Homo sapiens

2007-03-14T08:35:15Z

Poloeater:

Humans, or human beings, are bipedal primates belonging to the mammalian species, Homo sapiens (Latin: "wise man" or "knowing man") in the family Hominidae (the great apes). Humans have possibly been around for 200,000 years. Humans have a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, language, and introspection. This mental capability, combined with an erect body carriage that frees their upper limbs for manipulating objects, has allowed humans to make far greater use of tools than any other species. Humans now inhabit every continent except Antarctica, with a total population of over 6.5 billion as of 2007.

The scientific study of human evolution encompasses the development of the genus Homo, but usually involves studying other hominids and hominines as well, such as Australopithecus. "Modern humans" are defined as the Homo sapiens species, of which the only extant subspecies is Homo sapiens sapiens; Homo sapiens idaltu (roughly translated as "elder wise man"), the other known subspecies, is extinct. Anatomically modern humans appear in the fossil record in Africa about 200,000 years ago.

The closest living relatives of Homo sapiens are the Common Chimpanzee and the Bonobo. Full genome sequencing resulted in the conclusion that "after 6.5 [million] years of separate evolution, the differences between chimpanzee and human are just 10 times greater than those between two unrelated people and 10 times less than those between rats and mice". In fact, 95% of the DNA sequence is identical between chimpanzee and human. It has been estimated that the human lineage diverged from that of chimpanzees about five million years ago, and from gorillas about eight million years ago. However, a hominid skull discovered in Chad in 2001, classified as Sahelanthropus tchadensis, is approximately seven million years old, which may indicate an earlier divergence.

Many [[Christian|Christians]] believe that Homo Sapiens were created in [[God|God's]] image on day 6 of creation per [[Genesis]] 1:26-31:

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

Charles Darwin

2007-03-12T19:24:37Z

Poloeater: /* Religious Beliefs */

[[Image:darwin.jpg|thumb|150px|right|Charles Darwin]]
Charles Darwin was a famous naturalist born in [[England]] to a Christian family on February 12, [[1809]]. He is best known for the [[Theory of Evolution|theory of evolution]], which suggest that biological species develop over time via natural selection, branching from common origins. Outside of evolution in particular, he was regarded as an expert on barnacles as well as credited with discovering how coral atolls were formed.

==Early Career==

Darwin graduated tenth in his class at Christ's College in Cambridge (April, 1831). Although he intended on becoming a country parson and accepted the Bible as literally true, his intense interest in nature and discovering her secrets displaced his desire for a life as a clergyman. Darwin became the protege of the Reverend John Stevens Henslow, a professor of botany, and the Reverend Adam Sedgwick, a geologist. Henslow and Sedgwick encouraged Darwin to pursue his interests as a naturalist.

After touring the [[Galapagos Islands]] and studying the animals that lived there, Darwin developed an interest in the patterns of species distribution he had documented on the journey, as well as his realization that the economic theories of Thomas Malthus might have some application in the biological world. Researching this issue on a global scale, he slowly developed his theory of [[natural selection]] and finally published ''[[The Origin of Species]]'' in [[1859]]. Darwin had not originally meant to publish his work so early in his life, and in fact was quite fearful of what the reception might be, but was prompted to do so after being contacted by another naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, who had developed similar ideas.

==Religious Beliefs==

Charles Darwin was a Christian up and through his famous five year voyage on the ''HMS Beagle''. But in the ensuing two years after returning to England (1836 to 1839; and in his late twenties) Darwin abandoned Christianity (1) and [sic] "had become a 'materialist' (more or less equivalent to an atheist" (2). About twenty years later in 1859 (at the age of fifty) Darwin published his famous book ''The Origin of Species''. "In order not to hurt the feelings of his friends and wife, Darwin often used deistic language in his publications" (3). According to Darwin, the "manifestly false history of the world" (4) as recorded in the Old Testament and New Testament miracles led him to reject Biblical veracity (5). Eminent Darwin biographer, Professor Janet Browne, sums up Darwin's views concerning religion: Darwin "mapped out a comparitive evolution of the religious sense, proposing that religious belief was ultimately nothing more than a primitive urge to bestow a cause on otherwise inexplicable natural events...In short, he made no secret of his view that he did not believe religion to have any rational foundation at all" (6). Yet, in spite of these views, when he died in 1882 at the age of seventy-three, Darwin was buried at Westminster Abbey next to Sir [[Isaac Newton]].

When investigating transmutation of species he knew that his naturalist friends thought this a bestial heresy undermining miraculous justifications for the social order, the kind of radical argument then being used by Dissenters and atheists to attack the Church of England's privileged position as the established church. Though Darwin wrote of religion as a tribal survival strategy, he still believed that God was the ultimate lawgiver. His belief dwindled, and with the death of his daughter Annie in 1851, Darwin finally lost all faith in Christianity. He continued to help the local church with parish work, but on Sundays would go for a walk while his family attended church. He now thought it better to look at pain and suffering as the result of general laws rather than direct intervention by God. When asked about his religious views, he wrote that he had never been an atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God, and that generally "an Agnostic would be the more correct description of my state of mind.". Ultimately he found that his discoveries conflicted with the belief in God as the one and only truth.

'''References'''

1. Mayr, Ernst ''Growth of Biological Thought'' (1982:402).

2. Mayr, Ernst ''One Long Argument'' (1991:75).

3. Ibid. (1991:75).

4. Barlow, Nora (editor) ''The Autobiography of Charles Darin'' (1958:85).

5. Ibid. (1958:85-87).

6. Browne, Janet ''Charles Darwin The Power of Place'' (2002:341)

== External Links ==
*[http://creationwiki.org/Darwin%27s_Illness Darwin's illness - CreationWiki]

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Homo sapiens

Charles Darwin