Category Archives

3 Articles

Peak of Evolution

The latest levels of human evolution

Posted by Melanie Burns on
The latest levels of human evolution
The latest levels of human evolution

Human has not stopped evolving. Assuming that civilization continues along the same path as today major changes will be expected over the next few years. Since civilization hasn’t been around for long we can expect extraordinarily changes as years draw by. Here some major changes we expect in human evolution.

Muscle Atrophy

There are two main foreseeable causes of human gradual physical weakness which are; Over reliance on technology most especially on machine to do our muscle enhancing work. This makes the whole species weaker since they do not depend on physical strength for body muscle growth. If we were to relocate to space the second cause of muscle atrophy is much relevant. Here physical strength is less necessary for day to day activities but it doesn’t mean we spend too long as explorers since we eventually lose most of our body muscle mass. The future generation should consider this to prevent finding themselves confined to wheelchairs.

Smaller/larger scull volume

Scientists argue that it is impossible for human to evolve with larger heads. The ‘small scull’ gets all the support from biologists who believe that a larger head will make birth impossible. A larger head at birth is most likely to kill or hurt the mother and with it seems the head size will stay the same or decrease over time. With advanced technology caesarean section has provided more opportunities for survival of big headed children which is heart thrilling for the mothers affected. Many may think that C-section is safer than natural birth but its dependence would be dangerous for human.

Self-improvement

Soon human will reach a point where they can force evolution on themselves through technology. A good example of this is through gene selection where prospective parents choose their child’s trait before birth. This is the avenue of human evolution will take in near future leading to a boom of what is known as “designer baby” in which all undesirable traits are removed.

Mono-ethnicity

As long as multiculturalism continues being the essence of modern society humans are expected to evolve into a single ethnic group. Humans will start slowly start losing the main distinguishing features of their ethnicity and take on characteristics from different cultures in the world. This is a benefit since race will no longer be a problem.

Increased height

For the last two centuries human height has been growing rapidly which is believed is caused by abundance of nutrition. The more a person’s eats the more energy he/she has to grow. Eating will make species to grow taller whether the sky is our limit or not. Only evolution can tell the limit of tallness.

Brain rewiring

Technology has greatly affected how our memory works. Our brain can only remember where the information is stored but not the content. Technology is advancing each day thus our brain adapts to maximize properly at the detriment of our memory.

Weakened immune system

Human immune system is growing weaker due to relying on medication for survival. It is foreseeable that soon humans will evolve to the point where hormones no longer organically created within the body. Our body needs a powerful immune system to fight diseases and self-dependency. Use of medication will only make most of our internal functions obsolete.

Conclusion

These are the recent levels   of evolution which will be taking place in the next few years to come. Evolution is advancing so fast that many changes are not easily noticed. With time humans will have many more variations in traits as years goes by. Evolution from apes to human to more advanced creatures in future with better living environs mixed cultures and level of intelligence.

Peak of Evolution

8 things you probably didn’t know about human evolution

Posted by Melanie Burns on
8 things you probably didn’t know about human evolution

Evolution refers to changes or growth that occurs in a particular way most especially in biological organisms. This is in recent days referred to as Darwin’s theory of evolution through natural selection. Evolution by natural selection includes three principles: variation of traits that lead to reproduction, competition for the limited available resources and heritability for only the genetic traits being passed from one generation to another. The evolution stretches much back before our early human ancestors and before the evolution of Homo sapiens. Evolution is a tangled tale with most unanswered questions to many people till today. Here are some facts you may not know about human evolution history.

1. Early human beings migrated from Africa over 1 million years ago

Most of us have heard how Homo sapiens migrated to Europe and Asia from about 80000 years ago. The same route was taken by our ancestors, Homo erectus, who was on and off Africa for over million years. After Homo sapiens left they would have encountered other human creatures who looked exactly like them .This would probably be the descendants of Homo erectus or Neanderthal who have been wondering around Eurasia for hundreds of thousands of years. This entire people were the early human.

2. You might be a Neanderthal

Neanderthal is well-known specie in evolution story. Recently a genetic analysis of Neanderthal bones was done to determine if there are some of Neanderthal genes which made way into modern non-African population. It suggested that after Cro-Magnon entered Europe they most likely had children with the local Neanderthals. This reproduction caused the lead to the rise of more Neanderthal traits and species. The fact remains that we are all one happy family despite the trait variations.

3. Indian Ocean navigation by humans in boats over 50,000 years ago.

How did Homo sapiens get to Australia from the shores of Africa? Homo sapiens used small boats lashed together out of reeds. This was equivalent to Paleolithic early Stone Age where they used to fly using tin can. All this worked incredibly and humans were so comfortable to sale to the next region.

4. Low genetic diversity

Humans are considered as the least genetically diverse apes. This is because we all descend from small human groups. Genetic diversity is the full population of reproduction by each individual. When we consider our actual population size is 7billion.Humans number of genetic diversity rotates around 15,000 individuals which is totally less compared to today’s population.

5. Human population crashed about 80,000 years ago

Humanity effective population size reduced mysteriously about 80,000 years ago. There are many theories that explain why like apocalyptic disasters and interbreeding among small species. The eruption of Toba volcano affected the human diversity in a great way something many of us are yet to understand how it happened.

6. Homo sapiens used fire as a tool

As a species Homo sapiens couldn’t exist without one of the most important tool: tamed fire. Homo sapiens evolved after our ancestor’s tamed fire and were making tools. At this stage of evolution Homo sapiens was less apelike. Our species had more interest in the invention of fire and other artificial tools. This is because we were born tool users and fire makers for survival.

7. Homo sapiens had a culture or less than 50000years

Many anthropologists believe that human did not develop a recognized culture until around the time of Homo sapiens which is 50,000years ago. This species hanged around for the longest time before developing various features like symbolic communication and making tools. This is because Homo sapiens evolved around the time of mitochondrial Eve. Anthropologists believe that humans had not developed language until this stage which is very hard to prove.

8. Homo sapiens is still evolving rapidly

The good news is that Homo sapiens is still evolving. One day our posterity will be different from us just like we are from Homo erectus. This has made some biologist to wonder whether we are developing to be most intelligent or disease resistant which is not yet clear.

Conclusion

Human evolution started ways back during our human ancestors and it is still evolving. This makes it hard for many to understand clearly all the facts about human evolution story. The above listed few facts will help in understanding the evolution process a little better. We were all apes once and now we are living as one happy family of humans.

Peak of Evolution

The Story of Human Evolution: Where We Stand Now

Posted by Melanie Burns on
The Story of Human Evolution: Where We Stand Now

Simply put, evolution is the most scientific answer to the eternal questions of who we are and what’s our origins. It is nature’s process of creation. Scientific evidence shows that millions of years ago, our species and ape-like creatures began to evolve from a common ancestor.

Although, scientists did not identify the common ancestor research could trace back and determine the evolution of our species up until now. So it is evident how we evolved. We know that the first homo sapiens first emerged from Africa, then spread across the globe.

Homo sapiens adapted to every environment and dominated the world when they discovered fire. Interestingly, cooking meat with fire led to our brain evolve faster and become bigger. For survival, homo sapiens developed mutations that in a way led to more adaptation to harsh environments around the world.

So why we do not grow wings or breathe under water? Because evolution does not work like that, and it takes millions of years even to notice any significant change in any given species. Plus, if we needed wings to survive we would already have them. How?

Scientific evidence shows us that every species gradually adapts to its environment, but this does not happen overnight. It happens over generations and generations. Each generation passes the “good” genes to the next that is why how they survive.

How exactly? The more a species capable of adaption to its environment, its DNA becomes altered and that DNA gets to pass on to the next generation and so on. That is most notable in mutations. That is also why you see same animals with different colors or characteristics. It is an evolution in action.

As you now know, evolution is a process and doesn’t happen overnight. We are still evolving. When British naturalist Charles Darwin published his theory in two books On the Origin of Species and The Descent of Man, people of his time mistakenly thought that “the origin of man is apelike creatures.”

In fact, we share 99% of our genetic makeup with chimpanzees, but that does not mean we were apes in origin, that is an oversimplification. We do indeed have a common ancestor that maybe never identified as mentioned above, but it is entirely different to say we were apes in the beginning, and we theoretically share a common ancestor. What does that mean?

It says that millions of years ago, chimpanzees and humans branched out of the same tree, there are thousands and thousands of other species that did not survive. Making it either a huge tree or more accurately a bush.

The “missing link” never existed. Fossil specimens already prove the evolution of the various branches. We cannot know for sure who or what was the first primate to walk the earth. All we know for sure is that scientific evidence proves without a shred of doubt that evolution is the best answer to date for how we as humans came into being, and how life started on earth, from a common ancestor. The rest is history!