On the Cycle of Baha'u'llah: Imagine the changes humans may go through physically as well as spiritually in 500,000 years

A man of the ages passed on this excerpt with impressions. -gw

Skull Changes Show Time of Human-Neandertal Split
http://news.nationalgeographic...
The divergence occurred 300,000 to 400,000 years ago, according to an analysis of gradual shifts in the appearance of human and Neandertal skulls.

The Cycle of Baha'u'llah is to last 500,000 years. Imagine the changes humans may go through physically as well as spiritually by then, assuming linearity alone! Yes, that's how important the appearance of the Promised One of All Ages is.

These human-Neandertal divergences talked about here are the result of random "genetic drift" mutations ( pg 1) that don't confer any survival advantage, and are separate from the latter, which in any case happened earlier for BOTH Neandertals and Humans! (See last section of article called "Not so Random" on pg 2)

I'm no simple-minded "Creationist" and neither are the profound Baha'i Teachings on this topic (which have yet to be really delved into like so many other Baha'i topics at such an early stage of history), but it does pose an interesting question: *why* is human shape changing in such a way that we look less and less like Neandertals and our closest primate cousins? Reminds me of what I've read in the Qur'an and the Baha'i Writings that say humans being are created in the best of forms... and again, in the context of the half a million years, and of "creation" being a dynamic process, it really makes me go Hmmm...and makes me want to think about it more!

{Photo: "Some 50,000 years ago, a small group of Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) camped out beneath a rock shelter in what is now western France. Neanderthals were sophisticated toolmakers and even prepared animal hides, which they used as clothing." Uploaded on March 9, 2007 by wallyg on flickr, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic}