Chimps Evolved More Than Humans

jas_public writes "Since the human and chimp families split about 6 million years ago, chimpanzee genes seem to have evolved more than human genes. The results, detailed in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, go against the conventional wisdom that humans are the result of a high degree of genetic selection, evidenced by our relatively large brains, cognitive abilities, and bipedalism. The researchers found that 'substantially more genes in chimps evolved in ways that were beneficial than was the case with human genes.'"

Creationists

[by Anonymous Coward]

The researchers found that 'substantially more genes in chimps evolved in ways that were beneficial than was the case with human genes.'"

Well, that explains the creationists, anyway...

Evolution vs Inteligence Re:Creationists

[Forge (2456)]

Once man learned to manipulate his environment rather than evolve to fit it, the rate of human evolution slowed down. Not only that but it started going in strange directions.

Think about it. Gazels have been getting faster because the slowest gazel ends up in a Lions stomach before mating season. Humans have devised ways to protect even our paraplegics.

A chimp with the physical limitations of Stephen Hawkins would be lunch. As a human he not only survives but has managed to reproduce and even maintains high ranking in our social order.

Think about it. If you can be an Alpha Male without even being able to stand then genetic features become less relevant in determining who reproduces. Dramatically slowing the process of human evolution.

As for direction. Our professional athletes, scientists and Engineers produce far fewer children than those at the bottom of our social order. For the sake of our species, I would advise you all (Creationists and Evolutionist) to pray (To Jesus or Darwin) that human intelligence is not seriously impacted by our genetic makeup. If it is our society will collapse when we are no longer able to maintain what our parents built.

Re:Evolution vs Inteligence Re:Creationists

[smallpaul (65919)]

Our professional athletes, scientists and Engineers produce far fewer children than those at the bottom of our social order. For the sake of our species, I would advise you all (Creationists and Evolutionist) to pray (To Jesus or Darwin) that human intelligence is not seriously impacted by our genetic makeup.

What makes you think that people at the bottom of our social order necessarily have "lesser" genes than those at the top? Your reference to professional athletes is especially telling.

It's not "lesser/greater" its the strange evolutio

[alexhmit01 (104757)]

The traits that our capitalist society rewards (excellence in a field gives extreme wealth, and competence in certain people oriented skills trumps competence in technical fields, etc.) is the appearance of socially what we want. If the pay is better, the supply should increase. However, if you look at birth patterns, things that correspond with higher birthrates are: religion (more => more children), region of country, etc. Traits that are NEGATIVELY correlated are education (more education, for women especially, lowers birth rates), income, etc.

Even MORE interesting is the rate of genetic diversity. The crew most decried by the family values crew (the single mother with multiple children from different fathers) has interestingly creating more genetic diversity. Gentlemen like "K-fed" are producing multiple offspring with multiple women, ensuring their genetic diversity.

This is interesting because after generations of decreasing religiosity, increasing education, and healthier people living longer, it looks like those same biological forces are shrinking those characteristics. There was an amusing editorial a few years ago suggesting that Roe v. Wade destroyed the Democratic party, NOT because abortions were unpopular, but because they were popular. Because of the high correlation of political views with those of the parents, the the correlation of being a Democrat with abortion (roughly 2-3 times more likely to have an abortion if a Democrat than a Republican), then 18 year after Roe v. Wade we found a shrinking pool of Democrats.

Similarly, the higher birthrates of fundamentalists of all religions is causing a slow reversal of post-enlightenment reforms and changes in religious communities. The "mainstream Protestant Churches" are losing numbers, the Catholics are holding steady overall, but their growth is in South America and Africa, while their presence in Europe shrinks and American Catholics are increasing of Latin origin, Judaism has watched a growth of its Orthodox wing (from about 8% 20 years ago to close to 15% of Jews), which itself has been shifting rightward, and Muslim growth rates are outstripping everyone.

Basically. out secular atheistic culture has reached such a pinnacle of self indulgence and freedom that it might actually shrink itself. The American Left is constantly blaming the Bush administration, but the cultural shifts underneath America demonstrate that demographics and not demagoguery is actually causing the reactionary political pull.

It's very interesting, but I find it the HEIGHT of irony that the bible-thumping anti-evolutionary wings of all religions, that were marginal a generation ago, are suddenly making gains, while the secular, science and reason based culture with decades of dominance after WW2 finds itself on the retreat, and the REASON is that the anti-evolution crew is spreading their genetic material and creating offspring to advance their agenda, and the pro-science pro-evolution crew is cutting off their genetic material with families of 0-2 children.

In fact, most disturbing is that the men that engage in the most socially irresponsible behavior -- serial cheating, divorce, etc., are generally fathering many more children than those that "play by the rules." So with whatever genetic material influences behavior, we're going to find each generation a little more adulterous...

If current trends continue, which of course they will NOT, things will swing the otherway, but amusingly, in 4 or 5 generations, we'll have a general population of non-white, deeply religious Americas who going to Church/Synagogue/Mosques regularly, while engaging in adulterous relationships during the week. :) But seriously, if you think that the religious right is bad now, well in 50-60 years, if they continue to have double the birth rate or more as secular America... well they WILL be the majority in time...

Amusing amateur demographic observations...
Alex

Re:It's not "lesser/greater" its the strange evolu

[jotok (728554)]

I think they're spot-on, if a bit verbose.

Summary:
Reactionary and generally stupid people mate more, and thus have more offspring. This is a system with a positive feedback loop since the next generation of K-Feds and Britneys will also likely get pregnant and work shitty jobs (moreso than make it to Harvard).
Whereas, progressive and generally smart people may fuck as much (or more) but do not mate as much. This system also has a feedback loop.

Note that it is the PROGRESSIVE attitude towards sex (whatever, whenever) coupled (heh) with STUPIDITY that leads to the dumb outbreeding the smart.

Re:It's not "lesser/greater" its the strange evolu

[Profound (50789)]

>> if you could only find a credible link about intelligence being hereditary

Yes, this isn't immediately obvious so we need to raise a monkey and a baby human together and see which grows up to be smarter!

Re:It's not "lesser/greater" its the strange evolu

[Profound (50789)]

>> I can't remember his name at the moment. But there was a scientist who raised a chimpanzee along side his own son. He discontinued the experiment after his son started immitating it

George Bush Senior?

Re:Evolution vs Inteligence Re:Creationists

[veganboyjosh (896761)]

Your selecting for different genes. Instead of beign faster, stronger, tougher. You get smarter, craftier, less moral, hornier, and better looking. Since these tend to be the features that get you more kids. Although the pressure in those direction would be weaker because you dont' get killed if your below a certain IQ. The pressure is weaker.

Where do the smart genes come in to play again?

Re:Evolution vs Inteligence Re:Creationists

[TodMinuit (1026042)]

You're assuming he's human. In fact, he's a beowulf cluster of chimps typing away on keyboards.

Re:Evolution vs Inteligence Re:Creationists

[julesh (229690)]

Can you run Linux on chimps now? That's evolution in action, I guess.

Re:Evolution vs Inteligence Re:Creationists

[$RANDOMLUSER (804576)]

Ubchimptu and Chimpdrake both run on chimp hardware.

Hey! You forgot Gentoo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo!

Re:Evolution vs Intelligence

[Kandenshi (832555)]

Neuroscience student here, and yes there do appear to be some growth of new neurons in the adult brain, but at vastly reduced numbers. While we have pretty good evidence for neurogenesis(birth of new neurons) in most parts of the primate brain, there's somewhat less good evidence for it in the neocortex of humans. silly ethics rules slow research down! >;(

There's also somewhat debateable data on what these new neurons do exactly. What the consequences of them are. The data on their being related to learning/memory and such is a bit muddy. They do get functionally integrated in other species anyway, and there seems to be a link to depression. Possibly lower neurogenesis is what mediates stress inducing depression. And the lag of a few weeks before alot of the SSRIs begin to work seems to fit with the few weeks needed for new neurons to be made and mature.

And just to clear one other thing up, these new neurons aren't being made from mature neurons undergoing mitosis and splitting in two. They're made from multipotent stem cells in the dentate gyrus and along the subventricular zone.

As for humans evolving to become smarter, I'm not really sure that being smarted conveys much evolutionary fitness. After all, don't most /.ers consider themselves to be a bit smarter than average? And the running joke for years has been that none of them get laid. :P Besides, the smart ones are the people who'll use birth control properly right? Instead of just accidently knocking someone up.

Re:Creationists

[Marxist Hacker 42 (638312)]

I don't think that counts when it's your species domesticating your local environment to fit your current genes. The rest just makes sense- the chimps, without major building projects and air conditioning, were forced to evolve to fit local conditions. Mankind, who had these luxuries in various forms over the last 50,000 years or so, didn't need to evolve-he changed his environment instead of changing his body.

can't walk without shoes?????

[myowntrueself (607117)]

Fleshy feet that cant walk along most surfaces without shoes

Bull *shit*.

Maybe your pansy, city-slicker feet are too soft and lily-white for you to stand to walk barefoot long enough for you to adapt but I've lived barefoot a fair bit in my life and a LOT of people walk barefoot on surfaces which you may not think possible.

There are a couple of factors which contribute: the toughness of the soles of your feet will improve quite a lot and the way in which you walk counts for a lot as well. Then theres being observant.

Most people going barefoot for the first time over rough or sharp surfaces, such as rocky coastlines or dirt roads, try to walk in the same style as they walk when wearing shoes; this is going to lead to pain and injury. They are also used to being able to walk pretty much without looking where they are going.

After watching how 'native' people walk barefoot I realised that it helps a lot to put the foot down fairly flatly, not heel first but as if you are trying to plant the whole surface of the foot on the ground at the same time.

Then you have to look ahead of yourself and get used to having a view of the world which includes the surface of the ground which you are about to step on. People in 'civilised' parts of the world are *incredibly* unobservant and self-absorbed. *INCREDIBLY*. Walking barefoot with your head in the clouds is going to get you hurt.

I've found myself able to walk on sharp, bare, volcanic rock with no pain or injury even with deconditioned (ie: softened) soles of my feet (after not going barefoot for a long time) merely by looking where I'm going and treading properly.

Proof!

[Psmylie (169236)]

All that means is that we perfected our design sooner than the chimps did.

Once again, we prove our vast superiority over the monkeys!

...

Apes! I meant apes!

dammit...

Difficult concept: that more complex != better

[jakosc (649857)]

I work in a closely related field, and it's very hard even for those who work on evolutionary biology to hold in our minds the idea that things don't evolve towards greater complexity (with human beings at the pinacle), they evolve towards whatever works.

Often people giving scientific talks about some detailed aspect of evolutionary biology slip into terms like 'primative' and correct themselves with 'simple'. I think part of this is because we tend to organize organisms by appearance, and before the genomic era this was the only thing we had to go on. We now know that many of the organisms that seem simple have the same or greater gene complexity as ourselves.

Sometimes I think Evolution needs a better iconic image than the ape to man progression [google.com]

Re:Difficult concept: that more complex != better

[TheMeuge (645043)]

Exactly. People tend to think of evolution as having some sort of a goal, an endpoint of a "perfect" being.

In reality, there is no "evolution" in the way that people understand it. There is natural selection, which results in changes that create animals that are more adapted to their environment. In this sense, it doesn't matter that chimps' genes have changed more than ours, because by developing a sophisticated brain capable of reasoning we have sidestepped the need for much of the adaptations chimps may have had to undergo. Once we learned to shape our environment to our tastes, rather than change ourselves, the game was over.

Conventional wisdom?

[2nd Post! (213333)]

It's only conventional if you don't understand evolution.

The selective pressures on both species were/are different so different amounts of evolution will occur.

Simple selection pressure

[sakdoctor (1087155)]

Our relatively large brains, cognitive abilities, and bipedalism has allowed us to avoid selection pressure to a greater degree than the chimps.

Re:Simple selection pressure

[2nd Post! (213333)]

Which means our genepool is larger just in case there is a need for a classically unselected gene.

GWB is happy

[LiquidCoooled (634315)]

George Bush's family are preparing a statement:

"Nerrrrr nerrrrr told you we were better!!!"

It's all in your perspective

[by Anonymous Coward]

"On the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But, conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons." - Douglas Adams

Remember how evolution works!

[Chemisor (97276)]

It should be remembered that in the context of evolution, "beneficial" always refers to an individual's ability to pass along his genes through reproduction. And, as most of Slashdot readers surely know from personal experience, larger brains and advanced cognitive abilities are not particularly beneficial in this task.

Re:Humor?

[eln (21727)]

It is classified as Humor because it was posted by kdawson, whose method of category selection is, ironically, very similar to monkeys throwing feces at a wall.

Re:The real question is...

[i_should_be_working (720372)]

Because they don't have blogs. Yet.