How long has modern man been on this earth?

Give or take about 200,000 years.Seriously, where do you come up with this nonsense? Do you make it up yourself, or do you have a source?

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

Explain what you mean by written language. Do you mean hieroglyphics, cuneiform, idiograms, alphabets or simply pictures on a wall of a cave?
What do you consider modern man to be?

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There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969

Hi, Peg. In your mind, how long has written language been here?And, what do you do with the fossilized remains of creatures anatomically identical to modern humans that predate written language? Do you dispute that such fossils exist?Furthermore, why is written language the marker of choice?

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-BluejayDarwin loves you.

Oh i'm sorry, i must really be giving you guys the irrates!It is a well known fact that there is no 'written text' of any kind that is older then 5,000 years.when i say written text, i mean a written language.The only way that human migration can be traced before the advent of written language, is by the evidence of their existence which is dug out of the ground, ie bones, tools, artifacts etcthis puts the timeline of modern humans, ie humans with the ability to write, in line with the biblical account.(my source 'Origins - An atlas of human migration' published Sept 2007)

hey bluejay,it would appear by the archeological record that written language began 5,000 years ago. they have not to this day, unearthed anything older...so my view is that it is as old as the 5,000 odd years that they say it is. what sort of 'creatures anatomically identical' to modern humans do you mean??? Are you talking about Apes? Homo habilis? Homo erectus? Homo rhodensiensis? Neanderthal???i dont dispute that the fossils of any of these exist at all.The written language is the marker for the modern humans that we are today...with the intellect that we have.

Hi Peg,I think you're missing the implications of what you're saying. The original question from the opening post was this: This context of the question is the biological evolution of man, as Shekinah made clear when he touched on the topics of evolution and how it relates to the origin of life in his Message 10. Shekinah was asking how long ago Homo sapiens sapiens evolved into their present form.But instead of defining modern man in biological terms, you're defining him in intellectual terms as "humans with the abilty to write." That's an interesting reinterpretation of the question, but it isn't the topic of this thread, unless you're contending that the ability to write was a 5000 year-old evolutionary event.--Percy

Hi, Peg. I am aware that this is your standpoint.However, you have given no support for this, nor any sort of way by which would can objectively measure the intellect that you associate with written language. Do you believe that intellect suddenly spiked with the advent of written language, and that this spike marks the beginning of what you would call "modern man"? I didn't think this would be a difficult question. There are fossils of humans (i.e., Homo sapiens) that predate the advent of written language. The only difference between those humans and the humans of 5000 years ago is written language.Would you argue that those Amazon tribes and African tribes that still have not invented written language are not "modern man"?Would you argue that, at 5000 years ago, all humans became "modern man" with the advent of written language, or just those humans that used written language (surely you're aware that not all humans at that time used written language)?Would you argue that, up until the late 19th century or so, a large portion of the population of the United States (and probably Australia, too, though I don't know the history there very well) were not "modern man" because they could not read or write?Would you argue that written language is enough of a distinction between two groups of hominids to call them different species?Edited by Bluejay, : Addition and minor correction

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-BluejayDarwin loves you.

I think bluecat makes a good point, which Peg did not address. What is consider "written" language? Is a cave drawing that expresses an event considered "written" language, or do we base language just by our current means of dialogue?I don't know much about the evolvement of language, perhaps those who do can correct me but, I would imagine that a large amount of communities frequently crossing paths is needed to begin to compound enough words to form a proper language. Early man did not have this type of community so perhaps pictures was the only referencable "written" expression.But thats just my take on the matter.Edited by onifre, : No reason given.

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

Hey Peg, We will now see you equivocate on what "written language" consists of ... This is a written language, it communicates information. It is 10,000 to 15,000 years old.Stone tools are the result of communication of technology from one person to another. The oldest known tools, and the industry associated with this technology, dates to 2.5 million years ago. Alphabet alone does not make communication. I would talk about Homo sapiens and the evidence found in Ethiopia, of 160,000 year old "anatomically modern" humans:

quote:

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"We've lacked intermediate fossils between pre-humans and modern humans, between 100,000 and 300,000 years ago, and that's where the Herto fossils fit," said paleoanthropologist Tim White, professor of integrative biology at the University of California, Berkeley, and a co-leader of the team that excavated and analyzed the discovery site. "Now, the fossil record meshes with the molecular evidence."

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Howell added that these anatomically modern humans pre-date most neanderthals, and therefore could not have descended from them, as some scientists have proposed.

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Color for emPHAsis. Note that this is long after hominids developed means to communicate technology, an ability shared by Neanders and Sapiens. This is just the development of an alphabet, not of communication, it is just a way to simplify written communication by reducing the number of images needed to convey a message.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : cloarityEdited by RAZD, : changed photo link

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Hi, RAZD.Problem resolved RAZD has fixed the link. --AdminEdited by Admin, : Add comment about image problem.Edited by Bluejay, : No reason given.

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-BluejayDarwin loves you.

hi percy,im sorry, i did miss the point on that onewhen i thought of modern man, i immediately thought of ourselves as we are today

hey bluejay not really. i believe we were created with it. so for me, 'modern man' would equate to the creation of Adam & Eve. I do acknowledge that the species that came before us were real...however, i also believe that they, like all other animals, were created for a purpose and when their purpose was realized, they were permitted to become extinct....like the dinosaurs for instance.I wouldnt say that any groups of people who do not have a written language are not modern... they would certainly have the capacity for it, if they have the capcity for language, then they would have to have the capacity for writing...but i have no idea why they dont, perhaps their culture may not require written language???. i certainly think that written language is unique to todays humans...i've never been presented with anything different...and as i've already stated, written language has only been around for the last 5,000 odd years... unless you can present anything different on this???

hey radz i see where you are going with this...i was referring to language in terms of, the written word. Yes, paintings are a form of communication too, but these paintings are quite young really...if the carbon 14 dating method that they used to date them is accuratewhich is debatable. im not sure i would equate the use of tools as something that determines modern man for the reason that we can watch animals today use things as tools. the zoo in melbourne has a particular low land gorilla that pulls sticks off bush's to hit other gorillas with and to dig holes in the ground.

Peg, your definition of written language is as weasily as the word "kind"; there is no hard line between proto-languages using ideographic image-symbols and scripts indicating more complex capability. Proto-languages are in evidence in the 7th millennium BCE and their use flows smoothly into written language.At what point have you identified a time and place where the pre-human hominids died out and the modern humans begin? How does that point compare to the actual evidence that shows continuous development of written language from crude drawings through to e-mail and text-messaging. If Adam and Eve were created with the capabilities to write and no others then we should see all proto-languages die (at about the same time I assume) and all real languages evolve from a single, fully formed, written language (presumably Hebrew). Please direct us to a study of early writing that shows this relationship.I know you'll fall back on the Tower of Babel to further confuse the issue, but please do give us some dates along with links showing your evidence. Please show me why everything I've learned is wrong and why you are right.

the common theory is that languages started long ago as grunts, groans and barks. But what do some linguists say??? Journal of Semitic Studies, Vol. I, No. 1, January 1956, p. 11 have a list of quotes from the following people....Professor of Anthropology and Linguistics G. L. Trager says: “Historical knowledge about existing languages goes back only a few thousand years.”An article in Science Illustrated of July 1948 stated: “Older forms of the languages known today were far more difficult than their modern descendants ... man appears not to have begun with a simple speech, and gradually made it more complex, but rather to have gotten hold of a tremendously knotty speech somewhere in the unrecorded past, and gradually simplified it to the modern form.”Linguist Dr. Mason “the idea that ”savages’ speak in a series of grunts, and are unable to express many ”civilized’ concepts, is very wrong.” He adds that “many of the languages of non-literate peoples are far more complex than modern European ones.””Science News Letter, September 3, 1955.Linguists say that about 50percent of earth’s inhabitants speak languages belonging to the Indo-European language family. That puts them all originally in the same area,hence explaining their similaritiesOf the 1,000-odd languages spoken in Africa, some three hundred have a remarkable similarity in their unusual grammatical structure. Known as the Bantu language family, they are spoken in most regions south of the equator. “Bantu,” meaning “people,” is a word common to these languages, hence the name “Bantu family.” Linguists believe that the Bantu family descended from a parent language spoken in central West Africa more than two thousand years ago....Again, showing the same origin.so languages can be traced back to an original source ...this is evidence of a single language being spoken at a particular time in the past... and if you want to believe in the babel story or not, you simply cannot deny the possiblity of it Edited by Peg, : No reason given.