06 EVOLUTION
The study of the phases and the mechanisms involved in the evolution of the world open up to man a window from which he can look at and, yes, even understand God a little.
I will try to express the wonder that it arouses later on, returning to this chapter.
From an increasingly profound knowledge of the mechanisms and the history of evolution, it has been shown that there are no leaps forward: even from the creation of life up to our times, everything evolves with time, sometimes faster and sometimes slower, but without a solution of continuity. This radically changes our way of thinking.
If God was invented by man, then it is time he were invented a little better because if we examine the world closely, it looks as if it were really invented “by God”.
As in the previous two chapters, we will describe in general terms the history of “Our universe”, as we know it today, without advancing demonstrations or justifications, for which reference should be made to in-depth studies, if only to check that the scientists of the various disciplines actually see things in this way.
Of course, not knowing exactly what the force of gravity is or the strong force that binds Quarks in general, does not worry us, their existence is accepted at the scientists’ word, while the fact that life and man can have evolved without external intervention shakes thousand year old religious convictions and people do not wish to know about it.
It should be stated in advance that the history of the universe does not question the existence of a God, the Creator, but, on the contrary, it exalts His infinite power.
Astronomy, astrophysics, atomic physics, molecular physics, biology and palaeontology have taken giant steps forward over recent years, assisted by highly advanced technical instruments such as telescopes on satellites, extremely powerful particle accelerators, electronic microscopes, etc.
Furthermore, new theories have played their part such as the Theory of Relativity, Quantum Mechanics, molecular physics and, by no means least, the enormous possibilities provided by computer science.
All these sciences have revealed new aspects of the history of the universe, or confirmed less recent intuitions. The fact that some of these acquisitions and confirmations have come at a sustained rate only in recent years, does not justify the scepticism or the refusal with which they have been received by the so-called world of Culture or by the religious world, or the way in which they are kept well-hidden from outside the scientific world.
I think that for most “intellectuals”, the majority of which are atheists, the idea that creation took place, that the world had a beginning, insinuates the possibility of God and this annoys them. As for religions, we must not even consider questioning the dogma. This behaviour may be understood if we think that these two categories know little about science and understand it even less. Their culture has been limited so far to studying “their culture” and therefore, their thoughts do not have the huge backing that has recently led others to make an effort to understand the world or the Creation, the true source of the spirit of truth.
As for scientists, including doctors, they have their studies, their work, their convictions, most of which are agnostic, and they do not make much of an effort to illuminate the common people and look for trouble with Animists, Philosophers, Buddhists, Muslims, Christians, etc.
Returning to my Catholic religion, to the Church and more precisely to the Pope: it is understandably easier to keep pretending to be the only one inspired by the Holy Spirit, obviously as an inspiration of the Holy Spirit himself, rather than surrender to the consequences of the evidence. Evidence and consequences that I think are clear to him, as shown by the encyclical on Faith and Religion that is clearly directed towards asking for help and taking time in order not to make too many mistakes. Mistakes will still be made. The past shows that the Holy Spirit does not sustain us in the way we hoped!
We must not pretend to deny reason. As long as the subject did not pose any problems, reason and faith agreed with each other.
But now it is not so, the evidence must be denied.
By the way, this behaviour does not shake my faith, it only shakes my patience, because, in the end, it is only a question of time.
There is even amazement that the Church is so fearful and “Taleban”.
An example of all this: Recently, in the USA, and already in many states, a law has been passed that prohibits any questions connected with Evolution being asked during exams. Today I bought a reprint of my biology book for a friend. The birth of life is still dealt with, but the history of evolution is only briefly referred to and that of man has been taken out completely! People will say that it is mainly the Protestants’ fault, but in any case it demonstrates the very common “spirit of ignorance”.
THE BIG BANG
The theory of the birth of the universe that has been given the name Big Bang is based on the extrapolation of current laws of physics and it will certainly be modified and perfected as more knowledge is acquired. However, even as it stands now, it is amazing and it enables us to take a small step towards the knowledge of God through His Creation. This theory finds confirmation in three main facts:
1) The expansion of the world: Astronomers have ascertained that, if we leave out of consideration reciprocal movements between the galaxies, a point of the universe moves away from another at a speed that increases with the distance itself, and more precisely between 15 and 30 km. a second for each million of light years of distance. v = Hr in which H is the famous Hubble constant, the inverse of which gives the age of the universe. Between 10 and 20 billion years, considered at the moment to be 15. How?
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Conceptually, it is very simple, we just need to know how many billion light years away the farthest galaxies are. I will not tell you the reasoning processes and measurements that bring astronomers to formulate these figures. Telescopes fitted on satellites will enable this figure to be more clearly defined. Perhaps it is worthwhile clarifying the concept of the so-called cosmological horizon. If the world is x years old, the light in these years has at the most travelled x number of light years and vice verse knowing the distance of the farthest objects, we obtain the age of the world. By the way, each year, our cosmological horizon increases in size by one light year and we see about ten small galaxies more than the 100 billion approximately that we can already see.
Fig. 6-1 The basic radiation observed by satelite Cobe
There is more: the universe that is sooner or later visible, a greater emphasis being on later, is 1000 times larger, we will never see beyond because its parts move away faster than the speed of light. (Note, in the calculations, it is necessary to take into consideration that the speed of expansion is proportional to the root square of the time during the period of the materialization of the atomic particles and subsequently to the time to 2/3 starting from the age of 300,000 years).
And this universe is only one tiny part of the creation.
2) Basic uniform radiation: Two Englishmen discovered this a few years ago when they built a large parabolic antenna to pick up signals from satellites because they were afraid that the French one would not be ready in time: wherever it is directed, there is a very weak background radiation, 3 degrees Kelvin, but uniform.
| 3) The ratio in the universe between atoms of hydrogen and those of helium is one atom of helium to three of hydrogen. A spectroscopic examination of the stars is almost uniform and gives these values. |  |
| Fig. 6-2 Satelite Cobe | |
| But let’s come to the difficult attempt to explain the big bang in just a few words, that will probably be incomprehensible to most. | |
Phase I – Just after the explosion – It was an indescribable explosion of energy that
physics has begun to describe by the time of 10 to minus 43 of a second
(A second divided by 10 with 43 noughts) as we do not know enough about
gravity and its laws, for the moment to be able to trace this data back
any further. |
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| Fig. 6-3 Il Big Bang |
On the subject of us not knowing enough, “insignficant little things” that we are: just think that this differential of time is called the constant of Plank, as it was noted by the afore-mentioned at the beginning of the last century. I say this to underline the fact that not all these discoveries are recent.
Well, at that time, the universe that can be seen today was 10 million billion trillion times smaller than an atom of hydrogen , because this was the distance that the light could have travelled in the meantime. It had a “slight” temperature of 10 raised to the power of 320 (i.e. 10 followed by 320 noughts) and a density of 10 raised to the power of 96 times that of water. As for the universe as a whole, it was only one thousandth of a centimetre in diameter. How they have reached this conclusion I don’t know, but think how much bigger than the perceivable universe!
The universe is expanding, it is a universe consisting of indescribable energy, where matter has not yet appeared. It is controlled by gravity and electronuclear force.
Phase II – The inflationary era – It lasts from the second to minus 35 to the second minus 32. In this period of time, the volume of the universe increases 50 times linearly and therefore 150 times in volume at speeds far greater than the light as all the parts of the universe expanded, each 150 times, pushing away the other parts. Inflation, therefore, was far more powerful than an explosion. Our little piece of universe visible today had at the end become as big as an orange. At the beginning of the inflationary era, this orange corresponded to a tiny part of the sphere in which light had had the time to travel (300,000 Km/sec * 1/10 to the power of 35 = 3/10 to minus 30 (km). The distance that inflates by 10 to the power of plus 50 becomes 10 to the power of plus 20 (km) and much bigger than an orange.
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| Fig. 6-4 Radiation of energy in the first instants |
Whay this clarification? We should remember that from all directions (15 billion light years in every direction) we receive a uniform radiation of 3 Kelvin, a radiation that started from the ends of the world that were actually visible at the beginning of the world (otherwise it would already have arrived or should still arrive). At the beginning, before inflation, these distant zones were in close contact, and the energy (at the speed of light) was able to make the power uniform.
What did inflation cause: Up until that moment there was only energy around, from that moment on, the energy transformed partly into matter and anti-matter: Quark, electrons, neutrinos and their anti-electrons, anti-quarks and anti-neutrinos.
Energy can obviously be much more concentrated than matter, however as it expands, its temperature decreases, just as the light of a bulb diminishes with distance, and from 10 to the power of 320 degrees, it reaches 10 to the power of 270. At this density of energy, the bricks of matter can start to exist and they literally pour out from the void. Energy condenses into matter and matter needs space that it creates by inflation. At this point, the temperature has dropped to a level at which the electronuclear force takes on two sides, the strong nuclear force and the weak nuclear force.
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Phase III – The actual expansion begins – We are at 10 to minus 32 of a second and the expansion takes on a rhythm that is almost the existing one: at the same time in which during inflation, the universe expanded by 10 with 50 noughts, it expands by just 10. |
| Fig. 6-5 Expanding universe |
At the second to the power of minus 12, scientists believe that the weak electronuclear force divided its field of action between the weak nuclear force and electromagnetic force. The temperature has by now dropped to a million billion degrees and our existing cosmological universe is just slightly smaller than the orbit of the earth around the sun.
Until 10 to the power of minus 6 seconds, the expanding universe is however involved in frenetic activity. Energy is still so dense that particles and anti-particles come into being and are annihilated colliding into each other, absorbing and recreating energy in packets that we call photons. For each particle, the anti-particle is created, but it seems that matter is more privileged than anti-matter: a Russian physicist Sakarov has discovered and shown that for each billion quark, nature creates one billion + 1 quark, and the same is also true for electrons and neutrinos against anti-electrons and anti-neutrinos. Thank goodness, otherwise we would not exist!
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Phase IV – Hadronic Era – From the Greek word for “strong”. We are now at 10 to the power of minus 6 of a second, in other words one millionth of a second after the creation of the universe. The temperature has dropped to 10,000 billion degrees, a trifle, and the strong electronuclear force starts to join 3 by 3, Quarks in neutrons and protons and the anti-quarks in anti-neutrons and anti-protons. On this matter, the reader should refer to the fourth chapter. Even these particles join together with an absorption of energy and they eliminate each other with an emission of energy, just as the electrons and anti-electrons continue to do. Little by little, however, the energy of the photons diminishes with the expansion and a time comes when the pairs that annihilate each other can no longer be recreated by the weakened photons.
Phase V – Leptonic Era – From the Greek word for “weak”. The universe is one second old, the temperature has dropped to 10 billion degrees. There are only protons, neutrons and electrons left in the world as well as the elusive neutrinos that avoid all involvement as they do not interact with any particle. As for the neutrons, as in their free state they only have a lifetime of just 15 minutes and as they can no longer reform due to the progressive loss of energy of the photons, they have dropped in number and their ratio is 2 neutrons to 14 protons and 14 electrons.
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Phase VI – Era of the nucleosynthesis – The story of the ascent to complexity continues, two protons join two neutrons forming a stable nucleus, that of helium. The other twelve protons will be the nuclei of hydrogen. As the weight of a nucleus of helium is about 4 times that of hydrogen, at this point the ratio of mass in the world between these two elements is about one to three, the ratio that is seen even now. |
| Fig. 6-6 The nucleosintesis |
Phase VII – The reign of matter – Electromagnetic force comes into action, every proton procures an electron and the atoms that the weakened photons no longer have the strength to break are formed.
We have reached the three hundred thousandth year of age of the universe. It should be said that energy is free to irradiate only to condensed matter. In the previous phases, the photons collided with the particles and were not able to clear a path for themselves for very long without interacting. On the contrary, at this point, they are free to move. There are a billion photons for every particle of matter. Their number does not change but with the expansion their energy diminishes. Matter on the other hand, even as it expands, maintains its energy, linked as Einstein said to the square root of the speed of light E =mC2.
Phase VIII – The formation of the galaxies – It will seem strange but scientists have more difficulty explaining this phase than the previous one.
Initially, the expanding World consists only of atoms of hydrogen and helium. However, their density is not uniform: Even at the time of the first condensations of matter, there were small differences like those encountered in the crystallization of solids. I don’t know if it is clear to scientists why these differences should have existed, but what has subsequently become clear is that without them, nothing would have happened. In fact under the influence of gravity these small variations in density have a natural tendency to become increasingly larger. Without them, the universe would have continued to expand in a perfectly uniform way. What strikes the physicists is that these variations in density had to be perfectly balanced: if they had been too weak, they would have dissolved and adapted in the initial phases under the impulse of the powerful irradiation that contrasted the effect of the grouping together of the particles. If these variations had been too strong, gravity would have had the last word and matter would have been condensed into black holes. Black holes are those areas that also exist in our universe, which gravity isolates from the rest of the world due to the effect of the enormous concentration of matter, preventing even light from coming out, although they continue to exert their force of attraction on the outside and swallow matter.
To sum up, these seeds of density were perfectly measured out so that over the next 3 or 4 billion years, the gases of the only two existing elements agglomerated in enormous clouds. The wonderful thing is that their image reaches us from the ends of the universe having travelled for the relative 10, 12 billion years at the speed of light. Obviously, the image of what happened next comes to us from shorter distances.
Continuing its action, gravity coagulates these immense clouds into droplets, which, due to the effect of the compression of gravity itself, heat up incredibly and stars are created. The speed of condensation varies and the effects range from clouds that are completely transformed and form elliptical galaxies that account for about 3 out of 10, to spiral galaxies in which only the central part is already transformed into stars and these account for 6 out of 10, to the irregular galaxies that are the smallest.
During the frenetic movement caused by gravity, the galaxies often collide with each other, and if the galaxies involved are spiral ones, the gaseous cloud is immediately ejected into space while the solid part is transformed in a very short time into an elliptical galaxy. These galaxies in their turn become increasingly powerful and attract and incorporate other galaxies that happen to pass close by.
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| Fig. 6-7 Galaxi formation by cgas clouds condensation | |
The first stars – The first stars are therefore these gaseous masses formed 3 parts of helium and 1 part of hydrogen which due to the effect of gravity become increasingly compressed. The enormous increase in density, 160 times that of water, frees the electrons from the orbits of the atoms and the protons of the hydrogen are forced to come so close that they can unite 4 by 4 to form helium. Two protons in fact lose their positive charge, issuing two positrons and two neutrinos. The neutrinos disappear of their own accord, while the electrons and positrons around find themselves in the situation of the third phase in which the large concentration of energy enables a continuous passage from particles to radiation. This nuclear reaction produces an atom of helium of a slightly lesser mass than that of the four protons of hydrogen. This mass is transformed into energy that lights the stars |
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| Fig. 6- 8 Gaseus explosions |
Up until this point nothing new has happened: helium already existed, but after a while the supply of protons of hydrogen runs out, the irradiating energy of the reactions no longer counters the force of gravity and the star begins once again to compress itself until the compression is such that 3 nuclei of helium come close enough together that they join in an atom of carbon. (We must remember that the strong nuclear force only acts at a very short distance). For this reaction too, the final mass is smaller, the difference is transformed into energy and the resulting irradiation counters the implosion (the opposite of explosion) until the new fuel is consumed. This little game continues until atomic weight iron (between protons and neutrons 56), then it stops because for the subsequent elements the final mass is greater and must be supplied like energy. We will see how.
In reality, the different reactions are in part simultaneous, as they move further away from the centre, layers of increasingly light elements are formed that structure the star like an onion. Towards the end of its life, the heart of the star consists of iron, cobalt and nickel, resulting from the combustion of silicon. (These reactions are known as nuclear combustion because they free energy). Further away, the carbon burns into silicon, phosphorous and sulphur, and even further out, the helium turns into carbon, oxygen and neon. Still further on the outside, the hydrogen turns into helium. About 60% of the star takes part at this party, while the remaining 40% even further out, is primordial hydrogen that is too cold to change and therefore remains as it is.
But, let’s go back to the centre: when the last fuel has been used, there is only iron left, which, as we have seen, no longer creates heavier elements with a smaller final mass than that of the initial compounds. The energy runs out and the star compresses itself and dies.
White dwarves – The majority die in this way, when their mass does not exceed 1,4 the mass of our sun. To tell the truth, when it starts to burn at the beginning, the dwarf is red, then gradually it becomes white as it reaches the iron and then slowly it turns black. During the process, the star loses the layers of the external elements which, lit up by the white dwarf take on the appearance of a yellow and red nebula. This gradually disperses its precious elements of new creation into space. As for the white dwarf, as has already been said, it extinguishes itself and becomes a black dwarf that drifts like an astral corpse in space. Perhaps one day it will meet something, either a star or a black hole, that will eat it up.
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We have not explained that the reason why this quantity of mass lower than 1,4 that of the sun stops the implosion is not the electromagnetic repulsion of the electrons but a property of Nuclear Physics discovered by Pauli called the principle of exclusion by which the electrons, even though they are compressed, they cannot penetrate each other. |
| Fig. 6-10 White dwarve death | |
| Supernova – When the mass exceeds 1,4 the mass of our sun, the electrons can no longer counter the implosion and the star compresses even more, the protons lose their electrons and they actually become neutrons losing in their turn a positron and a neutrino which, as usual, runs away, an unwelcome and invisible guest of the universe. The packed together neutrons cannot in their turn compress and furthermore, they no longer have the habit of dying in 15 minutes as they do in their free state. The counterstroke due to the stoppage of the implosion causes an explosion of energy that projects the external layers into space at very great speeds. A supernova has been created. This is the end of one out of a thousand stars. It happens about once every century. A supernova was seen in 1572 by a certain Tyco Brahe in the constellation of Cassiopea. In 1987 there was another in a dwarf galaxy, a satellite of the milky way, located at a distance of 150,000 light years. |  |
| Fig. 6-11 Life cycle of a star |
The Black Hole - When the mass is superior to 5 times the mass of the sun, the principle of exclusion does not hold: Gravity compresses the matter in such way that resulting strength doesn't allow even the energy to escape. In this case also a supernova is had, whose external layers are projected in the space, and the dead body won't remain anymore visible, if not through the last pangs of X rays passing in the proximities that the black hole attract and inglobe.
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| Fig. 6-13 Black hole rappresentation |
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Just to make you understand how much the world is different from common knowledge, think that the gravity of the black holes also slowes the time. Scientist think that a black hole exists in the constellation of the Swan. In our Galaxy the black holes are in very smaller number than dwarf whites and the pulsars. Among the stars in fact, those so great they are rare. |
| Fig. 6-12 Pulsar | |
However there are reasons to suppose that these were very more frequent in the I begin: Át. that time the resultant black holes from their death were attracted toghether one after the other, up to become an immense black hole with the mass of million of reunited Suns! With their enormous strength of attraction they eat even then the galaxies. Galaxies that before disappearing illuminate a region of a few months light sending forth as much energy as 100000 million reunited Suns! This where the Quasars They are the quasars that we distinguish to the borders of the observable universe in the relatively dark zones. They emanate because of their enormous distance red light. They are the times of the beginning of the universe that we see only now. The light that we see is red because the quasars are so distant that the speed owing to expantion betwenn them and us is so big that changes its frequency for Doppler effect. That same effect that in sound makes for example more and more acute the siren or the hiss of an upcoming airplane and vice versa lower that sent forth by the same object that gets further. |
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| Fig. 6-14 A powerfull antenna composed with mani telescopes |
The subsequent generations of stars – The expansion of the world continues with the passing of billions of years at a speed that decreases proportionally to time to the power of two thirds (square of the cube root) because gravity is at work to slow down the quantity of initial movement of the Big Bang. Amongst other things, a big question mark hangs over whether it will continue to expand or whether the mass is such that at a certain point, the inverse movement will start.
Scientists worry about measuring this mass, but the one that for the time being is known amounts to so little, that it does not even justify any phenomena of current movement.
| As the billions of years pass, all these elements thrown into space will join up again in new stars and the cycles follow on from each other. The new short-lived massive stars live with the lighter ones that do not die so easily and shine for some time. In this way, the universe continues to accumulate elements. The galaxies currently contain 2%, the rest is hydrogen and helium, both primordial and not. |  |
| Fig. 6-15 Stellar burning shells | |
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| Fig. 6-16 Star bith |
The Sun – Time passes and the cosmological clock says 10,4 billion years. We place our attention on one of the hundreds of billions of galaxies that populate the cosmos, known as the Milky Way. At about two thirds from the centre, a cloud of stellar matter accelerates its concentration, perhaps aided by the explosion of a supernova in the vicinity. By a few tens of degrees, here then, after a few million years, by the effect of compression due to gravity, the temperature reaches 10 million degrees and the usual nuclear reactions take place. The sun, star of the third generation is born.
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The planets – At the time of the contraction, an infinity of granules of dust escape from the cloud and organize themselves, due to the effect of gravity, into rings such as those around Saturn. In the heart of these rings, certain larger corpuscles begin to capture others. They get larger and grow out of all proportion: first a gram, then a kilo, then a ton, thousands of tons. Soon, almost all the matter is concentrated in nine solid bodies, surrounded in their turn by other bodies, the moons. Other smaller bodies, asteroids and meteorites, drift in their orbits around the sun, satellites and planets and every so often they crash into them as demonstrated by the craters on the moon and on Mercury.
Four snapshots show dust disks around embryonic stars in the Orion Nebula being "blowtorched" by a blistering flood of ultraviolet radiation from the region's brightest star. Within these disks are the seeds of planets. The doomed systems look like hapless comets, with wayward tails of gas boiling off the withering, pancake-shaped disks. The Frisbee-shaped disks, called protoplanetary disks, are wider than our solar system and reside in the centers of the cocoons of gas. These cocoons were formed from material evaporating off the surface of the disks. Evidence from Hubble suggests that dust grains in the disk are already forming larger particles. But these particles may not have time to grow into full-fledged planets because of the relentless "hurricane" of radiation from the nebula's hottest star, called Theta 1 Orionis C.
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| Fig. 6-17 Birth of a Planet from the accretion of cosmic dust around a star |
In the picture at top left, the disk is the green-colored
oval near the center. Radiation from the hot star is heating up the disk,
causing matter to dissipate, like steam evaporating from the surface of boiling water. A strong "stellar
wind," a stream of particles moving at 4,500
to 8,900 miles per hour (7,200 to 14,400 kilometers per hour), is
propelling the material away from the disk. The material is glowing because
it is being energized by radiation from the hot star. Credits: NASA, J. Bally
(University of Colorado, Boulder, CO), H. Throop (Southwest
Research Institute, Boulder, CO), C.R. O'Dell
(Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN)
Life story
The palaeontological study of fossils found has enabled a history of the earth and its inhabitants to be traced, the more recent history (see Man) being more detailed and precise. The explanation of the causes of this history is complicated, it requires an effort on the part of various scientific disciplines and is still far from being fully explained. However, this in no way detracts from the fact that clear traces remain in the fossils of the mechanisms of this evolution which are gradually being revealed. An evolution has clearly taken place, from a ball of molten elements to the undersigned author, and it has obviously occurred by means of a growing complexity and as the result of the emerging properties of matter.
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| Fig. 6-18 Earth section |
The fact that many things are still not entirely clear, does not authorise us each time to invoke a supernatural intervention. This applies for example both to those with a fixation for an almost literal interpretation of the Bible, who invoke this intervention during the Cambrian period in which the fossils show various animal forms in a short space of time, as well as to the Catholic theologians who invoke divine intervention in the humanisation of a primate.
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The birth of Life – This is one of those unclear chapters, but nonetheless, it is quite improbable that the Creator, short of results and the initial spark having gone out, should have taken direct action! Therefore, for the moment, we have to content ourselves with that which the many experts have been able to discover and think on this subject. Life appeared in the period between 4.1 billion years ago when the earth solidified and 3.5 billion years ago when the planet had already evolved sufficiently to produce the first fossil stratifications of clear bacterial origin that have been found: the stomatolites. |
| Fig. 6-19 Evolution time table | |
According to what is now the most widely accepted hypothesis, the first organisms were the product of a chemical evolution that occurred in 4 stages: Abiotic synthesis (non living) of small organic molecules or monomers such as amino acids and nucleotides. Mention has already been made of this phenomenon on previous pages. |
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| Fig. 6-20 Stomatolite with bacteryum inside | |
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The conditions of the primordial atmosphere have been recreated in the laboratory and it has been possible to create the 20 most common amino acids in living organisms, as well as numerous molecules of carbohydrates, lipids and even the purinic and pyrimidinic bases present in the nucleotides of DNA and RNA. By adding phosphate to these mixtures, and with all those volcanoes phosphorous certainly was not in short supply, even ATP has been chemically produced.
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| Fig. 6-23 Cellular division fossil | |
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Individual fossil specimens from the Bitter Springs Formation of Australia (Schopf) arranged in a sequence that suggests cell division The fact that these cells contain a small, darker mass inside the body of the cell, suggests that these may be remains of an early eukaryote |
| Fig. 6-21 Bacteryum inside above stomatolite. | |
Syntesis of abiotic organic molecules was obtained with this apparatus heating different gases of preistoric atmosphear toghether with electric discharges. Abiotic synthesis of polymers. Organic polymers, such as proteins for example, are synthesized by the condensation of elementary units, in this specific case amino acids, with a distancing of hydroxyl groups (OH) and of hydrogen with the formation of water. These polymerisations are created in the laboratory when diluted solutions of organic monomers are poured on to sand, clay or very hot rocks. The water evaporates concentrating the monomers. |
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| Fig. 6-22 Organic molecules syntesis | |
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Protenoids have been obtained, in other words polypeptides obtained by abiotic means. It can be assumed that rain and sprays poured these molecules on to hot lava, even the cold clay could have achieved the result as monomers of various types may bind to its electrically charged sites, its reticulum may have encouraged the arrangement of the monomers and traces of metals may have acted as catalysts. Even pyrite, a mineral consisting of iron and sulphur, may have played the same role. |
| Fig. 6-24 I Brotobionts obtained in laboratory | Aggregation of the previous molecules in small droplets known as Protobionts: when they join cold water, the protonoids gather together in small droplets with various characteristics: they can be covered in a membrane that is permeable when necessary, making it swell up or dehydrate according to the saline concentration of the liquid in which they are immersed. Some even possess electrical charges at the opposite poles. Others, formed with liposomes, can have double layer membranes similar to cellular ones. |
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A third particular type of protobiont, Coacervate, has been obtained mixing a solution of polypeptides, nucleic acids and polysaccharides. Colloidal droplets are obtained which, in the presence of enzymes, act as chemical factories, absorbing the substrates from the environment and releasing the catalysed products from the enzymes. As we saw previously, enzymes are specific proteins that did not exist at that time, but other simpler molecules could already have possessed a weak catalytic effect. Therefore, protobionts could have existed capable of modifying the substances absorbed by something similar to a rudimentary metabolism. The origin of inheritability may already have been under way before the advent of the droplets; DNA and RNA are formed of 5 nucleotides that could have synthesized and then polymerised in short sequences with the above mechanisms.In particular, RNA formed of a single filament, may have been the base of the transmission of genetic information. If, in the laboratory, a short filament of RNA is added to a mixture of monomers in a test tube, it reproduces until it is the length of 10 nucleotides and, by adding zinc, we reach 40 with an error rate of 1%. |
| Fig. 6-25 a DNA possible initial formation | |
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The filaments tend to become entangled in specific arrangements as an effect of the weak electrical charges and their links to hydrogen. This may have started off an evolution based on the best overall capacity to replicate. Once absorbed in the membranes of the protobionts, they became the only beneficiaries of improved capacity. |
| Fig. 6-25 I Possible DNA beginning |
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| Fig. 6-26 I Organic molecules in meteorites |
The laboratory simulations cannot as yet establish whether life was created on earth by the types of chemical evolution illustrated, but they certainly point the way to some possibilities.
Some people hypothesize that life arrived on the back of meteorites, but they do no more than shift the problem. Another field of research is looking into where life was formed on earth, and on the contrary to what is written, they suggest very hot thermal and gaseous sources near oceanic volcanoes. In other words, the debate is very heated. The passage from an aggregate of molecules that reproduce and which we call protobionts and that of the simplest prokaryotic cell is immense and must be achieved by many small evolutionary steps. This was the step of the creation of life from the play of the emerging properties of matter. It was a step of the long sequence that was no less wonderful and, despite our science still to a great extent mysterious, of the phenomena that followed the BIG BANG that made it all possible.
What we do know is that the prokaryotes, the first single cell organisms still in existence today, had already affirmed themselves at least 3.5 billion years ago.
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| Fig. 6-27 I Primitiv Procariota |
Three and a half billion years ago – Life is considered such when the organism is capable of metabolism and reproduction. At the beginning for one and a half billion years, the organisms had a rather wretched life and only in the sea. At the start they were Chemo-autotrophic bacteria.
The nourishment from which they got their energy was of a chemical type, for example the metals dissolved in the sea such as iron and sulphur which, with the supply of oxygen could be oxydized in their compounds such as Fe203 or H2S with the release of energy, in the case of iron for example, 135.6 (KJ) kilojoules. The name “Autotroph” means that the bacteria construct all their organic matter themselves, while the Heteroautotrophs need organic matter in a ready state.
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At the beginning we saw that these existed in an abiotic way as a result of chemical synthesis. It has even been hypothesized that ATP also existed, the molecule at the basis of all organic syntheses, see chapter 5, and therefore, that Chemo-heteroautotrophic bacteria also existed. In chapter 5 we ignored the bacteria that are the simplest unicellular organisms and the cell of which is the forefather of the cells of multicellular organisms. The substantial differences are the absence of a nucleus that encloses the DNA and stronger walls. The life of these first bacteria was difficult because metals, abiotic organic matter and oxygen were scarce and, in actual fact were becoming scarcer. |
| Fig. 6-25 Evolution of living cell | |
| Two and a half billion years ago the most important change of all for life since its birth was the appearance of Photoautotrophic bacteria. By incorporating magnesium in a molecule that became chlorophyll, these bacteria were able not only to extract energy from the light, but also to store it in glucose and to produce oxygen according to the formula already given: |  |
| Fig. 6-28 Chemioatrofic bacteria | |
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| Fig. 6-30 I A siyntetic molecule capable of autoreplication | |
| 6CO2 + 6H20 + solar energy = C6H12O6 + 6O2 + 2872 KJ | |
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| Fig. 6-29 Different types of bacteria |
There was an abundance of matter and energy in the surface layers of the sea.
As previously mentioned, the atmosphere was formed above all of methane (CH4), water (H2O) and nitrogen (N) and traces of other gases. The energy of ultraviolet rays was not yet stopped by the ozone layer (O3) and that of the strokes of lightening from the very powerful thunderstorms of that time, the density of the atmosphere being 100 times greater than that of present, broke up the water and the methane freeing hydrogen and carbon dioxide. The lighter hydrogen rose upwards and was gradually lost in space where, what is more, it got on well being the first element of the world. The carbon dioxide CO2 melted easily in the sea and combined with the calcium forming calcium bicarbonate (CACO3) which is also highly soluble in water.
The first photoautotroph organisms must have been very similar to the green and blue seaweeds found in the reefs of our times (Cyanobacteria and blue-green algae): by extracting the carbon dioxide from the calcium bicarbonate, they left the calcium which fell to the bottom of the sea, accumulating enormous sediments of biogenic calcium (of biological origin) which then joined together with the carbon dioxide produced by fermentation to form new carbonate at the disposal of the cycle.
The abundance of materials led to great activity even for the heteroautroph organisms that fed on the fermentation, once again breaking up the glucose in water and carbon dioxide, but this activity must have been on a smaller scale because the oxygen given off was a powerful poison for these organisms.
The balance was therefore greatly in favour of the production of oxygen and biomass. While the latter accumulated, the oxygen spread through the surface of the sea, slowly even in the deepest layers, but especially in the atmosphere from where it soon passed into the earth’s crust
This gas with the dual valence (it has two electrons missing from the external layer that can amount to 8, and they are missing because it has 8 protons in the nucleus and the first layer can only have 2 electrons) (a little revision does no harm!) has the chemical property of combining itself with great ease with all the other elements but especially with metals. Iron rusts but also other metals like manganese, copper, magnesium and silicon combine with oxygen without having to find themselves, to any particular measure, in an energetically stimulated state.
Gradually all the earth’s crust became rusty and oxydised, the silicon and the aluminium became clays or quartzes (SIO2). From a further reaction with carbon dioxide and water which “extinguishes the lime”, calcium carbonate was formed from the oxydised calcium. The speed of these phenomena depended on the production of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere as a result of the breaking up of methane, but little by little nearly all the earth’s crust was oxydised and the oxygen also started to accumulate in the atmosphere where in certain eras it amounted to 30% compared to the current 21%. The molecular oxygen of the atmopshere (O2) then combined further with the free oxygen in the higher layers of the atmosphere and with the supply of energy from the strongest rays to form ozone (O3). Ozone has the ability to absorb the harmful ultraviolet rays and to transform them into harmless radiations. In this way, 10 km. from the earth a layer of ozone was formed which acts as a shield for living creatures.
Before only those organisms living in the sea were protected and so life prospered only in the sea and continued to evolve only in the sea up to half a billion years ago, giving origin to the multicellular vegetable and animal organisms. Isn’t it amazing that all the rocks, mountains, earth that we see were drastically modified by life?
700 million years ago in the Precambrian period we find the first animals: Agnate Placoderms, do not ask me what they are because I could not give a toss, the first fish with jaw arch, a multitude of brachiopods. Obviously, with the first animals the consumption of organic matter began by means of what is generally called respiration, and in other words the reverse reaction of the photosynthesis in which the supply of oxygen, the glucose, is separated into carbon dioxide and water with the release of all 2872 KJ. It was the very difficulty of finding a system of storing and using this powerful energy slowly that delayed the appearance of these organisms. Large amounts of oxygen and biomass had been around for some time, but its oxydisation was a combustion and as such a reaction that was too powerful to be exploited without burning. Nature took its time to draw out ATP: the fuel of all the biological reactions of synthesis and movement.
The current diagram of evolution is enclosed and it is a beautifual temporal geological table, I cannot say for your “edification” because as previously mentioned, in the United States the Creationists insist on inculcating that all the species were born in the Cambrian period by the hand of God and we will see later why they have stuck to the Cambrian period. Then Cola raved poor thing with his followers actually insisting that the earth was created by God personally only 6000 years ago in such a way to make it seem what it is: older and the result of an inorganic and organic evolution, in order to put man’s faith to the test.
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| Fig. 6-31 I Geological Era time table |
425 million years ago: At the time life had existed in the sea and in the ponds and lakes for 3 billion years, the earth’s crust was partly immersed and partly oxydised, but completely lifeless. With the formation of the protective layer of ozone, the conditions were created for the arrival on earth of plants. Simple seaweeds pushed and left on the dry by the play of the elements, they managed to adapt themselves and to develop new characteristics to be able to progress better: Stalks, leaves, roots, but the key was always photosynthesis with its consumption of carbon dioxide, now directly from the atmosphere, and its accumulation of oxygen and organic matter, the necessary metals were then absorbed directly from the ground. Here, too, the bacteria of fermentation come into play, but at the beginning the balance was in favour of the vegetable organisms and enormous quantities of biomass accumulated forming what have now become coal beds and oil fields. Even the plants continued to evolve and the usual schematization of their passage is enclosed
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| Fig. 6-32 Filogenic tree |
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Between 380 and 360 million years ago: the animals conquered the earth. They came from two very different groups of adaptation: the arthropods and the vertebrates. The first forms which were able to adapt were the less developed and the characteristics needed for their evolution were latent in them. I will not tell you the story of the difficulties encountered by the Boide peripatus, a worm whose descendents still live on earth. As for the vertebrates, the first to venture onto the earth were the fish and in all probability amongst the first was the direct ancestor of the Latimeria Chalumnae of the order of the Crossopterygians that we do not find in restaurants but which appears to exist still at a depth of 100 metres along the coast of the Comorres. The level of the sea was getting lower and on the earth there were many good peripatos to eat and so it was worthwhile making an effort and dragging themselves along on their fins.
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220 million years ago: In the Triassic period the mammals appeared which evolved from an ancestral group of reptiles known to few as therapsids. The therapsids disappeared during the reign of the dinosaurs, at last we have arrived, but the first mammals lived quietly side by side with them. Probably, due to the smallness of their orbits they were nocturnal animals that fed on insects. |
| Fig. 6-32 Plants Filogenesis | |
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| Fig. 6-34 I Reptilians | |
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| Fig. 6-35 Mammals philogenesis |
The causes of evolution
Evolution presents itself for our consideration not only for the history of the origin of currently living forms, but also for the history of the cosmos. We can leave the scientists of this particular branch to judge the plausibility of the Big Bang theory, but as far as the probable truthfulness of the history of the cosmos over the last 14 or more billion years is concerned, we can trust the astronomers who are now able to look at the world during the different stages of its existence. Due to the time taken by the light to reach us, these stages are enclosed in spheres of visibility that gradually increase in age: from 8 minutes for the phenomena of the sun to 15 billion (years) for the Quasar. And if we are at the centre of the spheres, our story too has passed through these stages. The History of the Cosmos tells us that the phases follow on from each other without a solution of continuity and are made possible and inescapable by the previous situation. I said inescapable because the scientists have been able to demonstrate that even a small change of the constants at the basis of the laws that have so far been discovered would not have made the current situation possible. Therefore, there is a design, a predetermination of the line of ascent towards complexity, but it is also clearly evident that this ascent is subject to chance in the sense of a reciprocal interaction of the infinite situations that are created. And it is right here that, to my mind, the freedom of the world begins to show itself even if on an unconscious level. It also seems equally clear to me that this is the introduction as to why freedom can then permeate even the self-conscious complexity that gradually emerges from it.
In fact, as far as the evolution of complexity is concerned, including self-consciousness, the same concepts are naturally at work except that as the complexity increases so does the difficulty of understanding the different passages. However, at least the history of these can be discerned with considerable certainty, even if in broad outline, from the study of traces of fossils and chemicals and their mark left on current biological organisms.
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| Fig. 6-36 I Example of evolution |
The great theory which for life takes the place of the Big Bang is that of Darwinian origin concerning the adaptation of the fittest organisms to the changes in environmental conditions and the disappearance of others.
Let us say of Darwinian origin because, although there have been many developments and confirmations, it has not changed in substance even if many things have yet to be explained. At the basis of everything there is the hereditary information of DNA that provides the organism with the comands for its development right from the first division of the mother cell into two. DNA presides over the whole development by the expression in time and space of the characteristics of the cells of the organisms. This activity is performed by every cell and concerns even its subsequent divisions that contain the totality of the information in this fantastic chain that uses only 4 “letters” and reference to which is made in chapter 5.
On one side, DNA already contains homologous genes originating from the parents that can be expressed or recessive, and on the other side many other variations may occur for various reasons such as, for example, very strong radiations or chance deviations in the processes of expression or repetition. In a population the diversity of the genes that do the same work is quite high, but due to their natural mixing no particular variations of the Phenotype are noted.
One of the mechanisms involved could be the pre-adaptation by which pre-existing anatomical structures make themselves available for functions other than the ancestral ones. Another mechanism is that of the allometric development by which differences in the succession and in the duration in time of the development lead to considerable differences in the result. That which for the time being seems impossible to demonstrate despite efforts made is the influence of the adaptation of the organism on children. For example, children of bodybuilders will not look like their parents unless they get down to work and the child of a Chinese parent will only speak Chinese if he or she is taught to do so.
On the other hand, the probability is also calculated that a certain characteristic such as the eye for example emerges only as a game of the probabilities of mutation which can occur for any reason in the DNA during the course of the generations, from such large numbers that billions of billions of years are not enough. The “fictional” reality makes us presuppose that other more finalized mechanisms or better still those more influenced by existing conditions concur, like the history of the Cosmos, to direct evolution towards greater complexity, the trend of which seems to be that of freeing itself more and more from these very conditions.
In the meantime, studies of evolution have shown different factors that have influenced it, which, at the end of the day, are no more than just variations in the environment due to the usual reciprocal interaction of the situations that are created.
This is why situations in which there was a shortage of oxygen kept the activity of chemo-autotrophic bacteria under control so they were not able to transform all the seas into a brownish mire before the heteroautotrophs could keep them at bay. This is also the reason why situations in which there was a shortage of food altered the species specializing their ability to use alternative sources of food. Even periods of abundance had considerable and various effects. Feathers for example originated as protuberances for the purpose of storing the surplus of proteins taken in abundance by their creatine. These feathers were initially useful for keeping in the warmth and then they took on another purpose, that of enabling longer jumps to be made. Even the flight of birds, an activity requiring a enormous amount of energy, was possible thanks to the abundance of insects to be eaten. The plants were able to grow taller by transforming the excess glucose in cellulose to act as a skeletal system. And so on, the number of examples connected with contingencies are countless.
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| Fig. 6-37 I Allometric growth |
Allometric growth – The difference in the rate of growth of some parts of the body compared to the rate of growth of other areas determine the proportions of the organism. (a) During the development of a human being, the limbs grow quicker than the head and the trunk, as is shown by this diagram that represents forms of women that are not drawn to scale (at the same height). (b) The skull of a human foetus and that of a chimpanzee are very similar in shape; the allometric growth of the bones tends to transform the rounded skull of the new-born monkey into the longer one typical of the adult animal. The same picture of allometry reappears during human development, but in this case the process is gentler, so that in our species, the skull of the adult is not so different from the rounded shape common to the embryonal skulls of many primates.
The feathers fit would for example have been born as bulges to stack the surplus of proteins assumed in abundance, in their creatina. Feathers that initially where suitable for warm preservation and that subsequently where used to prolong jumps. The same following flight of the birds highly energeticaly expensive has been permitted by abundance of bugs to eat. The plants where able to increase in size transforming the excess of glucose into cellulose to serve as skeleton. And so on, the examples be connected with some contingencies connections are innumerable.
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| Fig. 6-38 Birds evolution |
Even the catastrophes had an enormous influence on evolution. In the history of evolution at least five great mass extinctions have taken place. The first was that of the flora and the fauna of Ediacara that were already present with their fossils 700 million years ago. They are very strange organisms if compared with subequent ones, of which no trace remains and which were succeeded by the birth of the first animals. 250 million years ago, the continents that had emerged joined into only one continent called Pangea, and at the same time it has been noted that 90% of the life in the sea became extinct. 65 million years ago the dinosaurs became extinct.
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| Fig. 6-39 Crater of a meteorite |
At that time Pangea split up again due to powerful volcanic activity that obscured the sun for a long time, cooling the atmosphere and leading to the extinction of many marine and terrestrial animals. Recent studies have also correlated these drastic changes with the fall of large meteorites, the proof being the presence of iridium in the relevant fossil layers. Recently a series of periods have been shown with a strong “greenhouse effect” presumably linked to the increase in carbon dioxide of volcanic origin. The proof is in the relevant fossil vegetation which only in those periods shows a reduction in the stomia, those openings through which plants absorb the carbon dioxide. This proof coincides with the extinction of species 65,248,206 million years ago.
In fact, from the type of leaf that developed in this period, a leaf that was more suitable for dissipating heat, it can be deduced that it was not the cold but the excessive heat due to a greenhouse effect that caused the mass extinction in the cases mentioned. An amendment comes from a very recent article in the science section of “The Economist”. Together with the plants, the animals that fed on them would also have become extinct and evolution would have put on another spurt and taken another turn.
Even the catastrophes had an enormous influence on evolution. In the history of evolution at least five great mass extinctions have taken place. The first was that of the flora and the fauna of Ediacara that were already present with their fossils 700 million years ago. They are very strange organisms if compared with subequent ones, of which no trace remains and which were succeeded by the birth of the first animals. 250 million years ago, the continents that had emerged joined into only one continent called Pangea, and at the same time it has been noted that 90% of the life in the sea became extinct. 65 million years ago the dinosaurs became extinct.
At that time Pangea split up again due to powerful volcanic activity that obscured the sun for a long time, cooling the atmosphere and leading to the extinction of many marine and terrestrial animals. Recent studies have also correlated these drastic changes with the fall of large meteorites, the proof being the presence of iridium in the relevant fossil layers. Recently a series of periods have been shown with a strong “greenhouse effect” presumably linked to the increase in carbon dioxide of volcanic origin. The proof is in the relevant fossil vegetation which only in those periods shows a reduction in the stomia, those openings through which plants absorb the carbon dioxide. This proof coincides with the extinction of species 65,248,206 million years ago. In fact, from the type of leaf that developed in this period, a leaf that was more suitable for dissipating heat, it can be deduced that it was not the cold but the excessive heat due to a greenhouse effect that caused the mass extinction in the cases mentioned. An amendment comes from a very recent article in the science section of “The Economist”. Together with the plants, the animals that fed on them would also have become extinct and evolution would have put on another spurt and taken another turn.
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| Fig. 6-40 Dynosauurus extintion |
Causes and explanations of evolution apart, the proof of the correctness of its history are different. First of all phylogenesis. The genealogies that represent the evolutionary passages are represented in genealogical trees created and based in a hypothetical way on affinities. The various aspects and differences found in the current forms of life actually reflect episodes of speciation and macro-evolution that took place in the past. Genealogical trees are put together by searching for the greatest number of homologies between one step and the next and, in other words, the similarity between different structures.
This framework that began many years ago has been confirmed and made more precise by recent techniques. These techniques are based on the comparison of macromolecules such as proteins and DNA.
As the primary structure of proteins is genetically determined, the close correlation in the amino acid sequence of two proteins belonging to different species suggests that the corresponding genes diversified from a common point of departure present in the progenitor. The degree of similarity in the amino acid sequence is therefore an indicator of the degree of phylogenetic similarity. For example, the amino acid chain of the cytochrome, a protein common to all aerobe organisms, has shown the perfect correspondence of all the chain of 104 amino acids between man and the chimpanzee, it differs by one compared to the macaque, by 13 compared to the dog, by 20 compared to the rattlesnake and by 31 compared to the tuna fish!
Results are already achieved just with DNA even if, due to the enormous basic sequence, the work is harder. The techniques for a more rapid recognition of the DNA sequence are improving very fast and will provide further precise information concerning phylogenetic relations. Researchers have managed to isolate fractions of DNA on leaves that are 18 million years old.
To conclude, the history of the succession of the various species, the succession in time and the affinity with the progenitor have been widely documented and confirmed. It is hard to understand how anyone can have the nerve to deny the existence of mechanisms that caused it and call upon the direct intervention of the Creator for certain passages. These people must be in bad faith, stupid, desperate, not very well informed, arrogant, fearful or a little of all these things put together. And do not feel sorry for the Creationists or the American Protestants who shield them, just because you limit yourself to invoking Him for mankind.
The Man
Please refer to chapter 9 of Consience
Just as a reminder, taxonomically speaking, man belongs to:
Kingdom – Animal
Phylum – Vertebrates
Class – Mammals
Subclass – Placentals
Order – primates
Sub-order – Anthropoids
Family - Hominids
Genus – Homo
Species – Sapiens
Sub-species – Sapiens Sapiens
220 million years ago – During the Triassic period, the mammals evolved from the reptiles before the birds. The origin of this class should be sought amongst the mammals known by the name of Terapsids that disappeared during the reign of the Dinosaurs. Their descendents, contemporaries of the dinosaurs, were minute in size, they fed on insects and were nocturnal creatures.
65 million years ago – Dinosaurs became extinct: probably the increase in temperature and the percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere caused by volcanic eruptions and/or large meteorites led to a change in the flora which altered from being mainly Angiospermae that the dinosaurs fed on, to Gymnospermae. In this period, mammals continued to spread into the sub-classes of monotremes, those laying eggs, marsupials and placentals.
As far as the placentals are concerned, the phylogenetic relations between the orders are still confused but the experts agree in distinguishing four evolutionary lines that correspond to the following sub-classes:
A) Chiropters (bats) and Insectivores (shrews)
B) Herbivores of average size (rabbits, etc.), Perissodactyls (ungulates of various types such as horses, deer and rhinoceroses, etc.), Cetaceans (Whales, dolphins, etc.)
C) Carnivores (Felines, dogs, pinnipeds, etc.)
D) Rodents (Rats, squirrels, beavers, etc.),
E) Primates (platyrrhines, catarrhines, small monkeys – pongids, hylobates, - large monkeys – and Hominids.
The ancestral primates, at the time of the extinction of the dinosaurs, were arboreal placentals, whose teeth suggest that they derived from insectivores of the late Cretaceous period.
A fossil species known as Purgatorius unio, that was brought to light in Montana in layers on the limits between the Cretaceous and the Tertiary periods, is considered to be the oldest primate so far known.
Therefore, in the Mesozoic era about 65 million years ago, the order to which our species belonged had already taken good shape as far as its main characteristics were concerned: very mobile scapular joints that enabled the arms to swing hanging from branches, prehensile hands with considerable touch sensitivity, eyes that were close together in a front position to be able to appreciate better the depth of the field and the distances while moving swinging from the branches.
Even the parental care had a longer duration and was more attentive in order to teach the offspring how to move without falling, so much so that many species of primates give birth to one young at a time. As can be seen, even at this stage of evolution, we can appreciate that some adaptations had started that will be found again in mankind.
12 million years ago – Amongst the large monkeys there must have been a branching off of those species which began to adapt to life on the ground due to the progressive reduction in the extension of the forests. It is possible that one of these African anthropoids was the progenitor of our species.
5 million years ago – According to anthropological studies and research into the DNA of humans and chimpanzees, most anthropologists have come to the conclusion that hominids must have started their diverging evolution from the large monkeys in a period no less than 5 million years ago.
4 million years ago – The Australopithecus afarensis which could be the precursor of subsequent sub-species makes its appearance amongst the oldest African archaeological finds.
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3.5 million years ago – A female representative of the Affarensis, Lucy, is found in the region of Afar. She was a female of small stature, about one metre tall with a little head. The name given to her was taken from a song that was popular amongst the researchers at the time. Some anthropologists claim that Lucy is still on the genealogical line that would lead to the genus Homo, others think that our sub-species had already started to diverge beforehand. In any case, these finds demonstrate that the upright position had already been reached at this stage. The advantages of walking on two-feet were faster movement and above all, the ability to see farther ahead in the savanna. The free hands could be used to carry prey, to collect food and to care for offspring. Even the teeth had adapted to an omnivorous diet, but the brain remained the size of that of the anthropomorphic monkeys. These Australopithecus forms lived in various places in Africa and perhaps in Asia up to 1 million years ago. |
| Fig. 6-41 I Filogenesis of the Primates |
2 million years ago – The Homo habilis makes his appearance. Craniums have been discovered amongst the findings of this period with an encephalic capacity of 650 cc., compared with the 500 cc. of previous species. At the same time, the first stone instruments appeared (skilfully chipped stones) and it is for this that Homo habilis is believed by many authors to represent humanity. He lived until 1.5 million years ago. The items used show that communication was already possible between the hands and the brain. The implements made of stone have characteristics and are of various types implying a deliberateness, they required a project that needed a series of gestures to be completed. This can be interpreted as a form of reflexive and, therefore, human psychism.
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| Fig. 6-42 I Ominides skulls |
1.6 million years ago – Homo sapiens erectus makes his appearance. He lived during the lower middle Pleistocene period between 1.6 million and 300,000 / 130,000 years ago. Spread throughout the whole ancient continent, he appears much more evolved, even in the culture that he set up. He is, however, substantially connected in phyletic terms to the Homo habilis with which he lived for a certain period of time. The cranium now has a capacity of 800 to 1225 cc., the latter being similar to the brain of today. His forehead is receding, the face wide, heavy, prognathic and without a chin. Remains of the Homo erectus have been found everywhere: all over Africa, Asia (Java, Dijetis, Trinil, Ngandong, etc.). The Sinantrope was found in China which seems more evolved than the Pithecanthrope above. Other remains have been found in India (Narmada), while there are numerous findings in Europe (Croatia, Germany, France, Hungary, Spain and even a few in Italy).
It can be gleaned from these stone implements that the economy of these first men was probably based on a mixture of hunting and gathering products of nature. Even large animals were hunted because their bones have been found in the settlements and this leads us to suppose that these men lived in groups and had appropriate social structures. It is believed that the way they transported the food and shared it within the family group characterized their social organization and in this way a certain collaboration developed (the start of the concept of love for fellow-man extending from that of care for offspring), an essential condition for survival. The groups probably had the family clan as the base unit and they had to split up when the local resources were no longer sufficient for an increase in their number. This fragmentation and separation into new environments that were distant from each other led to a certain slowing down in cultural progress. The new great engine in human evolution.
Homo erectus built shelters and was able to start and use a fire.
300 thousand years ago – Archaean Homo Sapiens. The oldest forms that followed Homo erectus date back to this period and some experts include in these forms both the Neanderthals, whose appearance dates back to about 130,000 years ago as well as different forms found in Asia and Australia. Some remains are of men that lived up to 40,000 years ago. The Neanderthals are a sub-species with a much rougher appearance even than the Homo erectus, but they already had a developed psychism with a cranial capacity ranging from 1300 to 1650 cc., with an average that is not far from the 1450 cc. of current European populations.
Homo Sapiens Sapiens had already developed a language with which he handed down, with precision, the knowledge he had acquired.
40 thousand years ago – The modern form of Homo Sapiens Sapiens affirmed itself in all the continents. The primitive human groups were not tied in a stable way to a particular territory. The search for food and the change in climatic conditions, as for example the various glaciations, led to transfers from one place to another, and developed the ability to adapt and to experiment. In fact, starting from his first cradle in Africa, man spread throughout Africa, Europe and Asia.
The study of the origin of recent human forms is very interesting with its two alternative models: monocentric and polycentric, for which the illustrations should be referred to.
The biological aspect of the ancient Homo Sapiens is exactly the same as the current one, cranial capacity and DNA included.
The dominating force of evolution has by now become knowledge. Concepts of the hereafter, of life after death, of God and, at the heart of the matter, the idea of love for fellow-man come into being and are encompassed in all religions.
However, what transpires from all this history is that it is impossible to pinpoint a moment in which all of a sudden a self-consciousness manifested itself involving a supernatural intervention.
10 thousand years ago – The cultivation of cereals and vegetables began in the near east. This spread quickly to the Mediterranean and took a good 4,000 years to reach northern regions. The ceramics industry began 7,000 years ago.
It is thought that between 12,000 and 8,000 years ago the population increased from 5 to 85 million.
2,700 years ago – Stock-farming began in the same areas, first with sheep, then pigs and finally cattle.
2,000 years ago – The creator became Homo Sapiens Sapiens in an attenpt to help the intelligent self-consciousness in question to use freedom in an edifying (non-destructive) way. And he became man instead of intervening in a supernatural way in order not to damage the afore-said freedom.
With the benefit of “hindsight”, it is enlightening to examine why those times were chosen, as the Spirit of Truth takes all factors into consideration. Can you imagine the questions that would be asked if Jesus had chosen to come to earth now?
What are Quarks made of, what is the force of gravity, and in the other worlds when you visit them, how does the earth finish? What do you think of cloning and genetic engineering, what will we be like in a million years time and so on.
200 years ago – The industrial revolution started and with it technological progress and the human population have grown in an exponential way. Now the population exceeds 5 billion individuals.
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100 years from now – The main religions abandon once and for all the dogmas built around archaic conceptions of the reality of the world and on limited concepts of justice and love for fellow-man.
In fact faith cannot exist without reason from which it derives as an emerging characteristic of intelligence and access can be had to faith by combining reason and hope.
The church contests evolution: the most wonderful aspect of this world that brings out the phenomenon of the spirit and its manifestation in the intelligent individual and self-consciousness: the soul.
By assuming exclusive rights to a revealed truth, it is easier to impose the dogma of an invented world rather than try to understand the mysteries of this world and put them into perspective.
And now after all this trouble created by just one act of will, you want the Creator to go out of His way to insert a soul, right here and now, and just in your “hard head”?
But no…., you’re right, …. of course.
That’s just it, there’s the rub and the castle falls down around your ears.
Perhaps, you’re wrong though: everything is corollary created just for me.
Are you really sure my dear old chronocentric, geocentric, microcentric, egocentric boy?
Listen to the Spirit of Truth. Humility and obedience do not protect against mistakes, they can be blind and arrogant.
Why am I so livid? Why does the Church force me, in order not to lose hope, to be a prophet and a heretic, moreover with millions of others who think just like me?
Don't be crossed. Church it has all human excuses, but it is time to change
Franco 27 07 2002