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DNA
i was wacthing paul moony and he said there was a show were scientist trased every race and genders DNA all the way back to a black woman in africa.so that basically means that the mother of civilization is a black woman in africa based on the scientist.what i want to know is,is that accually possible?i personally do beleive it is but could DNA really tell us that?just wondering!and please dont say it is religiously inncorrect because i want to know if it is scientifically possible not religiously possible!thanx!
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Yes! It's definitely possible! Scientists have been working on this for years by testing millions of people's DNA from all over the world. Here's a basic description of how it works:
Certain parts of our DNA get passed down from generation to generation unchanged. That means that parts of your DNA are identical to your mother's, her mother's, her mother's, etc. However, occasionally there will be a mutation; a slight change in the DNA. If such a change occured in YOU, for example, then your kids would have that mutation, and their kids, and on and on. That means that anyone in the future that had that exact mutation could trace their ancestry back to you.
It's complicated to explain in a short answer, but through all this DNA research, scientists have found that everyone CAN trace their ancestry back to a single woman who lived in Africa some 140,000 years ago.
That doesn't mean that she was the only woman living at that time. There were others, of course... but their children or grandchildren or later descendants eventually died off without reproducing; that is, those other women have no living descendants today. Only this one woman had a continual line of descendants who survied and carried on her DNA... and we all descend from certain branches of her family.
I wish I could explain it better, because it really is fascinating! I've read a TON on this and I don't just believe it, I KNOW it's true... it totally makes sense once you understand it.
This website might explain it better for you:
[Link](Mouse over link to see full location)
It's the National Geograhic Genographic Project (the ones who are doing these studies). Near the top, click on "Genetics Overview" and "Atlas of the Human Journey."
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No, that was hypothetical. Humans did originate in Africa, but the woman they showed you was just an example of one of the first humans. Humans didn't start with just one person. It was a gradual change over hundreds of generations, from early primates to modern humans.
So at first there were single-celled organisms. Over many generations they turned into multi-celled organisms. These turned into fish. Fish turned into lizards. Lizards turned into rodents. Rodents turned into monkeys-like things(though not the same as today's monkeys). Monkeys turned into Apes(also different than today's apes). Apes turned into humans. Over the course of millions of generations and billions of years.
All life on earth is related to a single-celled organism, though not every organism is related to the same ones. All organisms are also related to either fish or phytoplankton.
If you followed our DNA, it would lead not only to early humans in Africa, but also to reptiles and fish. There is no definitive point where Humans began, and no one genetic mutation which defined us.
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