More Evidence For a Human Ring Species

Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology

Relationship between modern humans, Neanderthals and Devisovans (to which now needs to be added a fourth species)

Creationist loons and the professional liars of the Discovery Institute must dread a publication from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. After the recent confirmation that modern humans (Homo sapiens) and Neanderthals (H. neaderthalensis (or should that be H. s. neanderthalensis?)), interbred and that H.sapiens also interbred with the recently discovered Neanderthal relatives, the 'Denisovans', to form what amounted to an incompletely speciated 'ring species' only a few thousand years ago, the Institute has now dealt another blow to Creationism.

At the Biology of Genomes meeting last week, reported in Science, Svante Pääbo's team announced that DNA analysis of samples obtained from Neanderthal and Denisovan bones found in the Denisova cave in Siberia, using a new technique, has yielded a nearly complete, high coverage of the genomes of our closest cousins which not only confirms the previously reported interbreeding but strongly suggests a fourth, so far undiscovered species of Homo involved in the complex.

So far as I am aware, this is the first case of a new distinct group of Homo being identified on the basis of the DNA it contributed to another species with which it occasionally interbred.

It is amazing that, in the face of this blizzard of information confirming the scientific view of human origins, in full accord with the Darwinian Theory of Evolution, frauds, loons and politically-motivated liars still maintain their anti-science stance. One can only assume they feel the monetary rewards and the hoped-for political rewards justify this abandonment of pure reason and sacrifice of intellectual integrity. The Discovery Institute's ambition is of course well known. Their 'Wedge Strategy' is to insert Biblical Creationism into public schools disguised as science, and all areas of public policy to soften up the American people and prepare the way for abandoning the secular Constitution (and democratic freedoms which that guarantees), in preparation for installing a fundamentalist, Taliban-style Christian autocracy complete with rigid enforcement of the Old Testament Laws of Leviticus and Deuteronomy through the Christian equivalent of Sharia courts.

The Wedge Strategy includes propagandising against the basic philosophy of science whilst creating the false impression in the minds of the scientifically illiterate that the Theory of Evolution is a theory in crisis and that serious biologists are now rejecting it in favour of Creationist alternatives such as 'Intelligent Design' despite the latter being declared a non-science and merely a cover for Biblical creationism in 2005 in the Kitzmillar vs Dover Area School District Trial and as reluctantly admitted under cross-examination by Discovery Institute champion and Christian fundamentalist, Michael Behe, in the same trial.

Reference:

More Genomes From Denisova Cave Show Mixing of Early Human Groups
Elizabeth Pennisi, Science 17 May 2013: 340 (6134), 799. DOI:10.1126/science.340.6134.799

See also:

When The Conclusion Is Sacred Facts Must Be Ignored.
A Human Ring Species?

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