-Chromosome Adam – the most recent people from whom all women descend and all men descend.
Mitochondrial DNA is passed from mother to child, so you can trace back the female lines to the person all women descended from. At the moment Mitochondiral Eve is thought to have lived in Africa around 150,000 years ago. She was made in the usual way we’re all made, the latest in a long line back to the last common ancestor or all life and beyond. With good luck she may have known her mother, her grandmother, her great grandmother. She might have had sisters and aunts. She wasn’t alone. There would have been many other women around who we also descend from, but her’s is the only unbroken line of mothers and daughters. The other lines at some point either had no children or only sons. As time passes some of the lines of her daughters will die out and so who she is, and perhaps where she is from, will change and move forward in time.
Y-Chromosome Adam is also thought to have lived somewhere in Africa, but perhaps 250,000 to 300,000 years ago. The Y-chromosome is unique to men, so through it you can trace father-son relationships to the most recent father of all men. He too wouldn’t have been alone, and we descend from the other men of the species around at the same time, but he is the most recent one to which there is an unbroken line of fathers and sons to the present, at least for now. Who he is will also one day change as the lines of his sons break.