22 OCT 2024 by ideonexus
Why Humans Evolved to be Active
Humans of all to be much more physically active than our ape ancestors. Typical chimpanzee walks maybe two to three kilometers a day, and they take maybe what, three, 4,000 steps a day. A typical hunter-gatherer takes about 15 to 20,000 steps a day. Per kilo hunter-gatherers spend about twice as much energy per kilo on being physically active per day than our ape cousins. And importantly, that physical activity occurs as we age, right? So Americans are pretty inactive, as we all know. A typ...28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Better to be a Perfected Ape than Degraded Adam
As for me ... I would much rather be a perfected ape than a degraded Adam. Yes, if it is shown to me that my humble ancestors were quadrupedal animals, arboreal herbivores, brothers or cousins of those who were also the ancestors of monkeys and apes, far from blushing in shame for my species because of its genealogy and parentage, I will be proud of all that evolution has accomplished, of the continuous improvement which takes us up to the highest order, of the successive triumphs that have m...A quote from Paul Broca about being proud of our evolutionary advancement.
17 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
The Ascent of Man in Poem Form
Apes lifting hairy arms now stand And free the wonder‐working hand. They raise a light aërial house On shafts of widely branching trees, Where, harboured warily, each spouse May feed her little ape in peace, Green cradled in his heaven‐roofed bed, Leaves rustling lullabies o’erhead. And lo, ’mid reeking swarms of earth Grim struggling in the primal wood, A new strange creature hath its birth: Wild—stammering—nameless—shameless—nude; Spurred on by want, held in by fear...From apes with freed hands to muddled-thinking man in caves, up to clearer-thinking man with fire. A very nice passage about evolution.
29 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
The Paradox of Crying Babies
Crying is the earliest and most compelling of infant signals," writes Ronald Barr, and surely there is no sound on earth more piercing than the cry of an infant. The ability to cry was hard-wired into human babies long ago as a potent signal to get adult attention. Like other primates, human infants needed to be able to send a message of distress to motivate action on the part of someone more able. The same kind of vocal signals are found in Rhesus monkeys, for example, which have very distin...The alarm compels the mother to care for the child, but it can also push them to abuse it.