Chimps evolving faster than humans?

Preliminary evidence shows that chimps have evolved and mutated faster than humans, which isn't all that surprising considering their life and mating cycle is slightly shorter, but apparently it looks like their genes mutate more each generation: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article1662524.ece

More research will have to be done on this before anything clear comes out of this. For the moment, I'm not buying the big hoopla that people are trying to make out of this, that they're going to overtake us evolutionarily or something.

Chimps in caves

The same chimps who learned how to use tools now have been seen seeking out caves for shelter: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18057867/.

It won't be long until they start roasting hot dogs over a fire.

The human brain, old and new

Some dude says that the KNM-ER 1470 skull should be adjusted and that the brain therefore weren't as big as originally hypothesized: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/04/070405-human-skull.html
Rafe's hero, John Hawks, and others had a great response (summation: No, you idiot!): http://johnhawks.net/weblog/fossils/habilis/er/bromage_1470_2007.html

New research shows that art classes make you a better doctor: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17707457/
So, now that they've cut all the art programs from schools, does that mean we'll have stupider doctors? :/

Richard Dawkins interview on Fresh Air

I was driving home from the store tonight and totally by accident stumbled upon Terry Gross interviewing Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist and author of such books as "The Selfish Gene" and "The God Delusion." Knowing I was going to lose the reception, I raced home, turned on my computer, and downloaded the whole show off of NPR: http://www.freshair.npr.org

I am familiar with his work but have never finished a book of his, but I sat down with my dinner and listened to his interview. These were my first reactions:

First off, he is completely unapologetic about being an Atheist. In fact, half the time I was expecting him to start screaming into the microphone, "The science is right there, you idiots!" although that wouldn't be a very proper British thing to do. While I really admired his "passion for science" as he called it, I found that it made him blind to a couple of things.
One of those things was that most people don't think like him, they don't think like scientists. It's weird because he acknowledges this in the interview, and yet some of the arguments he makes as to why there is no God only make sense or seem logical if you are a very analytical atheist that has already accepted that we must have all evolved using the Darwinian model.
The best example of this was his designer argument:" if life on Earth came from a creator, then the creator has to have been more advanced than us, and must inevitably have evolved somewhere else," which he jokingly concludes means that either we all came from aliens or we had to have just plain evolved on our own. The thing is, he points out earlier in the interview why religious people aren't going to believe that, and he doesn't even realize it. He says that religion is the easy way, the easy answer, and that it takes a lifetime to learn even an iota of how the world really works and that it isn't in fact all magic. Most humans do not have time to study how even an iota of the world works. They have children, they are starving or diseased or at war, they have to get their jobs or get their kids to daycare. So if people don't have time to study why the world works, or even read a summary about how the world works, they'll take the easiest answer they can get, that they can understand.
I do think he has interesting ideas about why we accept what we learned as a youngster so readily: Whatever our parents told us usually kept us alive, so we evolved to listen to and believe our elders.
However, calling social and cross-species morality "a blessed mistake" I think is trying to uncomplicate the idea much too much, although again the family bands/reciprocity theory he mentions makes sense, but just to say that it accidentally carried over into larger society as a whole and to other species I think is generalizing it too much.
He also said that religion is responsible for most wars. I disagree with that. I'll conceed that religion often has an influence or is used as an excuse for wars, but it is not wholly responsible for wars. Maybe the Crusades or some of the jihadists today, but many more of the jihadists are doing it for political or economic reasons.
In the end, I really felt that while Dawkins had a lot of great theories and points and ideas, and a great passion for science and studying human evolution, he is not a great arguer as to why he believes in science over religion. "Because I've looked at the facts, so I know" (actual quote) isn't a strong enough argument as to why he's right and a bunch of religious people are wrong, and that's coming from an atheist who agrees with him. He's absolutely right that the argument "God must have created eyes because eyes are so complicated," isn't any sort of argument, but you can't just respond by going, "Nu-uh!"

Also, judging by the questions Terry Gross asked, I'd say she's either religious herself, or was simply playing devil's advocate the whole time.

symmetrical dancing

Just a quick update before the day starts to get crazy. Yes, technically the sun still isn't officially rising until well after 7:30 a.m. up here in the great white north. It makes me sad.

Anyway, I found this interesting study the other day about how human dancing really isn't all that different than male birds dancing, and we're all just looking for symmetry in our potential mates: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/features/health/orl-dancedarwin07mar26,0,6232044.story?coll=sfla-news-science

Northwest Anthropological Conference

I had such a good weekend: I presented my paper to a round of applause and great questions (which I actually knew all the answers to), I got to hear about some really awesome research going on in the Pacific Northwest, and was just really inspired overall. Eastern Washington reminded me a lot of central California and some places in CA that I grew up, although the trees were wrong (in CA they would have been oak, here they were some taller deciduous), and just the knowledge that is was four hours or more away from the ocean was freaking me out. I left really nice warm sunny weather on Saturday, however, to drive home into cold wet weather, but it still felt good to be coming home.

NWAC 2007 update

I'm at the conference. I'm about to present my paper. That is all.

Boy I'm nervous.

Moody teens and fighting humans and chimps

Recent research shows that there is a biological reason that adolescents are overly-emotional, as opposed to social or psychological reasons: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/healthnews.php?newsid=65035. My response: Great, but when do they grow out of it? I know some 21-year-olds who still aren't completely over that stage.

Next, we saw the movie "300" this weekend. It was bloody, but not too bloody, and overall an entertaining film. Rafe's two reactions were very similar to mine: 1) Great translation of what a comic book looks like onto the big screen, boobs included; and 2) "That is the best piece of pro-war, specifically Irag-war, propaganda I've seen!" It was indeed very good propaganda, and as another interesting statement: All the Greeks were played by white, British-looking actors, and all the Persians were played by either Black or Arab looking people (Xerxes was a Brazilian actor). Whites good, dark skin bad? Hmmm. Iranians (modern-day Persia) agree: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17599641/?GT1=9145

Finally, an interesting study for Rafe; one anthropologist has come out with the theory that hominids and our other ancestors evolutionarily kept their short legs for so long because it made them better fighters: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17584912/.

They already had a good reach with their arms, which many scientists assumed was for staying in trees, but this is an interesting take on why we kept our long arms and short legs: to beat each other up better. Woot! I'm off to Eastern Washington tomorrow to present my paper. I'm not super-prepared, but I'm decently prepared, and have two more nights to practice my delivery.

Chimps use spears!

By popular demand: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17281240/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6387611.stm
Female and juvenile chimps in a certain troop have figured out how to hunt bush-babies with spears. They will shape a stick and sharpen it with their teeth, and then stab the stick into holes they know bush-babies live in. If the stick comes back bloody...score!
A)This is incredible!
B)Reseachers bring up the interesting point that it's females and juveniles, not typically hunters, that are doing this practice. One theory is because they weren't getting enough meat from the males, so they went out and got their own.
C)Ooh, ooh, I just thought of a horrible headline: Female Chimps Empower Themselves! Yay Chimp feminism!

Gettin' schooled

I stumbled upon THE exact/perfect Master's program that I want to/should have applied to, the only major problem being it's in London: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/anthropology/mscantleacog.htm. But then, staying close to home is probably better for getting a job right out of school, which is important.

A study was released recently that says small schools are better for students than big schools, which is a total "DUH!" to me, but I'm glad some bigwigs are saying it too. http://www.sfu.ca/mediapr/news_releases/archives/news02120702.htm. Just think, I might be a bigwig someday too! The horror! ;)

Activists the world over

Activists in Washington State are trying to pass an initiative that would annul weddings in Washington after three years if no offspring had been produced (it is in reference to arguments made by the state supreme court): http://www.queerty.com/queer/news/wash-state-gay-activist-put-marriage-to-the-test-20070206.php
They acknowledge it's silly, and even some gay activist groups have said they won't sign the petition, but even as a straight person who will probably someday get married and have kids, it's damned amusing.

Evangelical Churchies in Kenya are protesting against a skeleton uncovered by Richard Leakey in the 80's, who is claimed to be the most complete prehistoric skeleton ever found, and it's release to the public this month BECAUSE...they think it would disprove the church on creationism: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17029155/.

Jeez, these people are driving me CRAZY! "No, don't release hard science, because it'll hurt our poor little fragile egos that have to be constantly fluffed by all our adoring fans, um, I mean worshippers, um, I mean GOD's worshippers. It is God's will we close our ears and eyes to actually see how the earth is put together!" Argghhdsdlafj! I don't believe in God, but did it every occur to these people that, assuming there was a god, he might have made the earth a little bit differently than some pompous humans living 1000 years ago wrote it down? Or whenever the first written versions of the Bible came out. *takes a few deep breaths to regain composure* In other news, refugees are seeking asylum in Mauritania: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IRIN/2dd8d8fec300efb17f98d99c3f7554e4.htm Last I heard Spain finally talked Mauritania into letting them dock. My first thought was: why in the world would you want to seek refuge in Mauritania? They say most of the refugees are from Pakistan or India, and unless they're Muslim it's going to get real awkward real fast. And after listening to Tarn's stories of the place, why aren't they going anywhere else on the West Coast of Africa? I mean, yes, they were trying to get to Europe first, but why would anyone pick Mauritania as their second choice?

Love is in the air

For you "for-all-eternity" style romantics out there, archaeologists found a pair of 5000-year-old skeletons who had been buried together in a hug

And finally, in a "the love is gone" feeling, Snickers has pulled their superbowl ad because it was deemed homophobic (which it was), but GM has not pulled its suicidal robot ad, which I and others have dubbed in really, really bad taste, and really callous to people who have dealt with depression and suicidal thoughts, and just all around inappropriate.

First, researchers have discovered primate fossils in Yellowstone National Park that date back to way before the first undisputed primate (55 million years ago):
http://www.livescience.com/animalworld/070205_primitive_primate.html

I was surprised that they found this in North America, but then I only know about human migrations, but honestly I have no idea where they’ve found other primate fossils, and they have done research that shows horses actually developed in North America and then moved into Europe and Asia, so migration among the continents seems common enough.

On to humans:
This article talks about how Indian women are “renting” their wombs to infertile couples who can get a better price in India (up to $5000, versus $10,000 in the U.S.): http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16988881/, http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-surrogate19apr19,0,4100387.story?coll=la-home-headlines
These articles talk about the cultural implications, how it’s mostly lower-middle-class wives, are rich countries taking advantage of people in need, etc., which is all important, but my first thought was about the biology of it all.
More and more research is showing that the lifelong health and nutrition of the mother have a big effect on the fetus. I don’t mean to sound negative, but India is a poor country (hence why $5000 goes such a long way). The country doesn’t have a very good health care system, a lot of Indians probably don’t have very good nutrition, and living in a big Indian city like Mumbai or New Delhi is equivalent to smoking a pack of cigarettes a day! They said the majority of these women are living in Anand, which is India’s milk production capital according to Reuters, so the Anand women are possibly healthier overall because of easy access to the milk and they are possibly more prosperous than some other cities, but, bear with me here, I still think it fairly possible that by outsourcing fetus-growth services to a developing nation would result in a lesser-quality product (i.e. baby), as well as putting women at a greater risk for illness and death from the stress of carrying an extra child to term (all these surrogates already have at least one surviving child).
I have spent time in India, and have just spent months writing an article on entrepreneurship in India, and I know that in some ways India is ahead of the game, but in some ways they’re really far behind.
I could be delving into this way too much and I should also point out that so many U.S. women spend their lives drinking Coca-cola and eating McDonald’s, and their kids come out healthy (although they may not stay that way eating that crap), but it just made me stop and think.
Disclaimer: I am also not a mother, medical doctor, or even biological anthropologist, just your average cultural anthropologist who lives with an evolutionary biologist and in a community of hippies that talk about Chakras and don’t drink caffeine while pregnant (although doctors just recently decided a pregnant woman can drink up to three cups of coffee a day without potentially harming the fetus. Just shows that medicine isn’t exact).

If only women here knew it was that easy

On Orango Island, Guinea-Bissau, the women propose marriage to the man by serving them fish, and the men are culturally bound to accept:
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/02/01/guinea.marriage.ap/

I know a couple of women who would have done this to their boyfriends (or now husbands) if that actually worked in the U.S. Lucky for Rafe I am not interested in getting married anytime soon, and red palm oil is hard to find around here. ;)

Dia de los Muertos

I think this is a great holiday and needs to be observed by more people.
For those out of the know, it is a holiday in Mexico that is part of Halloween but is a little different. While Halloween and November 1st are days to honor all departed souls in general (and little kids are honored on the 1st), November 2 is a day to pay your respects to specific family members and friends who have died in the past few years. It's supposed to be about honoring and celebrating the person rather than mourning that they're gone. People put up alters with candles, sweets, or the person's favorite things, or they'll put out an extra plate of food at the dinner table, or go visit the grave and leave flowers and food and pour some favorite beverage (usually alcohol-based) onto the person's grave. Sometimes the whole family will have a picnic at the gravesite.
But as for us non-Spanish Catholics, in this age I think it's a good holiday because it allows us to slow down and think back on lost loved ones and remember why those people were awesome, and for people who do believe it lets them feel closer to the deceased, like a reunion of sorts. It's like a very odd family reunion or Christmas party.
I didn't make an alter, but I did put up La Catrina at work (a famous symbol of dia de los muertos), and have been thinking about my Aunt Peg and John Grandpa. I think they'd both appreciate a nod on this holiday.