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In even beginning to address the question, this is the fundament...er, umm, foundational element to establish.
Humanity is humans. How many definitions of humanity are there.
Let's see, how many definitions of "Christian" are there? A rhetorical question asked only to make the point...kinda like Rabbis, ask 6 different anthropologists or sociologists and get 7 different answers as to what "humanity" means.
Are we limiting ourselves to our genetic connections to *all of* our ancient ancestors? Are we limiting ourselves to toolmaking and / or the use of fire? Are we delineating when "we" became carnivores rather than the typical ape vege / omnivore? Or do we step into a closer frame and use art and decoration to denote rational thought? Or how about the development of agriculture? Perhaps the establishment of government and rule of law?
Do we include, while we're are at it, other "species" of the genus *homo* that lived contemporaneously? Particularly if it can be shown that interbreeding was possible?
Humanity is about 100'000 years old, civilisation and organised way of living could very well be older then 10'000 years old. Even the ancients wrote of the wonderful land of Atlantis, the Egyptians and Plato.
Homo Sapiens is a little bit over 100,000 years old, at leasst by conventional reckoning. While Atlantis is an interesting collection of mythos to consider, there isn't a whole lot of evidence to support it at this point. A lot of conjecture, sure. But one would think if a civilization as advanced as Atlantis did truly exist, that there would be something a bit more concrete and wide spread available to archeology.
Perhaps the real question should be how long it was that humankind could perceive God. The moment that we obtained that kind of awareness would mark the beginning of Humanity. All others before that were animals in development.
Welcome to CR, xpdnc!
I have long thought similar. What anthropology holds is various pieces of artwork and decoration, dating back nearly 100,000 years. The painted cave walls are nearly universally held to be the work of Cro-Magnon, our purported direct ancestors, and generally don't go back much over 35,000 years. However, there are pieces of "portable art" of which the Venus of Willendorf is perhaps one of the more famous pieces, that date something like 65-80,000 years ago. I seem to recall some ostrich shell beads found in South Africa (Blombos cave?) that are tentatively dated around 80,000 years. There are also other works attributed to Neandertal that tend to be more geometric patterns etched on stones. Red Ochre was used pretty universally by both C-M and Nean, as body paint, etc.
Adam and Eve could have been the first humans in that respect, and they could have existed less than 10k years ago.
Well, that depends how we delineate "G-d." Further, I could posit that "animals," including rudimentary humans, intuitively perceive G-d. I may go a step further, in saying that an animal mind unclouded by frivolous thoughts, may well perceive G-d even better than a rationally thinking human. Instinctive intuition.
Exactly what I was thinking...however, there is also a strange point in Genesis when describing the "first" man. He is described as "ruddy" complected, or reddish, like the clay he was made from. This description is given by the authors of Genesis who for all practical purposes would be considered proto-Semites. They definitely were not "ruddy" complected, nor did they or their decendants live in lands where the clay was red...so why would the first man be different looking than them, and made from a colored soil they weren't used to?
Well...I'm not certain we can definitively say that "proto-Semites" were not ruddy complected.
Taking into account certain folklore pertaining to Ireland, the house of Tara in some accounts I have heard are direct descent from one of the daughters of the last king of Judah before Nebuchadnezzer had his eyes put out. The prophet Jeremiah is said to have escorted this princess and her entourage to the Emerald Isle. Which is how the Stone of Scone came to be first in Ireland, then Scotland, then England, now finally back in Scotland.
An alternate look would be to consider the interjection of a "unique" bloodline, tailor made genetically speaking, from an "alien" source.
I think we know how much airplay that will get. But I do wonder sometimes....
