A Many and Varied Family Tree

Our ancestors number like the stars in the sky, and the grains of sand on the beach...

We have two parents, four grandparents, either great-grandparents, etc. Continue backwards twenty generations and the level is*1 million* people across (Actually, 1,048,576). This is a mathematical fact, 2^20. Assuming each generation is thirty years, this coexistence of T.J.-generators occurred circa 1400 A.D.

I informed a girl friend a small region of medieval Europe existed solely to create her and that it was a lovelier product than any renaissance art. I give you permission to use that one if you want.

I envision this city of 1 million strong, going about, weaving cotton, escaping Black Death, coming together to produce me as some sort of civic project. It really does shrink the world.

Even more mind-blowing: On an educational adventure to The Fernbank Science Museum a month ago, I learned that mammals evolved from reptiles (specifically, "synapsids"). Creationists have enough problems with "Jesus was not a monkey"....but a lizard? It would make their head explode.

I find it fully plausible that humans evolved from an apelike ancestor, but I've always stopped there in my mind. I realized reading that diorama caption that I've never mentally gone further down the evolutionary history trail. We've been shown illustrations of tiny rodents scurrying around in the shadow of dinosaurs, but in childrens' books this is treated as if they sprung from the dirt. It makes sense we'd come from reptiles...what else is there?

The worst movie ever, Super Mario Brothers: The Movie, had it right. Humans evolved from dinosaurs.