Creationists: What was God's point in creating chimps that share 96% of their genome with humans?

Question

Not to mention very similar behavioral traits....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chimpanzee

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9136200/

and please, don't give me God's mysterious ways...

Answer 1

A new 'extremeophile' was recently discovered that lives INSIDE black smokers, 7 miles at the bottom of the ocean. It turns out that we humans have in our genes almost 75% of their genes.

Christians refuse to acknowledge this fact.

Answer 2

How about I give you a science answer. Chimps and human DNA is not 96% similar. I know what you have read and I also know it to be inaccurate. First neither the human nor the chimpanzee genomes are totally complete. When this study was completed the chimpanzee genome was far from complete. Don't believe me? Look at the human genome. There are many areas where the nucleotides are represented by X's. This is because the sequence there is not yet know. Secondly in the study which you mention only genes with similar functions were compared and only a small number of those genes. It was not a whole genome comparison. It was a comparison of a small number of genes. So saying there is a 96% overall similarity is just false. Chimps do not have 96% of their genome in similarity with humans. They have 96% of a small subset of genes in similarity. Also the following is a direct quote from the national institute for biotechnology information, the premiere website for any genetic information. The quote is as follows "Contigs were assembled using the human genome as a guide, and are therefore "humanized" in their construction. This is an important distinction, as some sequences, such as insertions, deletions, and gene duplications, may not be accurately represented by the current chimpanzee assembly." The way they put the chimpanzee genome together humanized it.

Let me add on a non-scientific note that the similarity if you consider the existence of a creator is not surprising either. Chimps and humans have similar body structures. So why would a creator not use similar genes and underlying mechanisms for both? Think about it with an open mind.

Questions like this show the ignorance of science is as prevalent in non-believers as it is in believers. I know you will likely ignore this answer and I will get lots of thumbs down. However I happen to be a biologist and a Christian. I do genomics research for a living.

Answer 3

Well all your talk is void because according to the theory of evolution we did not evolve from chimps. Chimps are a branch that have a common ancestor with us, so we are cousins. Since we did not evolve from chimps, that 96% thing is irrelevent.

As far as behavior, most animals share our behavior. Dogs do. Our dog loves to be inside and just sleep all day by the heater. My birds are even closer. They like to stand next to each other - they have an entire cage but they chose to be next to each other as they are right now. They groom each other and want to look good. They eat together. They like to fly together. They sometimes get into fits when they are tired and start attacking each other for no reason. They have moods. They have wants, they have fears. They even like certain types of bands. One of the birds likes hard rock music, the other likes metal. When I play a new type of music they don't know, like punk rock, they go crazy. If I take one of the birds out of the cage and put a cover over the cage, the birds will miss each other and start chirping loudly back and forth so they know where each other is. My uncle's parot can sing the "Happy birthday to you" song, and when there are gatherings at the house and someone tells a joke and the group laughs, the parot will start laughing too. Then we will laugh more that the bird just laughed, and the bird will realize we are paying attention to it and will be more charismatic.

From this, would you say we evolved from birds? No, its nonsense. Shared bahavioral traits do not imply that we evolved from them.

One of our cats is very shy and doesn't really like being touched, the other cat loves attention. The first cat loves chasing those red laser pointers, the other cat cannot even see it or doesn't even care.

Every animal has a personality of some sort. With so many people and so many animals, it is obvious you will see common traits.

Answer 4

There is claim that humans and apes share 95 percent of their genetic information and that this is proof of evolution. It is also shown for example, the genetic analyses published in New Scientist have revealed a 75% similarity between the DNA of nematode worms and man. This definitely does not mean that there is only a 25% difference between man and these worms! It is surely natural for the human body to bear some molecular similarities to other living beings being that we are on the same planet. This "common material" is the result not of evolution but of "common design," that is, of their being created upon the same plan.

Answer 5

Out of the millions of species that exist on earth, imagine the possibility that none of them were able to even closely resemble us. What about bees and wasps, don't they resemble? What about a zebra and a horse? What about beatles and cockroaches? What about gophers and chipmunks? Eagles and Hawks?

Bluegill and Sunfish

Pike and Walley

Elephants and Mammoths

Pumas, Panthers, Tigers, Lions, Cheetas, Cougers, etc...

It isn't at all mysterious.

Edit: tiafaha: You said, "i have actually heard a person say before that there were no dinosaurs, that the devil just put the bones here to confuse us and make us not believe."

The problem lies in your assumption that, since one "blind-faithed" Christian is unreasonable, all of them are.


Tara: That was not funny, and amazingly out of line.

PS: Props to Edge, that was something I did not know.

Answer 6

It's more like 94 percent but even at 97 percent, it represents 60,000 genetic differences between us...quite a huge gap. At 94%, the gap is more like 120,000 differences. Primates have no opposible thumbs, do not walk upright, have the intelligence level of a 6 or 7 year old human at best, cannot speak or write. They are just one of many animals that share common traits with man like the ability to use tools as in birds that use rocks to break open eggs, monogamous relationships in geese, the construction abilities of ants and beavers, the storage instinct in squirrels, etc.. God created a vast variety of animal and plant life for us to study the wonders of His designs. The field of bio-engineering is doing just that. Animals cannot tell right from wrong, man can.

Answer 7

you will never convince the creationist that they could be wrong. and why would you try, let people believe what they want. i have been down that road of trying to convince, and it leads nowhere when you are talking to people who will always refuse it. i have actually heard a person say before that there were no dinosaurs, that the devil just put the bones here to confuse us and make us not believe. all of us who agree with you appreciate the effort to try and give others new ideas, but eventually you gotta hang it up and let it be, its hard but in the end its better. have a good day.

Answer 8

We do not know ... we do not have an answer as we are not God ... we do not understand a lot of the Bible ....

And God might not have a point ... not everything has a reason ... for instance, you walk around a table. You might choose the right side. It does not, however, matter which side you walk on.

Do you have a reason for walking on the right side?

Answer 9

And what about cauliflower? No point at all. He created man in His likeness so I guess it's that darn 4% that makes ALL the difference =)

As far as your http's...it's on the internet so IT MUST BE TRUE???? I can go to my bookshelf and get about ten books that all say Pluto is a planet in our solar system...does that make it true? (Read the latest out there before you answer =)

Answer 10

Similar behavior ?!!!? I doubt that, well, some on R&S maybe. As far as the genome is concserned, I don't know, why don't we gop to God, and ask Him.
Minister

Answer 11

Genesis 2:15 Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
18 And the LORD God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.” 19 Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So Adam gave names to all cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him.

This is the text that immediately precedes God making woman from man. I suppose He could have brought each animal to Adam in order of intelligence or similarity to humans one by one to show Adam that no other animal, no matter how similar, was a suitable "helpmeet" for him. Only woman formed of man was "bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh".

That's a good enough explanation for me; you can keep questioning it from now until Doomsday and then maybe you will get the chance to ask Him yourself prior to the Judgment.