Are You Man or Mouse?

fygment writes "... according to recent studies. It seems were more closely related to rodents than the carnivores i.e. the primates didn't evolve from the noble jungle cats, wolves, etc. Were closer to rats. Of course this has long been suspected in lawyers and SCO execs ..."

This story writeup

[skookum]

The blurb from "fygment" must have been written by a mouse, as there's hardly a complete sentence in that jumble of incoherent fragments. I find this situation has become all too common on slashdot recently. If you can't be bothered to write a cohesive paragraph with complete sentences, then stop submitting to slashdot. You may not think it's important, but when you write things that will be read by a number of people it is essential. Use whatever style you want in email or IM but if you're going to submit something for public consumption you should take the time to learn how to use English, otherwise you just come off looking like a rambling idiot.

This has been a well known fact

[mnmn]

The mammalian line forks into one group that goes on to split into felines and canines, and another that further splits into rodents and primates.

Next this poster will post an article that says Birds are closer to reptiles than to humans. I'm no biologist but I can tell when someone tries to pass an encyclopaedia fact for a breakthrough news.

Re:Recent?

[RobotWisdom]

The interesting point is that junk DNA has some still-unknown function, so the disappointing figure of 30,000 genes isn't as bad as we feared.

Regarding mice-etc, primates began as shrews who climbed trees and developed their eyesight, mammalian carnivores like cats evolved much later from the shrews that stayed on the ground.

Re: Uhh

[Black Parrot]

> That is, of course, if you buy into the farce of evolution. I've never seen a generation so inclinced to believe a lie without proof. If you'd think for yourself, and not read the textbooks, you might realize that evolution isn't even an option.

Not read the textbooks? Sounds like "stay ignorant" is the key to your plan for understanding the universe.

Re: Uhh

[Copid]

Exactly. My favorite thing about this debate is people who think that the textbooks and established science are a bad way to go. "Use common sense," they say. If science were all just common sense, people wouldn't devote their lives to scientific study. Quantum mechanics isn't common sense. Relativity is not common sense. Lay people generally accept those ideas because they see generations of physicists who have spent their lives in intensive study of those subjects, and they see the results of the work. Suddenly, when it comes to biology, everybody is enough of an expert to laugh at those silly academics.

Why people think that the core ideas of biology should be something you can accept or reject after a few minutes of armchair quarterback thought without so much as a textbook is beyond me. The arrogance is astounding.