Russia’s science and higher education ministry has dismissed the head of a prestigious genetics institute who sparked controversy by contending that humans once lived for centuries and that the shorter lives of modern humans are due to their ancestors’ sins, state news agency RIA-Novosti said Thursday.

Although the report did not give a reason for the firing of Alexander Kudryavtsev, the influential Russian Orthodox Church called it religious discrimination.

Kudryavtsev, who headed the Russian Academy of Science’s Vavilov Institute of General Genetics, made a presentation at a conference in 2023 in which he said people had lived for some 900 years prior to the era of the Biblical Flood and that “original, ancestral and personal sins” caused genetic diseases that shortened lifespans.

    • APassenger@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      That’s quite literally in the Bible. People are stated as having extraordinary lifespans (e. g., Methuselah).

      Then there was a flood after which people saw a rainbow for the first time ever. Gods promise not to flood us again.

      The implication seems to be that the earth was in a firmament bubble and the bubble burst, sending down water. Then we had direct sun and not the filtered kind that He* created us for.

      No longer in our best element, we die earlier.

      I’m not saying the above is true, I’m saying I’ve heard this for decades now and it checks out against biblical description.

    • Psythik@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      So you mean to tell me that you’re weren’t raised by hardcore Christians who drilled this “fact” down your throat well into adulthood? And that it’s our fault for being sinners so we can’t live 969 years anymore?

      You’re lucky son of a bitch, you know that, right?

      • Microplasticbrain@lemm.ee
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        10 months ago

        I was having a normal conversation with a coworker about life expectancy rising medical advancedments and what not, she pivots and says yea in the bible people lived for like a thousand years. I was just like yeah haha

    • yeehaw@lemmy.ca
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      10 months ago

      Listen. It’s not that hard. A flood happens and now we have nearly 1/10th the lifespan.

      DONT YOU GET IT?!

      /s