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Modern life's pressures may be hastening human evolution (Human Evolution Speeding Up)
McClatchy ^ | April 8, 2009 | Robert S. Boyd

Posted on 04/08/2009 6:19:32 PM PDT by GOPGuide

snip

It's even conceivable, he said, that our genes eventually will change enough to create an entirely new human species, one no longer able to breed with our own species, Homo sapiens.

"Someday in the far distant future, enough genetic changes might have occurred so that future populations could not interbreed with the current one,'' Sussman said in an e-mail message.

snip

It's also the topic of a new book, "The 10,000 Year Explosion,'' by anthropologists Henry Harpending and Gregory Cochran of the University of Utah, Salt Lake City.

"For most of the last century, the received wisdom in the social sciences has been that human evolution stopped a long time ago,'' Harpending said. "Clearly, received wisdom is wrong, and human evolution has continued.''

snip

When he was asked how many genes currently are evolving, Harpending replied: "A lot. Several hundred at least, maybe over a thousand.''

Another anthropologist, John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said, "Our evolution has recently accelerated by around 100-fold.''

A key reason, Hawks said, is the enormous growth of the world's population, which multiplies the size of the gene pool available to launch new varieties.

"Today, beneficial mutation must be happening far more than ever before, since there are more than 6 billion of us,'' Cochran said.

The changes are so rapid that "we could, in the very near future, compare the genes of old people and young people'' to detect newly evolving genes, Cochran said. Skeletons from a few thousand or even a few hundred years ago also might provide evidence of genetic change.

"Human evolution didn't stop when anatomically modern humans appeared or when they expanded out of Africa,'' Harpending said. "It never stopped.''

(Excerpt) Read more at mcclatchydc.com ...


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: evolution; genes; genetics; godsgravesglyphs; homosapien; homosapiens; humans; science
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To: GOPGuide

Good grief. This article is a wonderful demonstration of how little anthropologists understand elementary genetics.


21 posted on 04/08/2009 6:58:11 PM PDT by Liberty1970 (Democrats are not in control. God is. And Thank God for that!)
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To: rbg81
You might be on to something.

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Goonie goo goo
22 posted on 04/08/2009 6:59:52 PM PDT by cripplecreek (The poor bastards have us surrounded.)
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To: GOPGuide

“that future populations could not interbreed with the current one...”

Ten-thousand year old people aren’t supposed to sleep with 20-year olds anyway. That’s just gross.


23 posted on 04/08/2009 7:01:09 PM PDT by Winstons Julia
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To: rbg81
I would not be surprised if we see reverse evolution.

Exactly. If anything we are devolving.

Look at the segments of the population that is procreating far faster than others. The welfare crowd, People stuck in a 600AD time warp. Not encouraging.

Women get implants, plastic surgery to make themselves more attractive. Men do tummy tucks, hair implants, eyelids.
Last I checked there wasn't a silicon gene. Their offspring will not look like the altered parents.

Modern medicine keeps weak specimens alive that in turn have children.
Years ago those weak people wouldn't live long enough to procreate.

Are up evolving or devolving. I vote for the latter.

24 posted on 04/08/2009 7:06:03 PM PDT by Vinnie (You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Jihads You)
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To: GOPGuide

Ah, I see. This must be why everyone in big cities is evolving into Democrats!


25 posted on 04/08/2009 7:11:42 PM PDT by April Lexington (Study the constitution so you know what they are taking away!)
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To: GOPGuide
Photobucket
26 posted on 04/08/2009 7:20:23 PM PDT by rfp1234 (Phodopus campbelli: household ruler since July 2007.)
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To: Liberty1970

This coming from someone who things *evolutionary legal scholars* is a valid classification?


27 posted on 04/08/2009 7:21:17 PM PDT by DevNet (What's past is prologue)
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To: GOPGuide

This flies in the face of the notion that genetic bottlenecks have been behind the evolution of mankind. Broadening the gene pool will cause a reversion to the norm. We’re not all that differentiated now, even after presumably tens of thousands of years in isolation from one another.


28 posted on 04/08/2009 7:34:58 PM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: GOPGuide

The FR atheist/evolutionists must approve. They have not shown up to spam your keyword lists with profanity, make personal attacks, twist and distort, create strawmen, or engage in any of the other methods they use to demonstrate their superlative intelligence /sarc>


29 posted on 04/08/2009 7:37:42 PM PDT by valkyry1
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To: GOPGuide
I do believe in micro-evolution as a Christian. However we will always be 100% human as a species.

From pygmies to giants and from summu wrestlers to jockeys; major differences in stature and size makes to difference; still 100% human.

30 posted on 04/08/2009 7:58:45 PM PDT by BillT (New Executive Order to abolish the WS Constitution to be signed to save the US Constitution)
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To: ChildOfThe60s

EEUUWW


31 posted on 04/08/2009 8:01:36 PM PDT by luvie (Zero is dumb as a rock)
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To: rfp1234; GOPGuide

It's not happening fast enough for some!

32 posted on 04/08/2009 8:03:13 PM PDT by luvie (Zero is dumb as a rock)
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To: GOPGuide

How the hell do you have evolution without “selection” for attributes that favor success in life.

It is in fact the least-successful people in this world that are propagating at the fastest rate.

Idiocracy is happening folks. Just enjoy society while it lasts.


33 posted on 04/08/2009 8:16:20 PM PDT by DiogenesLaertius
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To: GOPGuide; cripplecreek

In no time at all Barney frank should be making
the evolutionary leap into Ultraman.

Or Johnny Weismuller? These theories and charts get tricky.

34 posted on 04/08/2009 9:14:34 PM PDT by HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity
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To: Winstons Julia
What about Clinton suggesting "he'd hit it" about that mummy?

Cheers!

35 posted on 04/08/2009 10:55:35 PM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
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To: GOPGuide
But eventually, genetic engineering will increase human intelligence.

The very fact that genetic engineering will be designed by flawed human beings belies contradicts notion that genetically engineered humans will be intellectually superior to those naturally evolved by forces we really have no conception.

36 posted on 04/08/2009 11:56:29 PM PDT by TheThinker (Obama is a radical communist Muslim appeaser. America can fail. It is time to fight.)
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To: Vinnie

Also, in the realm of ideas, modern prosperity encourages idiocy. Because there is a cushion for Leftist politicians not to suffer the immediate consequences of their actions, people believe that that drivel is equally valid. When you become too civilized, you loose key aspects of the will and drive that got you to where you are. You start living off the past and are condemned to inevitable decline. One almost has to believe that a the success & advance of modern socieity also contains the seeds of its destruction.


37 posted on 04/09/2009 2:37:05 AM PDT by rbg81 (DRAIN THE SWAMP!!)
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To: TheThinker

Ever seen “Gattaca”?


38 posted on 04/09/2009 2:39:20 AM PDT by rbg81 (DRAIN THE SWAMP!!)
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To: GodGunsGuts; Fichori

Pingity-ping.

Ain’t it sweet?


39 posted on 04/09/2009 5:45:08 PM PDT by Gordon Greene (www.fracturedrepublic.com - Jesus said, "I am THE way, THE truth and THE life." Any questions?)
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To: Gordon Greene

Soon, we will be able to fly to the planet Krypton under our own power!


40 posted on 04/09/2009 5:49:43 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
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