[Avodah] Mitochondrial DNA and the Mabul

[Micha Berger]

On Fri, Sep 21, 2012 at 06:31:16PM +0200, Arie Folger wrote:
: Over time, some women have no kids, or only sons, and thus their
: mitochondrial DNA line becomes extinct. Over hundreds of generations,
: that extinguishes an awful lot of lines, and with his analysis, [Sykes]
: finds "seven mothers" of Europeans, hence the title of his book, the
: Seven Daughters of Eve. The differences between those individuals are
: fairly large, and hence it is useful to consider those women genetic
: foremothers.

Sykes' is one theory among many. And he makes his income off offering
mtDNA tests that will tell you which haplogroup and which of these
daughters you descend from. So I'm not sure his is the most accepted.

I think it's worth checking out the dating of mtEve
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve#Implications_of_dating_and_placement_of_Eve>
and of Y Chromosomal Adam
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Adam#Time_frame>.
We're talking 142,000 yrs since Y-Adam, and 150-200,000 yrs since mtEve.

All of which assumes things about mutation rates etc... that need not
have been true before the mabul.

BUT, there is one more person to identify... the MRCA (most recent common
ancestor) of all living humans. One person we all come from, even if he
isn't the father's father's father's father... or she isn't the mother's
mother's mother's mother... IOW, someone who was your mother's father's
father's mother's... and their father's mother's mother's mother's...

That person lived from 2,000 to 5,000 years ago. IOW, even without
questioning the science, we all could come from Noach, if there were
mountain top people, or residents of the future EY who survived the flood
whose DNA diverged from the Torah's Adam's genetic sources 142yrs ago.

One last note... The whole notion of DNA tracking is used to support
various theories about cultural evolution and human migration. They
aren't separable topics.

GCT and :-)@@ii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             A person lives with himself for seventy years,
micha at aishdas.org        and after it is all over, he still does not
http://www.aishdas.org   know himself.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter