You are a Homo sapiens. We are all Homo
sapiens.
And no Homo sapiens who doesn’t know their species will be given a final
letter grade for this course.
APG 201 (3
credits)
Human Origins and Evolution
Dr.
Holly Dunsworth
Acknowledgments: For contributing to this course and
syllabus through their lovely influence, I am grateful to Jeffrey Kurland, Alan
Walker, Pat Shipman, Jim Wood, Susan Antón, Briana Pobiner, Paul Beardsley, Anne
Buchanan, and Ken Weiss. And I’m grateful to all the authors of the texts
referenced here.
Course
description
The biocultural
evolution of humans. An investigation into humankind’s place in nature,
including a review of the living primates, human genetics and development,
evolutionary theory, and the human fossil record. Fulfills both the
General Education outcomes A1 (STEM knowledge) and C3 (Diversity and
Inclusion)
This is your
origins story. To write it, we will learn from biological and evolutionary
anthropologists, who study human and nonhuman primate biology, behavior,
diversity, adaptation and evolution in order to better understand the human
species and explain how we arrived at our current condition: Incessantly
chattering, naked, culturally dependent, big-brained, bipedal creatures who are
diverse in appearance and culture and inhabit nearly all types of habitats on
Earth. Along our journey we will ask ourselves how we know what we know. We
will also address, head-on why so much of this material is culturally controversial.
The science of human evolution and its dissemination into the popular
imagination has a long history of racism and sexism. In this course we will
address that history and the stigma it attached to human origins by identifying
bad evolutionary thinking, misconceptions, and the misapplications of that thinking. Class time will be spent on lectures (with
robust handouts), activities, and discussions where we take back our species’
shared origins story and make it one that’s fit for all humankind.
Required materials
1.
The
Incredible Unlikeliness of Being by Alice Roberts
2.
Moleskine
Classic Collection, hardcover, Ruled Notebook, 240 pages, 5 x 8 1/4 inch
ASSESSMENT
Book of Origins Check
During the designated week, early in the
semester, each student will meet briefly with me to show me the initial
progress they’ve made on their Book of Origins.
Quizzes 1, 2, and 3
These are take-home quizzes where students are free to consult
class resources. Quizzes will consist of multiple-choice, short answer, and
essay. They are passed out in class and submitted in class, there is no
opportunity to obtain quizzes late or submit late quizzes for any points unless
students have an excused absence as defined by the university handbook. This
way, course attendance and participation is all wrapped up in quiz scores,
which will benefit from regular attendance and participation.
Thanks, Evolution! Project –OPTIONAL EXTRA CREDIT
This is a
journey to the evolutionary origins of something for which you are grateful. It
is a hunt for high-quality, appropriate scientific/scholarly evidence in the
literature (via Google Scholar) and a short bit of science writing. By the end
of this project you will not write *the* one true correct version of an
entity’s origins; you will write a sound scientific and scholarly origins story
(for something meaningful to you). If you choose to do this assignment, you
submit it in class at which time you present your research to the class in a one-minute
(175 word max) ‘lightning talk’ without any visuals, just your spoken words. A full set of instructions, helpful
guidelines, and grading rubric will be provided separately in class. Again,
this is completely optional extra credit.
Book of Origins– Due last day of class,
in class
Your book is
your origins story. You will write this book over the course of the semester
and keep it when our course is over. Your book is not your notebook. You will
need a separate notebook for taking class notes and for organizing handouts and
worksheets; your book is something else. Your book is due on the last day of
class and will be graded and returned to you at the time of the final exam
(which is not a final exam, see below). Your book is your creation and the
content includes your assignments entered in preparation for that
day’s class meeting as well as all information that you find
meaningful and wish to enter that’s transcribed from your classroom lecture
notes, handouts, worksheets, etc. Assignments
(e.g. 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, etc…. ) that go into the notebook are listed on the
schedule and the details of each assignment are located in the long version of
this syllabus posted on Sakai. Assignments are choreographed
readings and activities that you do outside of class, timed to maximize your
engagement with the in-class course material and your mastery of it. Some will
ask you to respond to a reading with words or drawings. Others will involve
watching films or performing interactive activities on-line. Still others guide
you to perform specific exercises in preparation for in-class activities. If
the assignment asks you to write something, you must write in your own words.
If you want to include quotes in your book, please do but they are in addition
to any assignment that is to be completed in your own words. You need to
fill at least one page, at minimum, for each assignment to get full credit for
its completion. Grading is based mostly on whether you completed the
assignments thoughtfully and professionally, not whether you completed them
entirely correctly. In other words, you earn full credit for each assignment
by putting forth the effort to complete it—as long as it’s a solid effort, is
mostly accurate, and earnestly attempts to answer the questions that are
asked! I grade this way because these
assignments are often struggles that I’m asking you to face on your own ahead
of in-class discussion. Errors in the
assignments are therefore tolerated but systematic/egregious inaccuracies are
not. Your book’s overall grade will be based on completion of assignments, effort,
clarity/legibility, organization, and additional content you have added above
and beyond the bare minimum you are asked to include in each assignment. There
are more pages than there are assignments and that space is best used, rather
than left as empty space. So, the overall grade takes into consideration how
thoughtful you are in creating your book, curating materials beyond merely
entering complete assignments. Be sure to number your pages so that you can
provide a table of contents.
Racism and Sexism Project - Due at the time of the final, in class
This is a
written assignment due at the time of the final exam, and instead of an exam,
our time will be spent sharing out with small groups and the entire class. It
is a multi-part short-essay assignment that should reflect much of what you
accomplished over the semester and especially during the last weeks. If done
well, my feedback will be to urge you to share this assignment with your people
and online. Leading up to this project’s
deadline, we will use class time to prepare. A full set of instructions, helpful guidelines, and grading rubric will
be provided separately in class.
Assignments that go into your Book of Origins
(and non-required “resources” that
support/complement the material)
These
assignments, which must each fill at least one page of your book, are
due to yourself before class on the day listed on the syllabus. Using the
assigned materials, answer the questions for the assignments by writing,
drawing, sketching, collaging, pasting pics, etc in any format that works. “Assigned”
links are crucial to answering the question for that day’s assignment. Do not
even do that day’s assignment if you have not read/viewed the assigned links. “Resources”
are not assigned, but are provided as support for the assignment and/or the course
content in class. They will be especially helpful if you do not understand
something, have missed class, or wish to learn more. Dr. Dunsworth will be
helpful in all three of those circumstances too, so contact her as well.
A Tale of Your Origins and Evolution
With chapters of our course titled according to to Propp's Morphology of the
Folktale via Misia Landau's Narratives
of Human Evolution
Chapter 1: Initial Situation. Setting your story
in motion as only humans can;
anthropology; the scientific process; taxonomy; the Order Primates; observing
the natural world and determining our place in it; evolution (change over time
in lineages that share common ancestors); phylogeny; species and speciation;
fossils and fossilization
1.1
Write and/or draw at least one page of answers to the following: What is
evolution? What do you know about human evolution? What are you interested in
learning about evolution and/or human evolution? You must translate any and all
answers to these questions that you wrote on day 1 of class into your book for
1.1.
1.2 The Scientific Process! First, choose one
of the following well-known and established observations:
a)
Children
from low income homes show evidence of malnutrition.
b)
In
most humans, the right humerus (upper arm bone) is larger than the left one.
c)
Chimpanzees
living in zoos tend to be overweight compared to their relatives living in the
wild.
Next,
without using anything but your own mind, offer up two different hypotheses to
explain that one observation. Briefly describe how you would test these
hypotheses. Include discussion of the methods and variables for obtaining
evidence and the kinds of evidence that you would need to find to both refute
and to support each hypothesis.
Assigned
·
How Science
Works (video; 10 min):
·
Understanding
science: How Science Works, pages 1-21; starts here:
Resources
·
What is it like to be a biological anthropologist? A Field
Paleontologist's Point of View – Su (Nature Education) http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/what-is-it-like-to-be-a-59719064
·
Notes from the Field: A Primatologist's Point of View – Morgan
(Nature Education)
·
Expedition
Rusinga (video; 8 min) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y1puNyB9e8
·
Carl
Sagan’s Rules for Critical Thinking and Nonsense Detection
·
10
Scientific Ideas That Scientists Wish You Would Stop Misusing
·
Surprise! Semen
is required
1.3 For
all four great apes (orangutans,
gorillas, bonobos, chimpanzees), use at least one page (that’s one page for each
ape) to answer the following questions.
Complete sentences are not necessary and neither are the numbers, as
long as the info is there. Pictures and
figures are fine too. Get your information from these excellent websites:
Assigned
• Animal Diversity Web: http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu /
• Primate
Factsheets: http://pin.primate.wisc.edu/factsheets
• Encyclopedia
of Life: http://eol.org/
• Time
Tree: http://www.timetree.org/
1.
[paste or draw a picture of the ape]
2.
What is the species? (for gorillas
and orangutans, choose one, but note the others)
3.
Where does it live on Earth?
4.
What is the range of its habitat?
Describe the nature of the habitat.
5.
Is your primate nocturnal, diurnal,
or crepuscular?
6.
What does it eat?
7.
How does it move about?
8.
How does it socialize? (i.e.
solitary? groups?...)
9.
How does it raise offspring? (i.e.
solitary? groups?...)
10. Body
size (both kg/g and lb/oz)? Are male and female different?
11. What
does it look like? Color? Fur?
12. What
are its threats to survival?
13. At
what point in the past (millions of years ago) did it share a most recent (aka
“last”) common ancestor with humans? (go to www.timetree.org to find out)
Resources
·
Characteristics
of Crown Primates – Kirk (Nature Education)
·
Old World
monkeys – Lawrence and Cords (Nature Education)
1.4 Write
and/or draw in at least one page what you found to be meaningful,
significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling to identify that
information, then pull out what you have questions about, what you’d like to
learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised you, what relates
to other material we have already covered in the course, or what may relate to
what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Two
chapters from The Autobiography of
Charles Darwin: "Voyage…" (p. 71-81 ) and "An account of how
several books arose" (p. 116- 135)
1.5 Write
and/or draw in at least one page what you found to be meaningful,
significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling to identify that
information, then pull out what you have questions about, what you’d like to
learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised you, what relates
to other material we have already covered in the course, or what may relate to
what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts: Beginnings (chapter 1)
Resources
·
Reading a phylogenetic tree – Baum
(Nature Ed)
·
Trait
Evolution on a Phylogenetic Tree – Baum (Nature Ed)
·
Human
Evolutionary Tree – Adams (Nature Ed)
·
Human evolution is more a muddy
delta than a branching tree—Hawks (Aeon)
https://aeon.co/ideas/human-evolution-is-more-a-muddy-delta-than-a-branching-tree
https://aeon.co/ideas/human-evolution-is-more-a-muddy-delta-than-a-branching-tree
1.6 Using the table of primates and
their traits, draw the Human, Baboon, Squirrel Monkey, and Baboon lines on the
figure (which you should transfer into a page in your book). Make sure to draw
arrows where traits changed. Trees are hypotheses, as long as they are
logically based on the information, they are not incorrect. There is more than
one correct answer.
Resources
·
Monkeys all
the way down – Dunsworth (Sapiens)
1.7- Write and/or draw in at least one page what
you found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts: Heads and brains (2)
Resources
·
Our
Fishy Brain (video; 2.5 mins) http://video.pbs.org/video/2365207797/
·
Planet
without apes? – Stanford (Huffington Post)
·
Primate
Speciation: A Case Study of African Apes – Mitchell & Gonder (Nature Ed)
http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/primate-speciation-a-case-study-of-african-96682434
·
Why should
we care about species? – Hey (Nature Ed)
·
Speciation:
The origin of new species – Safran (Nature Ed)
·
The
maintenance of species diversity – Levine (Nature Ed)
·
Macroevolution:
Examples from the Primate World – Clee & Gonder (Nature Ed)
1.8 Go to http://www.eskeletons.org/
and based on what you see, draw the os coxa (half of the pelvis) of a
chimpanzee and a human, in at least one page. Describe the similarities and
differences in anatomy between chimp and human pelves/pelvises (do not worry
about applying technical jargon). What kinds of behavioral differences might
correlate with the anatomical differences in the pelvis and why? Go to http://www.eskeletons.org/
and based on what you see, draw the skull
(including teeth) of a chimpanzee and a human, in at least one page.
Describe the similarities and differences in anatomy between chimp and human
skulls and teeth (do not worry about applying technical jargon). What kinds of
behavioral differences might correlate with the anatomical differences in
skulls and teeth and why?
Resources
·
Amazing
Places, Amazing Fossils: Tiktaalik (video; 5 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2vKlEUX7DI
·
How to
Become a Primate Fossil – Dunsworth (Nature Ed)
·
Dating
Rocks and Fossils Using Geologic Methods – Peppe (Nature Ed)
·
Overview of
hominin evolution – Pontzer (Nature Ed)
Chapter 2: Hero. The origins of sex; how eggs and sperm get made and how
they make you; mutation; gene flow; natural selection; genetic drift and other
evolutionary processes
2.1Write and/or draw what you found to be meaningful,
significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling to identify that
information, then pull out what you have questions about, what you’d like to
learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised you, what relates
to other material we have already covered in the course, or what may relate to
what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
When Did Sex Become Fun? – Dunsworth
(Sapiens)
2.2 Write and/or draw what you found to be meaningful,
significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling to identify that
information, then pull out what you have questions about, what you’d like to
learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised you, what relates
to other material we have already covered in the course, or what may relate to
what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts:
Skulls and Senses (3)
Resources
·
Finding
the Origins of Human Color Vision (video; 5 mins) http://video.pbs.org/video/2365207765/
·
The
Evolution of Your Teeth (video; 3 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohq3CoOKEoo
·
Gregor
Mendel and the Principles of Inheritance – Miko (Nature Ed)
·
Mendelian
Genetics: Patterns of Inheritance and Single-Gene Disorders – Chial (Nature Ed)
·
Developing
the Chromosome Theory – O’Connor (Nature Ed)
·
Genetic
Recombination – Clancy (Nature Ed)
2.3 Without looking anything up (except to see
better pictures of the primates), write an answer for each of the questions
below. In other words, come up with a hypothesis (a good guess) to explain the
evolution of each of the four phenomena. These are evolutionary scenarios that
you are writing. This is brainstorming,
so have no fear, but be clear.
1.
How did the mandrill get that
colorful face? What about the rear (which looks like the face)?
2.
How did the colobus monkey (a
leaf-eater or foliovore) get a long, specialized gut?
3.
How did silverback gorillas become
twice as big as females?
4.
How did
humans become “naked”? (i.e. how did we cease to be as furry as the other
primates)?
Resources
·
What is a
Gene? Colinearity and Transcription Units – Pray (Nature Ed)
·
RNA
functions – Clancy (Nature Ed)
·
Phenotypic
Range of Gene Expression: Environmental Influence – Lobo & Shaw (Nature Ed)
·
Genetic
Dominance: Genotype-Phenotype Relationships – Miko (Nature Ed)
·
Pleiotropy:
One Gene Can Affect Multiple Traits – Lobo (Nature Ed)
·
Polygenic
Inheritance and Gene Mapping – Chial (Nature Ed)
2.4 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Things Genes
Can’t Do – Weiss and Buchanan (Aeon)
Resources
·
Mutation
not natural selection drives evolution –
Tarlach (about Nei; Discover Magazine)
·
Evolution
Is Change in the Inherited Traits of a Population through Successive
Generations – Forbes and Krimmel (Nature Ed)
·
Mutations
Are the Raw Materials of Evolution – Carlin (Nature Ed)
2.5 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling
to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions about, what
you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised
you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the course, or
what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts:
Speech and gills (4)
Resources
·
Secrets of
Charles Darwin’s Breakthrough - Bauer
(Salon)
·
Natural
selection, genetic drift and gene flow do not act in isolation in natural
populations – Andrews (Nature Ed)
·
Evolution is the only natural explanation
and it’s all we need – Dunsworth (The Mermaid’s Tale)
·
Negative
selection – Loewe (Nature Ed)
·
On the
mythology of natural selection. Part I: Introduction – Weiss (The Mermaid’s
Tale)
·
On the
mythology of natural selection. Part II: Classical Darwinism– Weiss (The
Mermaid’s Tale)
·
Natural
Selection: Uncovering Mechanisms of Evolutionary Adaptation to Infectious
Disease – Sabeti (Nature Ed)
2.6 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised
you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the course, or
what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts: Spines and segments (5)
Resources
·
Neutral
Theory: The null hypothesis of molecular evolution – Duret (Nature Ed)
Chapter 3: Change. Gestational development; ontogeny and phylogeny; genomics;
evo-devo; molecular clocks and the 'Last Common Ancestor'
3.1 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts:
Ribs Lungs and Hearts (6)
Resources
·
The Onion
Test – Gregory (Genomicron)
·
The
Molecular Clock and Estimating Species Divergence – Ho (Nature Ed)
http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/the-molecular-clock-and-estimating-species-divergence-41971
3.2 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts:
Guts and Yolk Sacs (7)
Resources
·
Hox Genes
in Development: The Hox Code – Myers (Nature Ed)
·
We Hear
with the Bones that Reptiles Eat With (video; 4 mins) http://video.pbs.org/video/2365207244/
·
How Do We
Know When Our Ancestors Lost Their Tails? (video; 4 min) http://video.pbs.org/video/2365211775/
3.3 Look back at what
you wrote for 2.3, for each of your evolutionary scenarios (i.e. your answers
to the questions1, 2, 3, and 4), describe which evolutionary mechanisms
(discussed in class) that you hypothesized were at work in each of your
scenarios. You probably didn’t use all the terms and ideas we used in class but
you may have been getting at some of them. .
1. [list
the mechanisms you used, even if you didn’t write the official terms at the
time]
2. [list
the mechanisms you used, even if you didn’t write the official terms at the
time]
3. [list
the mechanisms you used, even if you didn’t write the official terms at the
time]
4. [list
the mechanisms you used, even if you didn’t write the official terms at the
time]
Next, rewrite each of the four explanations you wrote back in
2.4. Make them more scientifically accurate, using only the four main
mechanisms of evolution that we discussed in class and those terms: mutation,
gene flow, genetic drift, and natural selection. You may need to just change a
few words or you may need to completely revise the entire answer, it depends on
what you originally wrote. Important!
Banned words for your scenarios include: Need(s/ed/ing), want(s/ed/ing),
try(s/ed/ing), best, most, and fittest.
1.
How did the mandrill get that
colorful face? What about the rear?
2.
How did the colobus monkey get a
long, specialized gut?
3.
How did silverback gorillas become
twice as big as females?
4.
How did
humans become “naked”? (i.e. how did we cease to be as furry as the other
primates)?
Chapter 4: Departure. When to get born and why it's so difficult.
4.1 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts: Gonads, genitals, and gestation
(8)
4.2 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Labor Pains and Helpless Infants: Eve or
Evolution? (Part 1) – Dunsworth (Sapiens)
·
Labor Pains and Helpless Infants: Eve or
Evolution? (Part 2) – Dunsworth (Sapiens)
Chapter 5: Test. When you were a big-brained, seemingly helpless baby; milk
and lactase persistence; origins of bipedalism; origins of language.
5.1 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts: On
the Nature of Limbs (9)
Resources
·
Overview of
hominin evolution – Pontzer (Nature Ed)
·
The
Smithsonian Human Origins website
http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils
·
Primate
locomotion – Gebo (Nature Education)
·
Ardi-Ardipithecus ramidus and human evolution
((video; 3:33 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5c5syi0124
·
Ancient
Human Ancestors: Walking in the woods (video; 4 mins)
·
The
Earliest Hominins: Sahelanthropus,
Orrorin, and Ardipithecus - Su (Nature
Ed):
5.2 Write and/or draw what you
found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If
struggling to identify that information, then pull out what you have questions
about, what you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what
surprised you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the
course, or what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts:
Hip to Toe (10)
Resources
·
Lucy
(video; 5 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8Lkk6u-wQM
·
Lucy: A
marvelous specimen – Schrein (Nature Ed)
5.3 Using resources and assignments
in this syllabus and from class notes and handouts, make page-sized informational,
fact-filled baseball-like cards for “Ardi” and “Lucy.” You must use at least one page for each. Why
do these individuals and species matter? What is interesting? What do we know?
What don’t we know? How do they relate to you? How do you relate to them?
5.4 Using resources and assignments
in this syllabus and from class notes and handouts, make page-sized
informational, fact-filled baseball-like cards for the “Nariokotome (Homo
erectus) boy” and a Neanderthal of your choice (may even be composite
individual that you name). You must use
at least one page for each. Why do these individuals and species matter? What
is interesting? What do we know? What don’t we know? How do they relate to you?
How do you relate to them?
Chapter 6: Donor. Development of adult brain,origins of human sociality, and development of 'secondary sex traits'
6.1 Write and/or draw what you found to
be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling to
identify that information, then pull out what you have questions about, what
you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised
you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the course, or
what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Peace Among Primates – Sapolsky (The
Greater Good)
Resources
·
Sexual selection – Brennan (Nature Ed)
·
What Influences the Size of Groups in
Which Primates Choose to Live? – Chapman & Teichroeb (Nature Ed)
·
Primate
Sociality and Social Systems – Swedell (Nature Ed)
·
Primates in
communities – Lambert (Nature Ed)
·
Why is no one interested in vagina size?
– Dunsworth (New York Mag)
https://www.thecut.com/2015/12/why-is-no-one-interested-in-vagina-size.html
6.2
React to the Whiten et al paper in at least one page. To help, try
miming each of the behaviors in Table 2 noting some that are familiar to you as
a human who behaves as a human, and some that aren’t.
Assigned (pdf will be passed out in class as
well)
·
"Cultures in
chimpanzees" by Whiten, Goodall, et al., Nature 1999
Resources
·
Primate
Communication – Zuberbuhler (Nature Ed)
6.3 Read on and then answer questions A and B
after reading:
Remember…
•
Most of us were taught incorrectly or
led, wrongly, to believe that ‘evolution’ = ‘natural selection’ and that all
evolution occurs through natural selection. This leads us to see every
evolutionary scenario, all the way from fairy tale ones to the most scientifically
legitimate ones, as natural selection. This is, of course, not a correct
understanding of evolution.
•
Natural selection can result in new
adaptations or in the elimination of bad traits. The former is “positive”
selection, the latter is “negative” and is always occurring no matter what.
Positive selection does happen but is not easy to test, since natural selection
occurs via differential reproductive success, but “survival of the luckiest”
alleles via genetic drift can look exactly the same by increasing and
decreasing allele frequencies just by chance. The difference between the two is
that, in a selection scenario, the trait that’s evolving is causing the differential
reproduction (whether enhancing or inhibiting, even if ever so slightly
affecting it slowly over time), but in a genetic drift scenario the trait is
randomly “drifting” to lower or higher frequencies merely due to chance
(unlinked to the trait in question) effects on differential reproduction and
chance passing of one allele or the other to offspring. Like selection, drift
can completely fix or completely eliminate traits. Genetic drift is always
occurring, and so is negative selection to some degree (filtering out mutations
that prevent survival and reproduction) and positive selection to some degree
(increasing the prevalence of mutations, new or old, that enhance survival and
reproduction).
Read this blurb from a website below about a very common perception of human
evolution:
_______________________________________________________________________________
Wisdom teeth might be lost as
people continue to evolve
Why the modern diet may make
wisdom teeth unnecessary
About 25 to 35 per cent of people will never get
their wisdom teeth
By: Astrid Lange Toronto Star Library, Published on Tue Jun 25 2013
Wisdom teeth are the third and final set of molars
that most people get in their late teens or early 20s. But not everyone does —
the American Dental Association estimates that about 25 to 35 per cent of
people will never get their wisdom teeth. Another 30 per cent will only get 1
to 3 of them. Anthropologists believe wisdom teeth evolved due to our
ancestors’ diet of coarse, rough food — leaves, roots, nuts and meat — which
required more chewing power and resulted in excessive wear of the teeth. Since
people are no longer ripping apart meat with their teeth and the modern diet is
made of softer foods, wisdom teeth have become less useful. In fact, some
experts believe we are on an evolutionary track to losing them altogether.
_____________________________________________________________________________________
A. Briefly explain the
evolutionary mechanism behind the evolutionary scenario for future wisdom tooth
loss that the author of the blurb alludes to. In other words, think about what
the writer is really hypothesizing for future human evolution and rephrase his
explanation, but scientifically, in terms of all or just some of the four main
mechanisms of evolution that we discussed in class which are mutation, gene
flow, genetic drift, and selection. Important!
Banned words for your scenario include: Need(s/ed/ing), want(s/ed/ing),
try(s/ed/ing), best, most and fittest.
B. Write out an alternative
scenario where natural selection is responsible for the loss of wisdom teeth in
our future selves. If it’s not obvious, this will be a significantly different
scenario from what the writer has imagined in the blurb and from what you wrote
in response to ‘a.’ Important! Banned
words for your scenario include: Need(s/ed/ing), want(s/ed/ing), try(s/ed/ing),
best, most, and fittest.
Chapter 7: Transformation. Adulthood: the joys; Origins of tool use and the relationship to
dietary evolution
7.1 Take this quiz and in at least one page write
and/or draw what you found to be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy about
the experience.
Assigned
Resources
·
Dietary Detective: Smithsonian Scientist
Briana Pobiner https://www.si.edu/object/yt_VYSw0EWwNhw
7.2 Write and/or draw what you found to
be meaningful, significant, or noteworthy in the readings. If struggling to
identify that information, then pull out what you have questions about, what
you’d like to learn more about, what you’re uncertain about, what surprised
you, what relates to other material we have already covered in the course, or
what may relate to what you anticipate we will cover down the road.
Assigned
·
Roberts: Shoulders and Thumbs (11)
Resources
·
Ancient Hands, Ancient Tools (video; 5 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_ew9J8lpwo
·
The
Ancient History of the Human Hand (video; 4 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUL8hKDdY84
·
A Primer on
Paleolithic Technology – Ferraro (Nature Ed)
·
Evidence
for Meat-Eating by Early Humans – Pobiner (Nature Ed)
·
Archaeologists
officially declare collective sigh over “Paleo Diet”
·
Homo erectus - A Bigger, Smarter, Faster
Hominin Lineage – Van Arsdale (Nature Ed)
·
The
"Robust" Australopiths – Constantino (Nature Ed)
·
Neanderthal
Behavior – Monnier (Nature Ed)
Chapter 8: Test Again. Adulthood: the oys; Removing the racism and sexism from scientific
explanations for, and consequent popular beliefs about, human biological variation
8.1 Have you taken a genetic ancestry test? Do you know much
about your ancestry? How many generations back do you know about? What is the
idea that Terrell says ancestry tests are keeping alive? How are they doing
that? What do you take away as significant from the video about Neanderthal
DNA?
Assigned
·
Ancestry Tests Pose a Threat
to Our Social Fabric: Commercial DNA testing isn’t just harmless entertainment.
It’s keeping alive ideas that deserve to die – Terrell (Sapiens) https://www.sapiens.org/technology/dna-test-ethnicity/
·
The
Neanderthal Inside Us (video; 4 mins)
Resources
·
Archaic Homo sapiens – Bae (Nature Ed)
·
What
happened to the Neanderthals? – Harvati (Nature Ed)
·
The
Transition to Modern Behavior – Wurz (Nature Ed)
·
Testing
models of modern human origins with archaeology and anatomy – Tryon &
Bailey (Nature Ed)
·
Anthropological
genetics: Inferring the history of our species through the analysis of DNA –
Hodgson & Disotell (Evolution: Education and Outreach)
·
Paternity Testing: Blood Types and DNA – Adams (Nature Ed)
·
Colonialism and narratives of
human origins in Asia and Africa—
Athreya and Ackerman
·
#WakandanSTEM: Teaching the
evolution of skin color—Lasisi
8.2
React meaningfully to the readings and make sure to address the following:
What’s the link between racism and evolutionary theory and what do you think
about it?
Assigned
·
From the Belgian Congo to the Bronx Zoo (NPR): http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5787947
·
A True and
Faithful Account of Mr. Ota Benga the Pygmy, Written by M. Berman, Zookeeper –
Mansbach
http://adammansbach.com/other/otabenga.html (Note! This is a fictional account
based on the real history.)
·
How to write about Africa –
Wainaina (Granta): https://granta.com/how-to-write-about-africa/
·
For Decades, Our Coverage Was
Racist. To Rise Above Our Past, We Must Acknowledge It: We asked a preeminent
historian to investigate our coverage of people of color in the U.S. and
abroad. Here’s what he found—Goldberg (NatGeo)
8.3 What
is race? What is racism? Choose one of Marks’ ten facts and explain why it’s
important to you.
Assigned
·
Chapter 15: Ten Facts about human
variation – Marks (Human Evolutionary Biology)
https://webpages.uncc.edu/~jmarks/pubs/tenfacts.pdf
(copy and past that URL, direct link may not work)
Resources
·
In the Name of Darwin – Kevles (PBS) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/darwin/nameof/
·
Why be against Darwin?
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/ajpa.22163
·
Human Skin Color Variation (NMNH): http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/genetics/skin-color
·
There's no such thing as a 'pure'
European—or anyone else – Gibbons (Science)
·
Frederick Douglass’s fight
against scientific racism – Herschthal (NYT)
·
The unwelcome revival of race
science—Evans (The Guardian)
·
A lot of Southern whites are a little bit black –
Ingraham (Washington Post)
·
There’s No Scientific Basis
for Race—It's a Made-Up Label: It's been used to define and separate people for
millennia. But the concept of race is not grounded in genetics—Kolbert (NatGeo)
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/04/race-genetics-science-africa/
·
On the Origin of White Power
– Johnson (SciAm blogs)
·
White People Are Noticing
Something New: Their Own Whiteness—Bazelon (The New York Times) https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/13/magazine/white-people-are-noticing-something-new-their-own-whiteness.html
·
Surprise! Africans are not
all the same (or why we need diversity in science) – Lasisi
·
Why white supremacists are
chugging milk (and why geneticists are alarmed) – Harmon (NYT)
8.4 What is the difference between
sex and gender? What does it mean to say that sex is a spectrum? How has
old/bad science encouraged people to deem women “inferior”? Does cutting edge
biology impact gender expression and gender stereotypes? What does this mean to
you?
Assigned
·
Sex
Redefined – Ainsworth (Nature)
·
The book that fights sexism with science
– review of Saini’s book (Guardian)
Resources
·
How
the alt-right’s sexism lures men into white supremacy – Romano (Vox)
https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/14/13576192/alt-right-sexism-recruitment
https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/14/13576192/alt-right-sexism-recruitment
·
How Donald
Trump Got Human Evolution Wrong – Dunsworth (Washington Post)
8.5 How does racism affect a person’s health? Racism affects
everyone, so how does racism affect you?
Assigned
·
Everyday discrimination
raises women’s blood pressure – Yong (The Atlantic)
·
Being black in America can be
hazardous to your health – Khazan (The Atlantic) https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/07/being-black-in-america-can-be-hazardous-to-your-health/561740/
Resources
·
Why
America’s Black Mothers and Babies Are in a Life-or-Death Crisis - Villarosa
(The New York Times) https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/11/magazine/black-mothers-babies-death-maternal-mortality.html
·
The
labor of racism –Davis (Anthrodendum) https://anthrodendum.org/2018/05/07/the-labor-of-racism/
· Against Human Nature—Ingold
Chapter 9: Triumph. Aging, wisdom, and reflection
9.1 Look back at day 1.1. Write a letter to yourself on day
1.1. Tell yourself what you got right, what you got wrong, what you left out.
Now from where you stand on 9.1 today, identify an idea or concept that emerged
from the course that’s important to you now. Next, identify a question that
emerged from the course that’s important to you now, describe the steps you
took to find an answer (web search, google scholar, etc), and whether or not
you found a satisfying answer, and whether you still have questions.
Resources
·
Roberts: The Making of Us (12)
***BOOKS ARE DUE IN CLASS TODAY***
Racism and Sexism projects are due at the time of the final,
in a few days…. See you then!
