The Scientist

Duh!  We know that populations, perhaps even our own species, falter when they maintain too little variation, deleterious or otherwise.  Genetic variability is a fitness variable significant at the species level.  It is hard to imagine a factor so important that depends on something as inconsistent as ambient radiation sources to assert itself.  The problem here lies not primarily with statistical error or experimental design, but rather with outdated evolutionary theory that stubbornly adheres to the idea that the only valid context for evolution is the lone individual.  No doubt the idea of the the individual über alles is a comfort to the Social Darwinist clique always eager to claim individual superiority and discount collective realities.

Duh!  We know that populations, perhaps even our own species, falter when they maintain too little variation, deleterious or otherwise.  Genetic variability is a fitness variable significant at the species level.  It is hard to imagine a factor so important that depends on something as inconsistent as ambient radiation sources to assert itself.  The problem here lies not primarily with statistical error or experimental design, but rather with outdated evolutionary theory that stubbornly adheres to the idea that the only valid context for evolution is the lone individual.  No doubt the idea of the the individual über alles is a comfort to the Social Darwinist clique always eager to claim individual superiority and discount collective realities.

Duh!  We know that populations, perhaps even our own species, falter when they maintain too little variation, deleterious or otherwise.  Genetic variability is a fitness variable significant at the species level.  It is hard to imagine a factor so important that depends on something as inconsistent as ambient radiation sources to assert itself.  The problem here lies not primarily with statistical error or experimental design, but rather with outdated evolutionary theory that stubbornly adheres to the idea that the only valid context for evolution is the lone individual.  No doubt the idea of the the individual über alles is a comfort to the Social Darwinist clique always eager to claim individual superiority and discount collective realities.

On Culture and Genetics, Horses and Wagon

 

If I told you once, I told you a million times:

It’s The Horses Pulling, Not The Wagon Pushing

 

 

I.

Lasting Evolutionary Change Takes About One Million Years

http://www.sciencedaily.com/re...

“The exact cause of these long-term, persistent evolutionary
changes is not certain.â€쳌

 

Getting Inside the Mind (and Up the Nose) of Our Ancient
Ancestors

http://www.sciencedaily.com/re...   

“"This is the first real evidence for the steps that
led to the evolutionary origin of jawed vertebrates.â€쳌

 

II.

Right-Handedness
Evolution

by dovhenis on
March 24, 2011

Right-Handedness
Evolution

Culture-Genetics
Relationship

http://universe-life.com/2011/...

Nov 12 2009 (http://www.the-scientist.com/c...

A. From
"Aping the Stone Age"
http://www.sciencenews.org/vie...

Chimp chasers
join artifact extractors to probe the roots of stone tools:

Converging
lines of evidence indicate that wild chimps indeed invent distinctive types of
tools within communities, and these tools get passed from one generation to the
next as a kind of cultural legacy.

For roughly
50,000 generations, Oldowan toolmaking techniques got passed from hominid experts
to novices. In recent experiments, it was found that captive chimps display a
similar capacity for learning how to use tools by observing more experienced
comrades.

One of the
projects combines chimp, hominid and modern human data to explore the enduring
mystery of why most people are right-handed. Judging by stone tools, by at
least 120,000 years ago right-handedness frequently occurred among Neandertals,
and archaeological record from ancient Homo sapiens that lived during the same
time as Neandertals shows similar signs of a right-handed skew. Most Oldowan
toolmakers from nearly 2 million years ago were probably right-handed. However,
whereas wild chimp communities display a variety of hand preferences, a trend
of relatively stronger right- and left-handedness does appear in chimp groups
that regularly use tools, such as nut-cracking stones or sticks for poking into
termite mounds to remove the edible insects.

Researchers
suspect that "specific genes contribute to human hand preferences".
Uomini hypothesizes that people and chimps share a genetic propensity to use
one hand more than another on tasks that demand dexterity. Genes for
right-handedness, though, have evolved in humans alone, she proposes.

B. Adnauseam,
it is culture that drives genetic changes, NOT genetics that drives cultural
changes

"Specific
genes contribute to human hand preferences"? Read this above abstract
again and again. Note: First comes culture. Genetics follows culture. Genes
propagate in an expression conformation that maintains their evolved energy
constraint level. If/when their higher stratum take-off organism attains an enhanced
level of energy constraint the genes modify their expressions accordingly. This
is the drive and direction of life's evolution. This is how the horses are
harnessed, to the front of the wagon, not to the rear.

C. And also
adnauseam, right-handedness is NOT an enduring mystery
http://www.articlesbase.com/sc...

Just as life's
chirality was the best energy-constraining product of the early organisms,
direct sun-energy fueled independent RNA genes, and therefore it was selected to
survive, so a preferred-tools-handedness proved energetically advantageous, and
since it happened to start with right-handedness it has been since then
inducing genetic expression adjustment. And since humans, and even primates,
are just fresh young novel organisms on Earth, the process is still going on,
not yet completed. Just wait and see. When you return to Earth one-two million
years from now you'll hardly find any left-handed people.

 

Dov Henis

(Comments From
The 22nd Century)

http://universe-life.com/

While I have little to say about the results of this study, I wish to applaud the authors.  With all the cases of research errors and bias being uncovered with penalties assessed,  it is a refreshing bit of candor that the authors, rechecked their work,  found errors, then retracted their papers along with a discussion of the source of the problem.  They are to be commended for their efforts.  I for one hope they are well rewarded for their future efforts in the field.  I only wish that other researchers would emulate their behavior. Science would be all the better for the effort.

On Culture and Genetics, Horses and Wagon

 

If I told you once, I told you a million times:

It’s The Horses Pulling, Not The Wagon Pushing

 

 

I.

Lasting Evolutionary Change Takes About One Million Years

http://www.sciencedaily.com/re...

“The exact cause of these long-term, persistent evolutionary
changes is not certain.â€쳌

 

Getting Inside the Mind (and Up the Nose) of Our Ancient
Ancestors

http://www.sciencedaily.com/re...   

“"This is the first real evidence for the steps that
led to the evolutionary origin of jawed vertebrates.â€쳌

 

II.

Right-Handedness
Evolution

by dovhenis on
March 24, 2011

Right-Handedness
Evolution

Culture-Genetics
Relationship

http://universe-life.com/2011/...

Nov 12 2009 (http://www.the-scientist.com/c...

A. From
"Aping the Stone Age"
http://www.sciencenews.org/vie...

Chimp chasers
join artifact extractors to probe the roots of stone tools:

Converging
lines of evidence indicate that wild chimps indeed invent distinctive types of
tools within communities, and these tools get passed from one generation to the
next as a kind of cultural legacy.

For roughly
50,000 generations, Oldowan toolmaking techniques got passed from hominid experts
to novices. In recent experiments, it was found that captive chimps display a
similar capacity for learning how to use tools by observing more experienced
comrades.

One of the
projects combines chimp, hominid and modern human data to explore the enduring
mystery of why most people are right-handed. Judging by stone tools, by at
least 120,000 years ago right-handedness frequently occurred among Neandertals,
and archaeological record from ancient Homo sapiens that lived during the same
time as Neandertals shows similar signs of a right-handed skew. Most Oldowan
toolmakers from nearly 2 million years ago were probably right-handed. However,
whereas wild chimp communities display a variety of hand preferences, a trend
of relatively stronger right- and left-handedness does appear in chimp groups
that regularly use tools, such as nut-cracking stones or sticks for poking into
termite mounds to remove the edible insects.

Researchers
suspect that "specific genes contribute to human hand preferences".
Uomini hypothesizes that people and chimps share a genetic propensity to use
one hand more than another on tasks that demand dexterity. Genes for
right-handedness, though, have evolved in humans alone, she proposes.

B. Adnauseam,
it is culture that drives genetic changes, NOT genetics that drives cultural
changes

"Specific
genes contribute to human hand preferences"? Read this above abstract
again and again. Note: First comes culture. Genetics follows culture. Genes
propagate in an expression conformation that maintains their evolved energy
constraint level. If/when their higher stratum take-off organism attains an enhanced
level of energy constraint the genes modify their expressions accordingly. This
is the drive and direction of life's evolution. This is how the horses are
harnessed, to the front of the wagon, not to the rear.

C. And also
adnauseam, right-handedness is NOT an enduring mystery
http://www.articlesbase.com/sc...

Just as life's
chirality was the best energy-constraining product of the early organisms,
direct sun-energy fueled independent RNA genes, and therefore it was selected to
survive, so a preferred-tools-handedness proved energetically advantageous, and
since it happened to start with right-handedness it has been since then
inducing genetic expression adjustment. And since humans, and even primates,
are just fresh young novel organisms on Earth, the process is still going on,
not yet completed. Just wait and see. When you return to Earth one-two million
years from now you'll hardly find any left-handed people.

 

Dov Henis

(Comments From
The 22nd Century)

http://universe-life.com/

While I have little to say about the results of this study, I wish to applaud the authors.  With all the cases of research errors and bias being uncovered with penalties assessed,  it is a refreshing bit of candor that the authors, rechecked their work,  found errors, then retracted their papers along with a discussion of the source of the problem.  They are to be commended for their efforts.  I for one hope they are well rewarded for their future efforts in the field.  I only wish that other researchers would emulate their behavior. Science would be all the better for the effort.

On Culture and Genetics, Horses and Wagon

 

If I told you once, I told you a million times:

It’s The Horses Pulling, Not The Wagon Pushing

 

 

I.

Lasting Evolutionary Change Takes About One Million Years

http://www.sciencedaily.com/re...

“The exact cause of these long-term, persistent evolutionary
changes is not certain.â€쳌

 

Getting Inside the Mind (and Up the Nose) of Our Ancient
Ancestors

http://www.sciencedaily.com/re...   

“"This is the first real evidence for the steps that
led to the evolutionary origin of jawed vertebrates.â€쳌

 

II.

Right-Handedness
Evolution

by dovhenis on
March 24, 2011

Right-Handedness
Evolution

Culture-Genetics
Relationship

http://universe-life.com/2011/...

Nov 12 2009 (http://www.the-scientist.com/c...

A. From
"Aping the Stone Age"
http://www.sciencenews.org/vie...

Chimp chasers
join artifact extractors to probe the roots of stone tools:

Converging
lines of evidence indicate that wild chimps indeed invent distinctive types of
tools within communities, and these tools get passed from one generation to the
next as a kind of cultural legacy.

For roughly
50,000 generations, Oldowan toolmaking techniques got passed from hominid experts
to novices. In recent experiments, it was found that captive chimps display a
similar capacity for learning how to use tools by observing more experienced
comrades.

One of the
projects combines chimp, hominid and modern human data to explore the enduring
mystery of why most people are right-handed. Judging by stone tools, by at
least 120,000 years ago right-handedness frequently occurred among Neandertals,
and archaeological record from ancient Homo sapiens that lived during the same
time as Neandertals shows similar signs of a right-handed skew. Most Oldowan
toolmakers from nearly 2 million years ago were probably right-handed. However,
whereas wild chimp communities display a variety of hand preferences, a trend
of relatively stronger right- and left-handedness does appear in chimp groups
that regularly use tools, such as nut-cracking stones or sticks for poking into
termite mounds to remove the edible insects.

Researchers
suspect that "specific genes contribute to human hand preferences".
Uomini hypothesizes that people and chimps share a genetic propensity to use
one hand more than another on tasks that demand dexterity. Genes for
right-handedness, though, have evolved in humans alone, she proposes.

B. Adnauseam,
it is culture that drives genetic changes, NOT genetics that drives cultural
changes

"Specific
genes contribute to human hand preferences"? Read this above abstract
again and again. Note: First comes culture. Genetics follows culture. Genes
propagate in an expression conformation that maintains their evolved energy
constraint level. If/when their higher stratum take-off organism attains an enhanced
level of energy constraint the genes modify their expressions accordingly. This
is the drive and direction of life's evolution. This is how the horses are
harnessed, to the front of the wagon, not to the rear.

C. And also
adnauseam, right-handedness is NOT an enduring mystery
http://www.articlesbase.com/sc...

Just as life's
chirality was the best energy-constraining product of the early organisms,
direct sun-energy fueled independent RNA genes, and therefore it was selected to
survive, so a preferred-tools-handedness proved energetically advantageous, and
since it happened to start with right-handedness it has been since then
inducing genetic expression adjustment. And since humans, and even primates,
are just fresh young novel organisms on Earth, the process is still going on,
not yet completed. Just wait and see. When you return to Earth one-two million
years from now you'll hardly find any left-handed people.

 

Dov Henis

(Comments From
The 22nd Century)

http://universe-life.com/

While I have little to say about the results of this study, I wish to applaud the authors.  With all the cases of research errors and bias being uncovered with penalties assessed,  it is a refreshing bit of candor that the authors, rechecked their work,  found errors, then retracted their papers along with a discussion of the source of the problem.  They are to be commended for their efforts.  I for one hope they are well rewarded for their future efforts in the field.  I only wish that other researchers would emulate their behavior. Science would be all the better for the effort.