Feb.4th.2011

The Ape That Took Over The World

• They found an unknown skull. 50 different species of Apes. Twice the weight of a man.
• Brain theory: Homo Sapiens evolved because of one primate ape, Species developed a bigger train than the others.
• They measured brain size by filling the skull glass beads.
• Our brain is 3x’s bigger than chimpanzee's brain.
• 600 cubic centimetres of the size of the skull, any bigger and ur not considered an Ape anymore.
• 3.6 million year old-fossilized footprints--> Laetoli
• Lucy: Dipedal but small brain
• Our superior intelligence drives our evolution
• Everything is like a chain--> stood up-->building tools--> making food-->bigger brains. and so it went on for million of years.
• Lucy walked on two legs , that's why we evolved to the most intelligent and unique creatures alive.
• Adaptive radiation: the evolution of many different species from a common ancester
• Revolutionary tree; from a common ancestors, related species
• Lucy evolved without any adaptive radiation. Lucy was a straight line.
• Human are different than all other animals= RIGHT! she defines the law of evolution.
• Massive extinction affected most but the Australopithicene-lucy
• do we really have a unique evolutionary path or have we evolved radiation like the rest of human life?
• how the spine entered the head. helps us walk up right. we walk on two legs and Apes dont.
• was it the saem specie as Lucy or something different?

Feb. 2011

What makes humans different?- The human spark
Why did the human spark ignite in our ancestors and not the Neanderthals?
Ca plunk the rock shelter, thousands of years old. Sculptures made 20,000 years ago.
South west France. Europe and Australia are the 2 continents where the human spark began.
2 million years ago, an African skull has a very long large face, little room for the brain.
The invention of stone axes- 1.6 million years ago
Cave of rock De Marcelle sheltered neanderthals tell the roof collapsed.
Approx, 100,000 years ago the Neanderthals made the same type of tools.
All language is symbolic

The Neanderthals had a tool kit and there solutions and they picked from there tool kit for 1000’s of years. Why didn't Neanderthals evolve?
-Fire
-Tools
-Clothes
-Social structure
They were good at adapting but not innovating.

Neanderthals were hunters- the only protein they ate was meat, no tracks of any vegetables or even fish.
Neanderthals had a way of living that worked no matter what circumstance they were put in. Humans created different developments for different circumstances.
You can’t separate technology from social structure. As our social structure changes technology becomes more advanced.

January 28th, 2011

Theories:
a. Ian Tattersall
b. Bernard Wood
c. Donald Johanson

Europe was the center for Neanderthals
The structure of the neanderthals skull is different then modern humans, they have a long short face and humans have a small high face.
Humans may contain some neanderthal jeans
Early modern humans have similar facial features compared to the neanderthal.
Neanderthals are very similar to humans. 4 neanderthal skeletons were dug up and there DNA was tested. No correspondence to humans occurred, but we cant rule out the fact that we have no relation to the neanderthals.

January 26th, 2011

Documentary of Origins:

• Donald Johnson discovered a knee join in Hadar named “Lucy” for the Beatles's song.
• A farensis: common ancestor to all others. She was the ape who stood up.
• Austral(sou-tern)pith ecus(ape)--> Australopithecus
• Hadar -->( Afar region) Ethiopia(Africa)
• in the past we shared common ancestors. They slowly started to look ape like
• 6 million years ago, deserts. Many apes perished , few species survived
• Volcanic ash.rain= cement
• laetoli footprints =kept a record of footprints from today
• bipedalism is the 1st thing that sets h.s apart from the apes.

1) The major study fields are : Sociocultural Anthropology, Archeology, Physical Anthropology, Linguistic Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Forensic Anthropology, Business Anthropology, Visual Anthropology, Environmental Anthropology and Museum Anthropology. http://www.aaanet.org/profdev/careers/Anthos.cfm

2) Some sub-disciplines for cultural anthropology are:  International Studies, Asian Studies, African Diaspora Studies, and Women and Gender Studies.
http://www.kenyon.edu/x11667.xml


3) “Most anthropologists work in colleges and universities, where they teach and do research. Others work for museums. Government agencies employ a few anthropologists, usually in museums, national parks, and technical aid programs. Anthropologists also work for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Army Corps of Engineers. Some anthropologists serve as consultants to government or industry.” http://careers.stateuniversity.com/pages/384/Anthropologist.html


4) Anthropologist use methods like ; Participant Observation, Comparative Method, Ethnohistory, Personal Interviews, Life Histories and Genealogies.
http://www2.eou.edu/~kdahl/methdef.html

5) A paleontologist studies the prehistoric life, including the evolution and interaction of organisms’. They try to explain cause rather than doing experiments to observe effects.
http://askville.amazon.com/paleontologist-study-fossils-remains-dinasaurs/AnswerViewer.do?requestId=40404928


6) George Matthew: http://new-brunswick.net/Saint_John/fame/matthews.html
   Robert Broom: http://dinosaurs.about.com/od/famouspaleontologists/p/robertbroom.htm
   Richard Owen: http://dinosaurs.about.com/od/famouspaleontologists/p/richardowen.htm