Today I requested that my membership at these forums be cancelled, because I won’t participate in a forum whose moderators are allowed to tamper with a thread or posting because they personally disagree with its content. …especially when it’s a thread quoting an author with established PhD specialist-credentials on the topic, and it’s a topic on which the moderator is uncredentialed. (You know who you are.)
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That’s relevant at this thread, because, if later there’s more argument from someone, I don’t want it to look as if I didn’t reply because he’s said something irrefutable. So I’m explaining why I won’t answer again at this thread (or any other at these forums).
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But that isn’t the topic of this posting. Because I’m quitting this moderator-petty-tyrant forum, I’d like to post this one more message to this thread, on this thread’s topic:
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Some of you here seem to have a lot of confusion about McCarthy’s Pigchimp theory. Dr. McCarthy doesn’t claim or assert that his theory is true. Do you know what “theory” means?
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Likewise, I, in this thread, haven’t asserted that McCarthy’s theory is true.
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As I myself have been doing here, McCarthy (who is more qualified in these matters than you or I) acknowledges that a survivable and fertile inter-order mammalian hybrid, even if possible at all, evidently must be very, very unlikely, and, if it ever happens, evidently must be very, very rare. Maybe it can’t happen. Someone here said “very unlikely”. Okay.
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But, while acknowledging that, McCarthy merely presents some facts that otherwise are difficult to explain. Facts that have been puzzling scientists for some time.
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*Yes, I’ve said this, but it doesn’t seem to have sunk in: McCarthy published a long list of attributes by which we differ from all of the other primates. And we share all those attributes with pigs.
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Unless someone can show why humans and pigs, with their different lifestyles and ways of living, would convergently evolve all of those attributes (while our putative only direct ancestors, the chimp-like apes, evolved none of them, then you have a remarkable coincidence to explain.
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Yes, some of you here have assured us, on your expert hybridization-genetics authority, that there’s nothing surprising about what was said in the above paragraph with the asterisk (*).
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And of course those are the same experts who, unlike McCarthy, who only has a genetics PhD, and a background of long specialization in hybridization, are sure that a survivable and fertile inter-order mammalian hybrid is, not only very improbable, not only very rare, but entirely impossible.
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How wonderful that you know so much more, about his own subject, than that recognized and established PhD hybridization-specialist!
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Bottom-line: McCarthy acknowledges the evident extreme unlikelihood and rarity of a fertile surviving mammalian cross-order hybrid. That’s why he calls his suggestion a “theory” instead of a “fact”.
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McCarthy merely mentions the facts in the above paragraph with the asterisk (*) in front of it. Make what you want of it.
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So you’re sure that you know that a survivable and fertile inter-order mammalian hybrid is, not just unlikely, not just rare, bu, on your expert authority, entirely impossible? (Where did you get your genetics PhD?)…and that the facts in the above paragraph with the asterisk are easily explained without the Pigchimp theory (the explanation is obvious to you, but not to McCarthy)? …and that you’re right about all that, and a PhD geneticist with an extensive background in hybridization-genetics is wrong?
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Then, have you heard of the Dunning-Kruger effect? Look it up. You’re exhibiting it.
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Michael Ossipoff

And refuting the morphological argument in the paper, and an analysis on chromosomal compatibility which strongly suggests that the pairing couldn't bring offspring at all, never mind fertile offspring.

The reason Myers got to be so insulting is because he thoroughly refuted the claims — fdrake

As I said, compared to McCarthy, Myers is uncredentialed in hybridization-genetics.

...casting doubt on his qualification to "refute" him.

Michael Ossipoff

Which is funny because people have babies a lot. — fdrake

Yes, and most of their babies have two parents of the same species, accounting for the better fertility-rate.

But, incidentally, human fertility is inexplicably low, compared to other primates, and other animals in general.

Michael Ossipoff

Therefore the theory being right is highly improbable. — Nils Loc

The obvious rarity (and evident nonexistence) of survivable, fertile inter-order hybrids gives it a very, very low a priori probability.

McCarthy merely cites facts that are otherwise difficult to explain.

How much that evidence changes someone's subjectively-perceived probability of there being even the remote possibility of successful inter-order hybridization is just that....an individual subjective matter.

McCarthy's long list of humans' anatomical differences from all the primates--attributes shared by humans and pigs--is worth mentioning, and makes McCarthy's theory worth mentioning.

...whatever your subjective perception of the probability of the theory being true.

Michael Ossipoff

What is the evidence of inter-ordinal hybridization in nature. Do not mention pig chimp sexual relations. — Nils Loc

You ask for evidence, and then ask that I not mention it :D

No one denies that survivable fertile offspring from inter-order hybridization is, if possible at all, very, very improbable and rare.

So, sorry there aren't more instances of evidence.

Michael Ossipoff

I'm sure the only reason that it was removed from the science category into the lounge was because no pigs were artificially inseminated with chimp semen. — fdrake

McCarthy answered that argument. No one claimed that every such inseminization would result in a pregnancy, much less a survivable and fertile offspring. On the contrary, if it can happen,, it's most extremely rare. The experiment you propose would require many, many thousands of artificial inseminizations. ...and tremendous expense. Feel free to offer to finance it if you want it done.

But such experimentation would be objectionable on humane grounds.

Or alternatively you can look at PZ Myers completely destroying every part of the claim.

Myers' "demolishing" consisted of name-calling, angry-noises, and unsupported personal-opinion.

In comparison to McCarthy, Myers is uncredentialed in hybridization-genetics.

The crux of the criticism of McCarthy's suggestion is the assumption that it's entirely impossible for a cross-order hybrid to ever be survivable and fertile. That's an assumption and a belief, but it isn't an established-fact. As I said, McCarthy pointed out that (understandably) it isn't known how distant a hybridization could, very very rarelly, result in a survivable and fertile offspring.

Anyone pretending to know that is displaying the Dunning-Kruger effect.

You may as well have linked a flat earth 'research paper', it's in the same league of ridiculousness.

Is that your expert professional opinion as a genetics PhD?

But by all means, get a Kickstarter going to artificially inseminate pigs with chimp semen to test it, the author certainly didn't bother.

See above. McCarthy probably didn't have the many millions of dollars that such a long project would require. As I said, the experiment would be objectionable on humane grounds.

Michael Ossipoff

Is that your expert professional opinion, as a genetics PhD?

Michael Ossipoff

Things interact, and have properties related to those interactions. That doesn't sound like something new. Density and albedo are determined by interactions, for example.

What I said about us as purposefully-respsonsive devices is nothing new either. It's what was correctly taught to us in pre-secondary school (In the U.S., pre-secondary school was previously called "junior-high school", and now "middle-school").

Some things (like that) that they taught us then were right.

Some things (like Materialism) that they taught us were unsupported and not well-defined. ...but nonetheless remarkably tightly held-onto by Western philosophers.

Michael Ossipoff

It just means that you were a malfunctioning purposefully-responsive device.

For some reason known only to you, the desire (purpose) to say that you have free-will was more important, predominated over, your preference for your favorite snack. So you bought shrimp in order to prove that you have free-will.

Governed by your philosophical goal/purpose, in preference to your favorite snack, you followed your stronger purpose/preference, by buying something that you like less. Malfunction.

Of course nutritional variety is desirable, and we surely have an instinct for nutritional variety that can be subconscious "I feel like ______ today.", or "I think I'll get ________ today".

But, in your case, you bought the shrimp because of a philosophical goal that was more important--the goal of proving (or so you believed) that you have free-will, by buying something that you like less.

Michael Ossipoff

Are they? Are you telling me that if I am standing next to a tree, that tree choses what I do? — OpnionsMatter

No. But your preferences, and your circumstances in the context of your preferences, determine your choices.

Or possibly what I think? Does a rock have the brain capacity to influence me as well?

Your circumstances don't have or need brain-capacity, to determine "your choices" for you.

Like all animals, you're a biologically-originated purposefully-responsive device. ...a purposefully-responsive device like a Roomba, a refrigerator lightswitch, a thermostat, or a mousetrap. You don't have any more free-will than they do.

Your job is guessing what courses of action best accord with your preferences and circumstances. ...circumstances, and hereditary built in or acquired preferences, that determine your choices for you.

Michael Ossipoff

13 W
1950 UTC

Obviously there isn't "free-will", any more than a Roomba has free-will. What you choose is determined by your (hereditary or acquired) preferences, and your surroundings. "Your choices" are thereby made for you, and your role is merely to make a good guess about which option best accords with those preferences and circumstances.

Not all Theists believe that God created this physical universe. For example, since medieval times or before, the Gnostics haven't believed that.

And the notion of creation is anthropmorphic.

Michael Ossipoff

13 W
1859 UTC

I'm just replying because no one has yet. There's nothing in the forum-guidelines against bringing up topic related to your academic course, and it seems to me that it's been done here before, with no problem.

I like the idea of the Scholastics' arguments, though:

1. I don't say "argument", because I don't regard the nature and character of Reality as a matter for assertion, argument, proof, logic or debate.

I prefer to say "discussioni".

2. The Scholastics' discussions aren't the ones that I prefer, though, as I said, I like the spirit and idea of them. They make a lot of sense to me in spirit, though they aren't what I'd say.

Michael Ossipoff

But, as for the matter of whether there could, very very rarely, be a survivable and fertile distant [inter-order mammalian] hybrid... That, as I said before, isn't known. So let's not claim to know the answer to that.

McCarthy doesn't claim the pig-theory as fact, but only presents some facts that are otherwise difficult to explain. — Michael Ossipoff

Because of the above, McCarthy's suggestion isn't "unscientific" or "absurd" or "ridiculous".

What's unscientific is the pretense of asserting what you don't know, the pretense of assigning to oneself the authority to declare, unsupported, that a suggestion by someone better-credentialed than you is unscientific, just-plain-wrong, absurd, etc.

Baden hasn't given a specific objection to McCarthy's suggestion, other than scientific findings like "I don't need a genetics PhD to know that it's absurd on the face of it".

Well,as I said, this topic has been useful and valuable, just for bringing-out certain character-flaws and pretenses that , regrettably, aren't nearly as rare as fertile inter-order mammalian hybrid offspring.

Michael Ossipoff

13 W
0401 UTC

Aren't you forgetting rather significant attributes like a significantly increased brain volume? — Echarmion

Aren't you forgetting what you read, when you read McCarthy's pages about human origins? Oh, that's right, you didn't read it. You're just expounding about what you haven't read.

A good rule: No read, no expound.

Pigs happen to have certain attributes that, combined with what chimps (or their near-ancestors) had, may have allowed, made possible, the attribute you describe in the quoted passage above, in addition to erect-standing posture.

As I said, McCarthy answers about that at his human-origins pages, but you'll have to do your own reading.

There is a fairly large amount of readily available evidence for similarly "humongous set(s) of coincidences" occurring. — Echarmion

Of course there's been convergent evolution, when conditions were such as to favor the same attribute. But the pig-human situation is one in which living conditions and lifestyle were distinctly different, and the number of coincidences needed to explain the many similarities (not shared by any of the other primates) presents a big explanatory-problem which has been puzzling to scientists.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2325 UTC

"So it seems that it is not that distant hybrids are entirely impossible, but rather that they do occur, — Baden

(quoted from McCarthy)

If there are survivable closer hybrids, then it would hardly be surprising if there were non-survivable more distant ones. ...nearly all of them unsurvivable, and, among the very few survibable ones, nearly all sterile.

But, as for the matter of whether there could, very very rarely, be a survivable and fertile distant hybrid... That, as I said before, isn't known. So let's not claim to know the answer to that.

McCarthy doesn't claim the pig-theory as fact, but only presents some facts that are otherwise difficult to explain.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2313 UTC

One might do one's best, but what would it mean to "want" to be someone else other than who one is?

This life started, period. Speculate about how or why if you like. I like those questions too. I suggest that there's no reason or purpose to life, and that it was inevitable. ...making it pointless and even meaningless to second-guess or evaluate it.

You eventually won't have any surviving descendants if there occurs the universe's (at least "local") heat-death, or a big-crunch. ...and of course the much sooner predicted nova will be a closer survival-problem, unless some of your descendants get in a space-ark..

Anyway, this notion of wanting doesn't make a lot of sense. Trying, liking, but not wanting.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2247 UTC

As already clarified, McCarthy didn't write those chicken reports, and doesn't endorse them as true.

If inviting donations for publication-expenses were discrediting, not much would be left undiscredited.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2235 UTC

You don't need a PhD in genetics to know how silly this idea is. — Baden

You need one to qualify you to expound about the correctness or incorrectness of what McCarthy says.

If you assert that an inter-order mammalian hybridization is entirely impossible, then you're claiming knowledge that science doesn't have, As I said, publish a paper, to share your findings with other genetics experts.

But as it happens, I do have a background in this field, i.e. a degree in Zoology.

...a genetics PhD, with specialization in hybridization?

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2128 UTC

But anyhow, seeing as you seem to give it credence, (on what basis I don't know) here is some of the basic detail of why it's wrong:... — Baden

Whereupon Baden quotes some text from Prothero or Myers. Neither Prothero nor Myers have credentials in the area they're discussing. In my previous post, I provided links to McCarthy's replies to Prothero and to Myers.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2123

The idea is so ridiculous and so wrong in so many ways, and insultingly wrong to anyone with any background or understanding of the field, i — Baden

You mean like Baden's background and understanding of the field? Where did Baden get his PhD in genetics?

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
2115 UTC

Baden’s quote is from an unsigned article. Not only are the author’s credentials unstated, but so is the author’s name.
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The anonymous writer claimed that McCarthy rejects natural-selection. Incorrect. Of course natural-selection has guided evolution, and McCarthy doesn’t say otherwise.
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Natural-selection makes use of variation resulting from ordinary genetic re-mixing made possible by sexual reproduction, and also the more drastic (and then usually fatal) variations resulting from mutations, …mutations caused by irradiation by cosmic-rays, and naturally-occurring radioactive substances such as radon. …and mutations caused by naturally-occurring mutagenic substances in the environment.
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Another occasional cause for drastic variation would be distant-hybridizations.
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As with drastic variations resulting from mutations caused by irradiation or mutagens, the drastic variations from distant-hybridizations are nearly always fatal. …but, one driver of evolution is the fact that drastic variations, very very rarely, can be adaptively beneficial.
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No one’s denying natural-selection. In fact, no one’s saying that it’s known whether or not there can be successful mammalian inter-order hybridization. McCarthy merely points out some facts that are otherwise difficult to explain, and which have long puzzled scientists.
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McCarthy has collected and displays many articles and reports about alleged inter-order and inter-class hybridizations, but he doesn’t claim that the accounts are true. Is it advisable for him to have those articles and reports at his website? Probably not. I’d say of course not. Does the inclusion of those articles and reports somehow refute his pig-ancestry theory? Certainly not.
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So what’s Baden’s point, posting from an article that isn’t even signed? …the opinions of someone unknown, and almost surely uncredentialed?
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McCarthy answered his two most vociferous critics in pages at his website. You can link to those rebuttals from the table-of-contents at McCarthy’s primary page about human-origins, or else here, where he replies to Protherr and Myers:
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http://www.macroevolution.net/PZ-Myers.html
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http://www.macroevolution.net/prothero.html
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It’s to be noted that neither of those critics has any credentials that qualify them in any way comparable to McCarthy, on mammalian hybridization genetics.
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The objection to McCarthy’s suggestion is that it’s impossible for an inter-order hybridization among mammalian species to ever result in a viable living-thing.
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McCarthy doesn’t claim to know. …and neither do McCarthy’s critics, and neither do you. …because not everything about genetics is known, and the possibility of successful mammalian inter-order hybridization is one of the many things that just aren’t known.
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If any of you are sure that it isn’t possible, then you should write a paper, to share your findings with the rest of the scientific community. :D
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McCarthy points to facts that are difficult to explain any other way.
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The many anatomical attributes by which humans differ from all the other primates, but not from pigs, suggest that such a hybridization has taken place.
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Here are a few brief quotes from McCarthy, which summarize his suggestion:
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“The theory I actually propose (a theory, by the way, that accounts for the fact that we share many traits with pigs that we do not share with chimpanzees) is that long ago there was hybridization between a population of pig-like animals and a population of apes (similar to modern chimpanzees and bonobos) and that the resulting hybrid(s) then backcrossed to the ape population, resulting in the production of a mostly apelike population that retained a lot of piglike traits.”
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“What I would say to PZ Myers is: ‘Stop all the speculating and propounding and explain why the traits that distinguish us from chimpanzees consistently link us with pigs. Offer a different hypothesis accounting for our affinity to pigs. Put up or shut up!’ “:
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“Certain types of crosses produce a high percentage of inviable offspring, but occasionally produce viable offspring as well. But PZ Myers, says "I think they are highly unlikely to be possible." Why? We know that crosses can sometimes work even between forms of life that are rather distantly related.”
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“But Myers is dancing around the facts. What we know is that in hybrid crosses there are elevated levels of dysfunctionality. More dysfunctional offspring are produced than in ordinary matings. And in distant crosses there are, typically, more produced than in close ones. However, even crosses that produce many dysfunctional individuals may from time to time produce functional ones. What about them? What are their implications? Why couldn’t a rare functional individual pig-ape participate in the foundation of a new population? Even if most individuals from such a cross were non-viable and sterile? In fact, we know that certain crosses produce hybrids that are superior to their parents in certain respects. The best known case, of the many examples of this phenomenon, is the ordinary mule.”
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I suggest that this topic is valuable and useful when it attracts and showcases the common tendency here, for uninformed proferssional-pretense from uncredentialed self-appointed experts.
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Michael Ossipoff
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13 Tu
2112 UTC

My understanding of hybrids is that they are formed when species X breaks off into two groups as the result of geographical isolation and after considerable time they evolve separately. Following the separation, they are reunited, they breed, and they produce a hybrid.
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So, the idea would be that you have horses, some get isolated and they turn into donkeys, the two find each other one day and they make mules. This assumes a common ancestor. It holds that species X forms subspecies Y that breeds into XY.

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No, hybridization refers to interbreeding of different species, not different subspecies of the same species.
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This article seems to suggest that a primitive man fucked a pig that created a pig centaur and that pig centaur is us. Do I have this right?

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No, and I suggest that you read some of McCarthy’s pages before expounding about what he says.
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I don't get the need to interpose hybridization into this mess, when all we really need to say is that there appears to be a common genetic similarity that likely arose from a common ancestor.

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Undeniably there was common ancestor. Likewise, just like us, all of the apes share that common ancestor too. So the common ancestor doesn’t explain the ape-human differences described in McCarthy’s page entitled “Human Origins”, which are also the human-pig similarities described in McCarthy’s page titled “The Other Parent”.
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Michael Ossipoff
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13 Tu
1740 UTC

Convergent evolution is also the big problem for this hypothesis though. Since convergent evolution can only be ruled out via molecular and genetic evidence and all such evidence has been eradicated in the scenario proposed, there is no way rule out convergent evolution.

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All of the attributes by which humans differ from all of the other primates--and by which all the other primates are like eachother—are attributes that humans and pigs have in common.
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Pigs and hominids had and have quite different lifestyles and modes of living. With apes as our immediate ancestors, the fact mentioned in the above paragraph calls for explanation. For all those attributes mentioned above to be convergent-evolution would amount to a humungous set of coincidences.
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Which leaves us with a massively complex theory stacking improbabilities

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See above.
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Michael Ossipoff
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13 Tu
1708 UTC

Yeah, you know, I was joking.... — Janus

Of course. But what you said is still true--though easily explained by separate convergent evolution,.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
0306 UTC

It's just really unlikely. Really, really. — T Clark

Of course it's unlikely. Maybe often no offspring. And when there is, nearly always stillbirth or offspring that soon dies.

But, very, very rarely (just as the case with cosmic-ray mutations, ground radon irradiation mutation, environmental mutagen mutation) there could be that very, very rare instance where the two species just happened to have separate unshared attributes which, when combined, confer adaptive advantage.

So, distant hibridizations aren't a recipe for reliably successful offspring, any more than irradiation by cosmic rays or radon, or exposure to environmental mutagens, are. ...but are, instead, just one more source of mutation. ...nearly always fatal, but, very very rarely, adaptively advantageous.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
0303 UTC

humans share a lot of traits with sheep as well! — Janus

Very true, but those are just psychological traits. And that's easily explained by separate convergent evolution. Obedient sheep are chosen for breeding more sheep. Obedient humans who follow and identify with the powerful thereby gain favor and protection that increases their survivability, reproduction-opportunities, and the societal status and protection for their offspring.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
0256 UTC

There is a mass of evidence that humans emerged from an African population made up of a variety of species of the genus Homo. — frank

McCarthy doesn't deny that. What you're referring to happened later.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
0251

Species don't arise by natural selection, mutation, and genetic drift? — frank

Genetic drift caused by what? Mutations from cosmic rays, and maybe from some natural mutagen chemicals in the natural environment. But maybe also from distant hybridizations which (like the other mutations referred-to above) nearly always result in stillbirth or unsurvivable offspring, but which very rarely combine previously unshared attributes of two species which, when combined, provide a significant adaptive advantage.

(Alright, the pig-chimp experiment might have produced a species that is singlehandedly creating a big extinction due go global-warming, but it was well-adapted for a long time.)

Michael Ossipoff

13 M
2248 UTC

And, yes. It is possible that McCarthy is correct. It's just really unlikely. — T Clark

Is that your professional opinion, as a PhD geneticist?

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
0241 UTC

It seems that whether the sperm and egg of two vastly unrelated mammalian species can fuse at all is an interesting question and an experiment that is likely to have been done in a petri dish. — Nils Loc

Various species have done that experiment in the old-fashioned manner,, and the answer to your question is "Yes" they can and have.

Michael Ossipoff

13 Tu
0239 UTC

If you believe in the religion of Materialism, the metaphysical theory/belief of Materialism, then it's simple: For you, reincarnation is ruled out.

I don't believe in a metaphysics.

I no longer speak of reincarnation, because it's a Materialist term. Speaking of "incarnation", taken literally, implies a belief in Materialism.

Michael Ossipoff

13 M
2033 UTC

One needs no science here. — Bitter Crank

:D

Just spend an hour among humans, then spend an hour among pigs, and it becomes obvious that we are closely related. The pigs probably lost more than they gained.

No one denies that we have more recent primate ancestry.

McCarthy speaks of many, many generations of primate back-hybridization.

Maybe you should do a little reading before expounding?

The pigs probably lost more than they gained.

Whatever that means.

Our species' worst attributes seem chimp-like.

A few arbitrary morphological similarities aren’t massively convincing. — I like sushi

And it isn't just a few. It's all of the attributes by which we differ from all of the other primates.

McCarthy points out that that's a standard way to identify the other parent of a hybrid.

Michael Ossipoff

13 M
1638 UTC

A few arbitrary morphological similarities aren’t massively convincing. — I like sushi

Is that your expert professional opinion as a PhD geneticist?

Michael Ossipoff

13 M
1634

Semantics. It was an ape that was more a chimpanzee than anything else that there's a word for.

Michael Ossipoff

13 M
1620 UTC

Here's a link to McCarthy's self-introduction, listing some credentials:

http://www.macroevolution.net/about-me.html

I can't find any evidence on the web that he is a "world-class hybridization-geneticist — T Clark

Even his opponents on that issue acknowledge it.

McCarthy, at his website, states his credentials.

Feel free to check out his website.

I'm not a biologist or geneticist, but I am certain that pigs cannot interbreed with chimpanzees and produce fertile offspring. — T Clark

You're certain that that established hybridization geneticist is wrong. What are your credentials in hybridization-genetics?

To re-paste an earlier answer:

Be specific. McCarthy is a world-class hybridization-geneticist. Where do you find that he's wrong?

Michael Ossipoff

12 Su
2009 UTC

Since I've mostly retired, I lose track of time sometimes. When I read the OP, I thought maybe it was actually April 1. — T Clark

The proximity to April 1st is purely coincidental.

I have read in a number of places that geneticists have determined that about 4% of the human genetic makeup comes from Neanderthals. There may also be a contribution from Denisovians. Do you really think they would have overlooked pig DNA?

As i said in my initial post: Commonly and typically, many generations of back-hybridizations will eliminate any gene-sequence difference from the parent species to which the back-hybridization happened. As I said, the remaining anatomical differences from that parent species result from differences in amounts of genes, not in the gene-sequence.

Typically, then, the only evidence of a long back-hybridized hybridization is anatomical, not gene-sequence.

Horses cannot mate with donkeys and give birth to fertile offspring, but you want us to believe that pigs and chimps can?

Mules are an unusual exceptionally infertile hybrid. As I said, inter-order hybridization isn't unknown.

Here's another reason to miss TimeLine. She would have opened up a can of Australian whup ass on this pseudo-science in three seconds.

I'll paste here what I said in reply to Nils Loc:

What are your credentials to say that an established hybridization-geneticist is pseudo-scientific?

Be specific. McCarthy is a world-class hybridization-geneticist. Where do you find that he's wrong?

Michael Ossipoff

12 Su
1924 UTC

Yes, the suggestion is that that survivable initial hybrid that was our ancestor was a female. ...because there's no cost for a male to impregnate a female (...whereas a female must critically-evaluate any male that she let's impregnate her).

Likewise, subsequent reproduction by the hybrid animals was female hybrids with male chimps, for the same reason. Resulting in continuing back-hybridization with the chimp line.

A chimp, compared to a pig, is better equipped to care for a nearly unsurvivable offspring,and so it's likely that that first surviving hybrid had a pig father and a chimp mother. But the back-hybridizations were probably chimp male with hybrid female, for the reason described in the above paragraphs.

Michael Ossipoff

12 Su
1900 UTC

That sounds like the extent of the "evidence" he's presenting. At least per the article you're quoting. — Terrapin Station

No. What you quoted isn't even the extent of the evidence that I stated in my post.

Check McCarthy's articles--Human Origins, and The Other Parent, linked to at the bottom of Human Origins.

By the way, McCarthy describes pig pelvic-structural differences that, by chance, not by natural selection for that purpose, had the potential to facilitate upright posture. ...and skull-structure that likewise differed from that of chimpanzees. Sometimes two different species have different unshared attributes which, when combined, facilitate fortuitous opportunities not possible for either species alone.

Michael Ossipoff

12 Su
1832 UTC