Human Evolution: Are We All Equally Evolved?

Human Evolution: Are We All Equally Evolved? 

 

Acts 17:2

“And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures,”  

 

The late Stephen J. Gould once commented that “biological arguments for racism may have been common before 1850, but they increased by orders of magnitude following the acceptance of evolutionary theory.” Charles Darwin’s views, in particular, would not pass muster as politically correct today. The reason for this seems clear. If one believes that human beings have evolved, from more primitive ape-like creatures, then it is possible for some people groups in the world to have evolved further than others. Of course, Darwin’s view was that the most highly evolved people group was that of white Europeans. 

 

Over the decades, evolutionists shied away from such attitudes. This is probably the motivation for the popular “out-of-Africa” evolutionary model that suggests all humans evolved in East Africa, and then migrated to the rest of the world. This gives evolutionists, like creationists, the ability to suggest that all humans are related, and therefore to oppose racism. 

 

However, recent evolutionary ideas reported in previous Creation Moments have suggested that early homo sapiens sapiens, migrating out of Africa, interbred with a differing number of times with groups that evolutionists consider subhuman, such as Neanderthals and Denisovans. One article suggested that differing amounts of interbreeding with Denisovans could have developed the specific characteristics of people groups, such as Tibetans or Australian Aborigines. It would seem that the stage is set for some evolutionists, while notionally accepting the out-of-Africa model, could describe certain people groups as more or less “pure”, depending on their imagined levels of interbreeding. Evolutionism could be returning to racist ideas, whereas biblical creationism cannot allow for racism. 

 

Prayer: Thank You, heavenly Father, that You made us all of One Blood. So we know that all who call out to You in repentance and faith shall be saved. Amen. 

 

Ref: Gould, S.J. (1985), Ontogeny and Phylogeny, (Belknapp Press), p. 127. Image: Indigenous Australian playing didgeridoo, Graham Crumb / ImageCity.com, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported. 193 06