Ken Ham Blog, 3/7/24
What is humanity’s biggest threat? Well, it seems to be a new one every week, if you believe everything the media says. (Of course, our biggest threat is our sin problem!) Consider, for example, this attention-grabbing headline: “Humans Could Become Extinct Unless We Change Sex as We Know It.” What is this talking about?
Well, it’s referring to the Y chromosome, one of the two sex chromosomes in humans. It’s this chromosome (and the genes on it) that makes a male a male (males have an XY pair of sex chromosomes, females have XX), and apparently, “it’s degenerating in humans and may disappear in a few million years, which could lead to our extinction.” What’s the solution? “We [need to] evolve a new sex gene. Fast.”
Of course, this is entirely based on false evolutionary assumptions regarding shared ancestry and millions of years. When the evolutionary model is applied to the Y chromosome, it’s estimated that it has lost 10 genes every 1 million years. If that rate continues, in 4.5 million years, the Y chromosome will have completely degenerated.
But, as is often the case, the evolutionary story is not consistent. While claiming that 10 genes are lost every 1 million years, the article points out that:
Our Y chromosome has lost only one gene since humans and rhesus monkeys diverged evolutionarily 25 million years ago.
Furthermore, it hasn’t lost any genes since the divergence of chimpanzees 6 million years ago.
But this is just evolutionary storytelling! If we don’t really share a lineage (which we don’t) with all other life on earth and our Y chromosome didn’t evolve from a different chromosome, then data regarding Y chromosome mutations and mutation rates needs to be interpreted through a different lens. And, of course, that lens is the perfect history God has given us in his Word. In a biblical worldview, we understand that our genome (including the Y chromosome) was created perfect but has degenerated because of mutations over the past 6,000 years due to living in a cursed and fallen creationbecause of sin.
And actually, it’s this framework that makes sense of the evidence! Geneticist Dr. Nathaniel Jeanson has actually looked at mutation rates in the Y chromosome and, using the biblical timescale, has been able to find genetic time stamps of known historical events on the Y chromosome. It’s phenomenal, groundbreaking research that’s only possible if you start with a young earth and a biblical timescale of just thousands of years. If you start with the idea that we diverged from rhesus monkeys 25 million years ago and chimps 6 million years ago, you can never do the research Dr. Jeanson is doing! I encourage you to read all about it in his book Traced or by watching his fascinating YouTube series.
A shrinking, mutated Y chromosome is not humanity’s biggest threat. But those mutations are a reminder that we no longer live in a perfect world. Everything, even our genetics, is affected by sin in creation. But, praise God, he provided a Savior in his Son, Jesus Christ. His Son took the ultimate penalty for our sin—death—for us when he died on the cross. His death perfectly satisfied God’s just wrath against sin, then he rose again and now offers the free gift of eternal life to everyone who puts their faith and trust in him.
And remember, God is in control of history. God determines what will happen on this planet. And one day, life on this sin-cursed earth will end when Jesus returns and makes a new heavens and earth.
If you’ve never come to Christ for salvation, recognize your biggest threat is the sinthat separates you from a holy God and come to Christ today!
Any arguments based on evolutionary scientism will be false ones. This is just another false argument that seeks to establish more than two sexes, which is neither natural nor scientific.