Age of Man

[alextemplet]

New Orleans would be done for; that could be a good thing.

[Draco]

Why would that be good?

[mcar]

alextemplet wrote:that all modern humans are descended from a single woman who lived around 150,000 years ago; if this is true, it might also be possible that this woman's culture told a story of such a flood and that this flood story was then carried on to all of her descendants and eventually to every culture that exists today, even though the actual flood may never have happened.

Is that also an idea from D. Brown's book?

[alextemplet]

No, it's something I saw on the Discovery Channel.

[alextemplet]

Why would that be good?

Have you ever been to New Orleans? In the words of Obi Wan Kenobi, "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

[Draco]

Oh ok then. Still not the best for most of the other places in the world.

[lfgreene]

I agree with you that as a species we have been around for quite a while but I think your time lines are wrong. H. habilis, the first member of the Homo genus is dated at 1.5 million years. Just a thought.

[chaka8]

Going back to the original topic, fissile dating is by no means the only way to estimate the immergence of humans.
Genetic calculations based on rate of mutation is also an excellent method. Time frame of divergence between apes and modern humans from a common ancestor can has also been calculated based on genetics.

As the national geographic article states:
"The 195,000-year-old date coincides with findings from genetic studies on modern human populations. Such studies can be extrapolated to determine when the earliest modern humans lived."

Case closed?