Hole in head shows old inbreeding according to an article in ScienceDaily 18 March 2013 and Fossil Science 22 March 2013. Researchers from Chinese Academy of Sciences and Washington University, St. Louis have found pieces of an ancient human skull with hole in the top known as “enlarged parietal foramen”, which occurs because the two bones that form the vault of the skull fail to grow together properly. This is a rare defect that can occur in living humans, and is now known to be caused by mutations of the genes ALX4 on chromosome 11 and MSX2 on chromosome 5.
According to ScienceDaily and Fossil Science, “Traces of genetic abnormalities, such as EPF, are seen unusually often in the skulls of Pleistocene humans, from early Homo erectus to the end of the Paleolithic”. Erik Trinkaus, one of the researchers, commented: “The probability of finding one of these abnormalities in the small available sample of human fossils is very low, and the cumulative probability of finding so many is exceedingly small”. This new finding along with “an unusually high incidence of rare conditions among these Pleistocene humans” indicates there was significant inbreeding within the population at that time.
Editorial Comment: Inbreeding occurs when a small population becomes isolated from the larger human race, and this is what began to happen to man, first when only one family of eight survived the flood and even more when society was further split into isolated small groups after man was scattered at the Tower of Babel. Genesis tells us that after the Flood, Noah’s descendants grew into some 70 family groups, but rather than obey God who had told them to spread out across the planet, they gathered together to make a name for themselves and storm heaven via the infamous Tower (Genesis 11). God judged them by splitting them up into different language groups which became the ancestors of all modern ‘races’.
The initial groups would have been groups of related people, similar to what we would call clan groups. As these migrated away from Babel all would have become isolated from others and become inbred. At the same time the environment was becoming harsher and the mutation rate was increasing, so such mutations would become common within an inbreeding group. One factor in causing the decrease in lifespan of man, recorded after Shem (Genesis 10/11), as well as embedding the racial characteristics, such as skin colour, etc. The now provable high rate of abnormalities in this newly discovered group of so-called “primitive man” is evidence that these remains are not some kind of pre-human creatures evolving upwards, but human beings afflicted by degeneration. As such, they are a reminder that the human race is not a rising species, but a fallen one, suffering the effects of human sin and God’s judgement, and in need of a Saviour. (Ref. genetics, mutations, malformations)
Evidence News 27 March 2013