Non-controversial science news.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I meant the T-rex species didn't multiply and expand at the same rate as humans. For example, he wasn't able to beat the climate, and was subject to nature-willed death as well as his sauropods. He occupied his ideal niche, something humans have learned to escape. Whether our ability to leave our evolutionary niche is indicatory of our prowess or not, I do not know.

Those are my points, as well. Humans are running amok on the planet. It's just a question if we will get smart before we get wiped out, either by disease or disaster (natural or man-made). Whatever happens, there are too many of us, and the rest of the life on this planet is suffering from our overpopluation.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

True. I haven't decided whether it's a sign of evolutionary superiority or disease-like parasitism.

We're a disaster for the rest of the planet, IMHO. If you get a chance, see the series "After Humans". It considers how the Earth will recover from our presence if we all disappeared at once. May be on Youtube, I haven't looked.

I know that, I just meant I don't know if our dominance over the entire planet is a sign of prowess or not. We seem to be the most evolved species on the planet so far.

Actually, we have been evolving for about 4 billion years (give or take a few hundred million), exactly the same amount of time as a deer, a kangaroo and E. coli. In our opinion we are more advanced than these other examples but that is only because, being possessed of intelligence and self-awareness, we value these qualities above antlers, jumpy legs and bacterial conjugation, however, we are not more evolved - merely differently evolved - from any other creature.

[Chinaski]

True. I haven't decided whether it's a sign of evolutionary superiority or disease-like parasitism.

We're a disaster for the rest of the planet, IMHO. If you get a chance, see the series "After Humans". It considers how the Earth will recover from our presence if we all disappeared at once. May be on Youtube, I haven't looked.

I know that, I just meant I don't know if our dominance over the entire planet is a sign of prowess or not. We seem to be the most evolved species on the planet so far.

Actually, we have been evolving for about 4 billion years (give or take a few hundred million), exactly the same amount of time as a deer, a kangaroo and E. coli. In our opinion we are more advanced than these other examples but that is only because, being possessed of intelligence and self-awareness, we value these qualities above antlers, jumpy legs and bacterial conjugation, however, we are not more evolved - merely differently evolved - from any other creature.

But we are able to assert dominance over these other species. Doesn't that imply superiority?

[Xamonas Chegwé]

True. I haven't decided whether it's a sign of evolutionary superiority or disease-like parasitism.

We're a disaster for the rest of the planet, IMHO. If you get a chance, see the series "After Humans". It considers how the Earth will recover from our presence if we all disappeared at once. May be on Youtube, I haven't looked.

I know that, I just meant I don't know if our dominance over the entire planet is a sign of prowess or not. We seem to be the most evolved species on the planet so far.

Actually, we have been evolving for about 4 billion years (give or take a few hundred million), exactly the same amount of time as a deer, a kangaroo and E. coli. In our opinion we are more advanced than these other examples but that is only because, being possessed of intelligence and self-awareness, we value these qualities above antlers, jumpy legs and bacterial conjugation, however, we are not more evolved - merely differently evolved - from any other creature.

But we are able to assert dominance over these other species. Doesn't that imply superiority?

E. coli thrives in our guts, mosquitoes suck our blood, cats and dogs sponge off of our fondness for 'cute', thousands of species consume our dead carcasses - doesn't that imply that they have superiority over us? All life on Earth is interdependent. Without earthworms, soil would not be formed and ALL of our crop plants would eventually die - and us with them.

To assume the superiority of the human race is species arrogance. Read Darwin.

[Chinaski]

Ok, so does that mean that our abnormal proliferation is also part of the natural cycle and that ecological balance depends on it?

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Ok, so does that mean that our abnormal proliferation is also part of the natural cycle and that ecological balance depends on it?

You think we are abnormally prolific? Let's look at E. coli again. How many do you have in your gut? Now multiply that number by every other member of the human race! We are nothing but their incubators from their POV.

And I could name thousands of other species that outnumber ourselves on this planet.

We have the (so far) unique phenotypes of self-awareness and advanced language skills - lets not get ahead of ourselves here. We are merely another of evolution's quirks until proven otherwise through surpassing the natural restrictions placed upon us by this Earth of ours. We might be wiped out by a comet strike in a few month's time and some descendent of the stag, kangaroo or E coli might end up replacing us in a million or few years time - or they might not - evolution doesn't care.

[Chinaski]

Pwned. Gotcha.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Slightly off track, but I watched Mythbusters doing their kitchen-sink science yesterday to "bust" the myth that cockroaches would survive a nuclear war because of inherent ability to resist radiation.

To test the theory they put roaches, fruit flies and flour beetles in a chamber an radiated them with 1,000, 10,000 and 100,000 rads. (1,000 rads will kill a human.) The roaches all died at 100,000. The fruit flies died of old age. (This was a 30-day survival experiment.) The flour beetles survived better than any of them. (10% survivors after 30 days at 100,000 rads.)

We ain't so tough.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Slightly off track, but I watched Mythbusters doing their kitchen-sink science yesterday to "bust" the myth that cockroaches would survive a nuclear war because of inherent ability to resist radiation.

To test the theory they put roaches, fruit flies and flour beetles in a chamber an radiated them with 1,000, 10,000 and 100,000 rads. (1,000 rads will kill a human.) The roaches all died at 100,000. The fruit flies died of old age. (This was a 30-day survival experiment.) The flour beetles survived better than any of them. (10% survivors after 30 days at 100,000 rads.)

We ain't so tough.

Insects survive irradiation far better than most animals because radiation damage is far higher if it occurs during cell-division. Insects' cells only divide during metamorphosis - hence they can survive far larger doses of radiation (unless they get zapped during moulting.) Oddly enough, I was only reading this on wiki the other day for a completely unrelated reason!

[ScholasticSpastic]

The subject of humans being "more evolved" than other animals has been brought up in this thread. I should like to point out that all organisms on Earth, as we share a common progenitor, have been evolving for the same amount of time and are thus equally evolved. There are no organisms which can be said to be more evolved than others.

If anything, human strength derives from our lack of specialization coupled with our intelligence. We are less capable hunters in terms of physiological adaptations. We are less capable herbivores. We are less capable runners. We are less capable swimmers. Our bodies are shit alone. The only reason we shine is because our ancestors learned how to pick up sticks and take advantage of the greater momentum arm by swinging the sticks around our elbows and shoulders.

Further, intelligence is not the purpose for life. We do not represent a pinnacle of evolution- just a possible direction. There is no overriding drive for intelligence in the universe and the success of a species is not measured in terms of intelligence- only in terms of survival. To that end, our success may well prove to be our failure. We have been so successful that we've managed to overshoot the carrying capacity of our planet to a greater extent than has occured since the first great extinction. Recall that the first great extinction (and the first incident of climate change resulting from overly successful photosynthesizers, resulting in the massive oxygen pollution we live with today) wiped out most of the organisms which had brough it about. We will be lucky if we survive our success and if we fail to survive, we really cannot be said to have been successful.

The assumption that human beings are any more special in the world than other animals is a type of bigotry. We are not special, objectively speaking. We are only special to ourselves. Which is fine. I will not jump on anyone who says they favor human beings above the other animals because they're a human being. I will, however, gleefully contest any claims that our species is objectively special as this is simply not the case.

The trouble Australia faces with the kangaroos came about because aboriginal settlers and the white conquerors who followed them were fucking idiots and we wiped out the predators which kept the 'roos in check. We are still too stupid to reintroduce natural balace to the system because doing that would force us to agree not to utilize the shit out of the continent. Also, many of those predator species are now extinct, which makes their reintroduction problematic. The only solution, then, is to kill them ourselves until we find a better solution. It's not about right or wrong. It's about how we fucked up and we'll keep right on fucking up until we figure out how incredibly stupid we're being.

[ScholasticSpastic]

I see, upon reading the thread further, that many of my points have already been made. So we'll just call that my agreement with those who were quicker on the draw.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I see, upon reading the thread further, that many of my points have already been made. So we'll just call that my agreement with those who were quicker on the draw.

Your fawning apology is duly noted, unworthy one. I did think I was reading my own echo for a moment there! Good point about the roos though!

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I see, upon reading the thread further, that many of my points have already been made. So we'll just call that my agreement with those who were quicker on the draw.

Spaz, I humbly disagree about all critters being equally evolved. The coelacanth (SP?) stopped evolving a few days ago. (Creationist "days".) Slime mold peaked in the wee small hours of the morning. If something finds a niche where it doesn't need to evolve, there's no selection pressure. So the same old same old returns year after year.

Or am I wrong?

[Chinaski]

I see, upon reading the thread further, that many of my points have already been made. So we'll just call that my agreement with those who were quicker on the draw.

Spaz, I humbly disagree about all critters being equally evolved. The coelacanth (SP?) stopped evolving a few days ago. (Creationist "days".) Slime mold peaked in the wee small hours of the morning. If something finds a niche where it doesn't need to evolve, there's no selection pressure. So the same old same old returns year after year.

Or am I wrong?

I was under the same impression. Granted, my knowledge of biology is minuscule. Enlighten us?

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I see, upon reading the thread further, that many of my points have already been made. So we'll just call that my agreement with those who were quicker on the draw.

Spaz, I humbly disagree about all critters being equally evolved. The coelacanth (SP?) stopped evolving a few days ago. (Creationist "days".) Slime mold peaked in the wee small hours of the morning. If something finds a niche where it doesn't need to evolve, there's no selection pressure. So the same old same old returns year after year.

Or am I wrong?

I was under the same impression. Granted, my knowledge of biology is minuscule. Enlighten us?

Do slime moulds no longer adapt to new pathogens? Have there been no new species / sub-species of Coelocanth in the last few million years? Evolution doesn't have to be in huge leaps. That is one of the things that cretinists always get wrong with their "Why are there still monkeys?" bollocks. Evolution doesn't cease simply because a creature is extremely well adapted to its niche and has no need for major restructuring. Small aspects are evolving constantly.

Micro-evolution is occurring all the time - even in humans - we are a lot more resistant to bubonic plague than we once were, and asian flu, thanks to the millions that left the gene pool.

While it is true that the first, recognisable slime moulds evolved many hundreds of millions of years ago, it is not true that those that are around now have not evolved since.