On cutting class(why not to) and Evolution
I was feeling particularly lazy this morning and almost succumbed to the temptation to skip biology lecture. What kept me from doing that was a combination of facts. First, the lecturer, while not taking roll specifically hands out mini-quizzes and makes it quite clear that missing too many of them adversely affects ones grade. I attended a class last semester in which I missed a significant portion of classes because the instructer did not take any sort of roll and ended up with a B, though I was sure I had done A work. So all the more reason to attend this one. Secondly, as I was mulling over the decesion of whether or not to attend class I asked myself to come up with three places that were so much worse than class as to make attending pleasurable by comparison.
1. The Dentist
2. EXPO
3. Iraq
Seeing as how I must be at 1 and 2 tommorrow and thursday respectivily and hopefully will never find myself in 3 I decided that class was not such a burden afterall. Actually it was quite enjoyable this morning. We discussed Adaptive radiation and evolution in humans. It's interesting to see som many in the class who have little or no vocal objection to evolution suddenly make perturbed noises when human beings become involved. Though I understand the discomfort, I fail to emphasize with the emotion in the statement "I didn't come form a monkey!" (read whiney voice) For one thing, they're at least technically correct though their correctness stems from a missunderstanding of evolution rather than a clear understanding of it. We do not "come from" monkeys or apes. We meaning Homo Sapiens (humans) share a common ancestor with chimpanzees. That ancestor shares a common ancestor with Gorrilas and Oranguatans. That ancestor shares a common ancestor with Gibbons, who in turn share a common ancestor with old world monkeys like baboons and Macacs.
And it's not like there were these apes that suddenly split into humans and chimps (though you wouldn't know it from looking at the President). The common ancestor of us and the now extinct Neanderthal was a type of Human called Heidleburgensis. Before him was Ergastor and Erectus. They were preceeded by Habilus and Austrolopithicus with many, many branches in between. No one just made this up. There is in fact so much DNA evidence that geographical and fossil evidence (of which there is more than enough) becomes the icing on the cake.
The fact of the matter is that all living species on the planet share common ancestors going back the the primative archea-bacteria 3.8 billion years ago.
Here's a lame and kind of - ironically - primative video I made awhile back that shows the common ancestor progression. It's based on the book The Ancestor's Tale by biologist Richard Dawkins. Remember there is lots and lots of all sorts of evidence for this. Whereas evidence for the alternatives is restricted to one or two ancient books and/or late night radio talk show crack pots.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4315010285710272757&q=ancestors+tale&hl=en
1. The Dentist
2. EXPO
3. Iraq
Seeing as how I must be at 1 and 2 tommorrow and thursday respectivily and hopefully will never find myself in 3 I decided that class was not such a burden afterall. Actually it was quite enjoyable this morning. We discussed Adaptive radiation and evolution in humans. It's interesting to see som many in the class who have little or no vocal objection to evolution suddenly make perturbed noises when human beings become involved. Though I understand the discomfort, I fail to emphasize with the emotion in the statement "I didn't come form a monkey!" (read whiney voice) For one thing, they're at least technically correct though their correctness stems from a missunderstanding of evolution rather than a clear understanding of it. We do not "come from" monkeys or apes. We meaning Homo Sapiens (humans) share a common ancestor with chimpanzees. That ancestor shares a common ancestor with Gorrilas and Oranguatans. That ancestor shares a common ancestor with Gibbons, who in turn share a common ancestor with old world monkeys like baboons and Macacs.
And it's not like there were these apes that suddenly split into humans and chimps (though you wouldn't know it from looking at the President). The common ancestor of us and the now extinct Neanderthal was a type of Human called Heidleburgensis. Before him was Ergastor and Erectus. They were preceeded by Habilus and Austrolopithicus with many, many branches in between. No one just made this up. There is in fact so much DNA evidence that geographical and fossil evidence (of which there is more than enough) becomes the icing on the cake.
The fact of the matter is that all living species on the planet share common ancestors going back the the primative archea-bacteria 3.8 billion years ago.
Here's a lame and kind of - ironically - primative video I made awhile back that shows the common ancestor progression. It's based on the book The Ancestor's Tale by biologist Richard Dawkins. Remember there is lots and lots of all sorts of evidence for this. Whereas evidence for the alternatives is restricted to one or two ancient books and/or late night radio talk show crack pots.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4315010285710272757&q=ancestors+tale&hl=en