"Are we all related?"

If you accept evolution, then all animals are related when you look back far enough.

If you believe the Biblical creation story, then as far as I can tell, you still have to at least conclude that all humans are related. There were only two people in the beginning, Adam and Eve, so all human genetic material that didn't come from mutations must have come from them, which means the first few generations would've had to be pretty incestuous. Talk about original sin!

I won't speak to the detailed of the Creationist point of view, but it's implicit in the Bible that humanity would have bottlenecked twice, once at Adam and Eve and again with Noah and his kids. So yeah, we'd all be related, and the first few generations after each bottleneck would have necessarily practiced some inbreeding to continue the species.

From an evolutionary viewpoint, we still necessarily have a a common ancestor somewhere back in the woodpile. No one special, but it's a mathematical certainty that unless two populations of humans evolved parallel to each other from completely separate lines of decent from there very beginning of life (which is both highly unlikely and not evidenced. Our DNA proves we share a common decent), there would be a single individual who is the most common recent ancestor for all of us. That individual wasn't the first human, just some random human who's descendants succeeded, where his/her cousins' or neighbors' descendants did not continue in an unbroken line down to today. When this individual lived is difficult to calculate, but recent estimates put him or her at only a few thousand years ago. Please note, that's just a date for the most recent human being who we can all trace in our family trees. That individual was by no means the first human, and he or she would have been one of millions alive at the time.

We also have a most common female ancestor in Mitchondrial Eve and a most common male ancestor in Y-Chromosome Adam. Mitochondrial Eve is the woman from whom the mitochondrial DNA (passed exclusively from mother to offspring) derives. She was no more special than our general most recent common ancestor, but the luck of the draw has it that we can all trace our maternal linages back to her. Genetic drift is fairly well understood, enough to act like a sort of molecular clock over large periods of time, so we can estimate based on our current array of mitochondrial DNA that Mitochondrial Eve must have lived about 140,000 years ago.

Y-Chromosome Adam is similar to Mitochondrial Eve in that he's the most common ancestor from whom all current Y chromosomes found in men today have descended. The molecular clock puts him at about 60,000-90,000 years ago. Again, he was no one special. He, Mitochondrial Eve, and our general most common recent ancestor did not know each other, and we don't know exactly who they were. We just know that logically, mathematically, they must have existed.

Brothers and sisters in humanity.

Yes - we are all related.  We all have common ancestors and that ancestry is what makes us related.  If we look at this from an evolutionary perspective - we are related to every living thing on Earth.

From a Christian view - we are related in the sense of adam and eve and all that rot.... But what about inbreeding?  The Christian answer to this - is that Adam and Eve were genetically pure and that their genetic purity allowed for inbreeding without the normal problems we experience today.  



There is also the Cain and Lillith line - which is another story all together.  The idea being that while Adam and Eve were considered the first - there were others - elsewhere - the Lilith (THE REAL FIRST WOMAN) myth. 



anyway:
Thanks for fun question....

Forget about Adam and EvE!

Why Andean religions, or Muslims, or Botswana people does not have Adam and Eve on their beliefs? Is that we are the owners of the truth???

 

Acts 17: 26 tells us God has made all of us from one blood.  This means all of us are the same ... we are all children of Adam and Eve.  Adam and Eve had sons and daughters and these would have married each other.  The problem of incest would not be such a problem at that point because being early in the process of populating the world there would be few genetic defects to pass on.  Mitochordrial Eve is evidence that every person living on earth was descended from one woman.  I know evolutionists will argue --- well there may have been other woman and men around who did not leave descendents or whose line did not continue to today ---- and so we as creationists cannot claim this as PROOF that every person who EVER LIVED descended from this women yet what is significant is that there is no evidence to the contrary.  Meaning that though science does not prove everyone (who ever lived) descended from one women it seems very strongly to be saying all alive today descended from one women and nothing RULES OUT that everyone who ever lived could have descended from one women, therefore confirming, if not quite proving, the Biblical account to be true.

 

This also speaks to the so-called issue of races.  According to the Bible there is only ONE RACE of humans, according to science there is actually only one color --- melanin in different amounts makes up the different shades of brown we all are.  Albinos actually have a genetic defect that leaves them without melanin, everyone else just has different amounts of melanin. 

 

Mitochondrial Eve -

 

http://www.answersingenesis.org/e-mail/archive/answersupdate/2006/0527.asp

 

Only One Race -

 

http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/OneBlood/index.asp