Humans Evolved from Monkeys and the Origin of Species Was Pre-Planned (original) (raw)

Physical, Mental and Spiritual Highlights of Early Human Evolution

Excerpts about early human evolution from nine discourses of spiritual teacher and philosopher Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar are presented. For example: “The first human beings were born in the vast geographical area between the Java Islands and Palestine. The Australopithecus gradually transformed themselves into human form but this great transformation did not take place overnight, nor even in one century, but by slow degrees. Ethnologists, to be more precise, have conceived of an intermediate stage of beings – the Homo Erectus – who are neither Australopithecus nor exactly human beings in form and nature.” And: “Since the days of Australopithecine, a new kind of creature slowly evolved: the proto-ape or ape-man. At a certain stage in evolution, one of these creatures became an exception to the norm of the community, resulting in some evolving into chimpanzees, some into orangutans, some into gorillas, and some into human beings. All of these creatures are tailless.”. P. R. Sarkar’s descriptions are often at odds with current scientific understandings about human origins. The latter undergo changes as more fossil evidence is discovered and better dating techniques are developed. P. R. Sarkar (1921-1990) was the founder of Ananda Marga (“The Path of Bliss”), an international socio-spiritual movement.

Genesis: The emerging story of our human origins

Throughout history, the worldview at the heart of virtually every culture has been a religious worldview, at the heart of which in turn has been a creation story that explains how we came to be here and our place in the cosmic scheme of things. The story typically attributes divine intent to our creation and assures us that we have a significant role to play in the ongoing drama. Believing that our creation story is a true and accurate account also reinforces our sense of belonging and commitment to those who hold the same worldview, and usually confirms our prejudice that we – our particular tribe, nation, ethnic or religious group – are superior to, and more divinely favoured than, others. So the Biblical creation stories in the opening chapters of the Book of Genesis, thought to have originated in the 10th century BCE, introduce the core theme of the Judaeo-Christian narrative that for so long has shaped our Western worldview – namely, that we have been created by God in his image, have subsequently fall into sin with all its attendant consequences, and need to be restored again, by our faith and ethical behaviour, to a right relation with each other and our Maker. Since the Scientific Revolution of the 17th century, and particularly since the publication in 1859 of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, the Biblical narrative has been increasingly eclipsed by a quite different creation story that yields a very different understanding of who we are, where we have come from, and what if anything we may construe to be our raison d’être. Born of continuing archaeological, biological and anthropological study, this new creation story remains a work in progress, with many unanswered questions and a good deal of ongoing debate. There is widespread consensus, however, about its broad outline – and, however different it may be from what has for so long underpinned our Judaeo-Christian worldview, what remains consistently the same is our need throughout the whole of our history to have some creation story. This paper is a summary presentation of a small portion of this developing story, which in its entirety spans nearly 14 billion years since the universe is thought to have been born. It is a brief but reliable account of what we currently know about our human origins – from our emergence as a primate 2.5 million years ago until our last great exodus from Africa 60,000 years ago. It is offered with the hope that it may be useful to any who are disinclined to struggle through the many far more academically sophisticated works that tell this story in greater detail and that have informed this paper.1 It is presented in seven sections: • Our primate ancestors • The big brain experiment • Our extinct human predecessors • A “Garden of Eden” update • The world of early Homo sapiens • The Great Leap Forward • Epilogue

A brief history of human evolution: challenging Darwin's claim

International Journal of Anthropology and Ethnology, 2018

which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. Abstract There is a consensus among evolutionists today that man first appeared in Africa approximately four million years ago. Others counter this theory saying, "... when shall we speak of man as man"? The timeline they give is approximately one million years and to fully understand one million years is still a difficult task. However, another even better way to understand time and man is to study it in terms of generations. So, keeping in mind that primitive people married and had children early, twenty years will make an average generation. According to this there would be 50,000 generations in a million years. Keeping this in mind if we calculate generations we find that 250 generations back take us to the time when written history began. While, another 250 generations back would take us to the time (10,000 years ago), when cultivation began, and man started settled life. Now we are left with 49,500 generations of men, plus a time span of 990,000 years. Keeping these statistics in mind let us ask the question once more, when should we speak of man as man? Therefore, this paper attempts not only to understand the timeframe "when we can really call Man?-Man" in light of the so-called history of human evolution but also to understand that if the specie roaming the earth for a million years was truly man's ancestor, as is claimed by Charles Darwin. Then what took man's ancestor so long to show signs of development that we only witness in the last 12000 years. Moreover, while keeping man's progress under consideration of the last 12000 years, it will further shed light on why there are serious reservations about Charles Darwin theory of human evolution. As many scientists, evolutionists, archeologist and different religious scriptures strongly claim that man came to the earth fully developed and did not evolve from a lesser specie.

Evolution from a Genesis Perspective: Adam was an Ape

The God Rule, 2020

This paper discusses the Biblical (Genesis) and corresponding Pseudepigraphal books explanation of the emergence of man, which is very different from traditional Christian views. The story is not so dissimilar from current Evolutionary Theory.

Evolutionary Origins of Homo sapiens

Preface The following paper is extracted from a larger book project under the title, "Application Holy Wars or a New Reformation – A Fugue on the Theory of Knowledge", that is designed as a hypertext. Thus the book and this paper offer more than the linear development of a classical book or academic "paper". If printed, the paper version provides a normally sequenced narrative and argument supported by numbered endnotes and extensive bibliography. In its electronic form, the textual core of this document provides a cognitive road map to the World Wide Web's much greater knowledge. The text is intended to be read while connected to the Web, where every issue discussed in the core is electronically linked either by endnotes or bibliography references to current debates, additional source documents and multimedia illustration. To enter the worlds of knowledge I have tapped for my core arguments, follow and explore the links as you read the text. Superscripted no...

Human Origins: Continuous Evolution Versus Punctual Creation

Global Perspectives on Science and Spirituality, ed. P. Das, Templeton Press 2009, pp. 143–164.

One of the particular problems in the debate between science and theology regarding human origins seems to be an apparent controversy between the continuous character of evolutionary processes leading to the origin of Homo sapiens and the punctual understanding of the act of creation of man seen as taking place in a moment in time. The paper elaborates scientific arguments for continuity or discontinuity of evolution, and what follows, for the existence or nonexistence of a clear borderline between our species and the rest of the living world. It is argued that, due to the conventional character of the notion of species, anthropology is unable to point to a moment in time or a place on Earth when or where Homo sapiens came into existence as a ‘really new’ species. The argument of the non˗specificity of humans is reinforced by considering emotional homologies between man and apes, “cultural” transmission of the patterns of behaviour in animals, or their mental and communicational abilities. All this is in line with a more general philosophical view of ontological continuity of the world. However, the argument is counterbalanced by pointing to such human characteristics as the ability to use abstract notions, or those forms of human behaviour which do not seem to have their animal analogues. In turn, various possibilities of theological interpretations of the act of creation of man are pointed out and a question is considered as to what extent theology is interested in a "momentary" account of this act. By pointing to theological accounts proposed as early as the 2nd century, it is argued that a vision of God – the craftsman who ‘builds’ its creation step by step, or even less restrictive forms of divine interventionism, are theologically inadequate. The original opposition between the continuity of evolutionary processes and ‘punctual’ character of creation is thus weakened and, from that perspective, a solution to the controversy in question is sought. One of such solutions, an “evolutionary model of creation”, a form of evolutionary creationism, proposed by a Polish philosopher Kazimierz Kloskowski, is presented. This model is based on two assumptions, stemming from process philosophy and evolutionary epistemology. The need to apply them in constructing a coherent view on evolution and creation is critically considered in the paper.