Mid-Term on Human Evolution Essay

The robust australopithecines or paranthropines had a curved face with a arch for the cheek bones that are formed by connecting the zygomatic and the temporal bones together. The robust australopithecines had a bone ridge on top of their skull called a sagittal crest, which is also attached to the jaw muscles. They had a flexable base just above were their jaw bone connected to their cheek bone. With their really large back teeth (below the cheek bone) the robust australopithecines fossils were known to the researchers as the “nutcracker man”. They used these really large back teeth to eat tough foods and nuts. And their teeth in the front were smaller.

The principles of genetics and evolution show that race, biologically does not exist. The differences that appear in humans does not come from an allele that marks for a specific race. Usually most of the variations we see in humans comes from mutations that occur. The change in DNA is a major factor of variation in humans, it is something random which means certain attributes aren’t associated with a specific race. Another important thing to note is that all humans share the basic structure of DNA. This reinforces the idea that race is a social construct, not a reality of nature. Another main source of variation comes from gene flow (the movement of alleles to and from a certain location). Populations have always been moving from one place to another, and through this a trait can become more unique or more common. So there is less to do about

We share almost 99 percent of our genetic material with chimpanzees. Yet we have several traits that are very different. Two legged walking, or bipedalism seems to be one of the earliest of the major hominine characteristics to have evolved. To

The Australopithecine are some of the earliest known hominids and they embody many characteristics that are associated with bipedalism. Bipedalism is a highly specialized and unusual form of primate locomotion that sets modern humans apart from all other living primates as we are the only extant obligate bipeds. Many evolutionary biologists and paleoanthropologists have devoted innumerable research hours to attempting to understand this unique form of locomotion and how it evolved. A number of interdependent morphological adaptations occurred over a long period of time to solve challenges posed by habitual bipedalism. As a result, there are obvious differences that exist between early and late hominin species.

They found that Au. ramidus had very similar characteristics to Sahelanthropus Tchadensis an ancestor that dates to 6-7 million years ago. Ardi had a foot that was primitive and had an opposable big toe which was most likely used to grab on branches. She also had a long and curvy spine just like humans. Its pelvis was large like those of apes and had short and broad shoulders suggesting it had a lower center of mass and could possibly walk on one leg at a time. But it is also thought that it was still spending a lot of time in the trees as well. Thus, why it is thought to be intermediate form of bipedalism it lived in both worlds, walking upright, and climbing trees, equal success in both biospheres. Although Ardi is not the connection to apes it still served to prove that the ancestor of apes was a lot more primitive than we believed. There are still several questions to be answered in this puzzle called our ancestry. It may seem that more questions arise as more clues are found, but that is science, there would be no intrigue left if all questions were

The term “race” has been defined differently throughout history. Race has been not only defined as skin color but also defined as social class, national origin, religion, and language have all been used in history to separate different groups in society. Leibniz in the 17th century defined race religiously, dividing groups in two groups Christian v. Non-Christian. It wasn’t until 1735 when Linnaeus distinguished groups by skin color and geographic origin. He had four separate groups: Europeaus (white), Africanus (black), Americanus (red), and Asiatic (yellow) (Uppsala Universitet,

Michel Brunet and his team found the fossil in the sand dunes of northern Chad after “a decade of digging”(Whitfield 2002). This discovery is most definitely a new one and one that will cause the reinterpretation of all previous hominid research. What makes this find so spectacular is that the structure of the skull suggests a being that walked upright, though it lived in a time when apes and chimpanzees also existed. “Sahelanthropus has many traits that shout ‘hominid’. These include smaller canines, and thicker tooth enamel than apes. And the point at the back of the skull where neck muscles attach suggests that Toumai walked upright”(Whitfield 2002). The key to this discovery, Brunet believes, is the back of the skull that suggests a muscle attachment for upright walking ability, which supports the scientist’s theory that

Afropithecus is a fairly large extinct ape- 50kg, characterized by a lack of a prehensile tail, long snout with procumbent incisors, generalized limb proportions and thick molar enamel. The braincase of Afropithecus is fairly small in size compared to other Miocene apes and Old World Monkeys from the same area. The primitive characteristics of Afropithecus suggest a relation to early catarrhines- such as Aegyptopithecus. And the post-cranial fossil record suggest that it was both arboreal and quadrupedal, similar to the proconsul that Afropithecus is categorized

To understand the question, we must first familiarize ourselves with the definition of race. Race is defined as “An arbitrary classification of modern humans, sometimes, especially formerly, based on a combination of various physical characteristics, as skin color, facial form, or eye shape, and now frequently based on such genetic markers as blood groups” (dictionary.com).

Race is not a biological reality because there are no indications of some biological DNA that would have a certain outcomes of a race. The variation in skin tone comes from the mix of certain races. For example, the mix of black and white would result a skin color of Latino. However, the mix of white and yellow (Asians) will most likely result a child having more essential characteristics of white people. It is impossible to classify humans into races because human is making a new race every single moment from the combination of two people who come from different races. Light skin and dark skin have a lot to deal with the temperature, latitude and langtitude of the region. It could be characterized by a regions, instead of ethnic groups. Race

According to Ansell (2013), race is not real but merely a social construct that has been used to justify the inequalities that are a characteristic of our society. In exemplifying this school of thought, he argues that the difference in people’s skin pigmentation has more to do with their geographical location rather than biological inheritance. In this case, people who live in cooler climates tend to have lighter skins than those who live in warmer climates attributed to the difference in melanin levels that contribute to skin pigmentation. On the basis of this, society has come up with races which are not real.

The English term ‘race’ is believed to originate from the Spanish word raza, which means ‘breed’ or ‘stock’ (Race). People use race to define other groups, this separation of groups is based largely on physical features. Features like skin color and hair don’t affect the fundamental biology of human variation (Hotz). Race is truly only skin deep, there are no true biological separations between two ‘racial’ groups. Scientifically speaking, there is more variation between single local groups than there is between two large, global groups; the human variation is constantly altering (Lewontin). The majority of today’s anthropologists agree that race is a form of social categorization, not the separation of groups based on biological

They were full bipedal and their brain size and brain patterns evolved by increasing (590-687 cc). Their diet was mainly meat which might have an influence on their rapid growth of their brains. (Tobias 1987).

Biological evolution is the name for the changes in gene frequency in a population of a species from generation to generation. Evolution offers explanation to why species genetically change over years and the diversity of life on Earth. Although it is generally accepted by the scientific community, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution has been studied and debated for several decades. In 1859, Darwin published On The Origin of Species, which introduced the idea of evolutionary thought which he supported with evidence of one type of evolutionary mechanism, natural selection. Some of the main mechanisms of evolution are natural selection, mutation, and genetic drift. The idea that all life on Earth shares a common ancestor has been around for

The Australopithecines were the first to walk upright, or became bipedal, although rather clumsily. Their walk was unsteady, judging by their bone structure (Figure 1.), and they most likely were quadrupedal the majority of the time. The Australopithecines had a brain about the size of an orange, high up cheekbones, and big molars. They were about three feet tall, and had small thumbs. Australopithecines, while definitely possessing some human characteristics, humans are still much closer to the chimps. Australopithecines were vegetarians; even if they knew that animals were edible, they still had no reliable means of killing animals for food. About 2 million years ago, highly evolved Australopithecines made the