World's 'Oldest' Rice Found

BBC ^ | 10-21-2003 | Dr David Whitehouse

[blam]

World's 'oldest' rice found

By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor

Rice was on the menu for ancient man

Scientists have found the oldest known domesticated rice. The handful of 15,000-year-old burnt grains was discovered by archaeologists in Korea.

Their age challenges the accepted view that rice cultivation originated in China about 12,000 years ago.

The rice is genetically different from the modern food crop, which will allow researchers to trace its evolution.

Today's rice is the primary food for over half the world's population, with 576,280,000 tonnes produced in 2002.

Rice is especially important in Asia, where it is responsible for almost a third of all calorific intake.

Tracer of evolution

The oldest know rice was discovered by Lee Yung-jo and Woo Jong-yoon of Chungbuk National University in South Korea.

The rice DNA will aid evolution study

They found the ancient grains during excavations in the village of Sorori in the Chungbuk Province.

Radioactive dating of the 59 grains of carbonised rice has pushed back the date for the earliest known cultivation of the plant.

DNA analysis shows the early rice sample to be different from the modern intensively farmed varieties, thereby offering scientists the opportunity to study the evolution of one of the world's principal food sources.

The region in central Korea where the grains were found is one of the most important sites for understanding the development of Stone Age man in Asia.

[curmudgeonII]

There was a saying in New Orleans, when I lived there 30 years ago, about the Cajun who went into a restaurant in New York City. The waitress asked him if he wanted everything on it. He thought for a while and said, "No, hold the rice."

[r9etb]

For goodness sake, it's still rice. It is not half rice half some primitive ancestor.

I think you're misunderstanding their use of "evolution" in this sense. The usage here is primarily agricultural, in that rice has "evolved" in much the same way that dogs, horses, wheat, and tomatoes have "evolved."

[r9etb]

The discovery is another scientific and theoretical proof that there was an ice age in Korea.

Sure -- but that doesn't mean that all of Korea was under a sheet of ice.

Also, I think you need to be very careful of this particular news source (North Korean). It would surprise me a lot if this story was not put there for some political purpose.

[Jim Cane]

This is the first rice I remember seeing.

[stands2reason]

They're not saying it necessarily evolved naturally....but it did evolve. So has corn. Not everything is evo/crevo.

[stands2reason]

God put that rice under the glacier just to fool archaeologists.

Please tell me you're kidding.

[RightWhale]

Not everything is evo/crevo

Not everything need be c/e, but it could be.

[Indrid Cold]

Of course I'm kidding. But isn't that the creationist line, that God buried all those dinosaur skeletons in the ground and aged them 150 million years just to fool archaeologists?

[gore3000]

They're not saying it necessarily evolved naturally....but it did evolve. So has corn. Not everything is evo/crevo.

No, but they are implying it and they are dishonestly repeating it in just about every sentence. Yes, the article is dishonest.

[stands2reason]

No they are not. "Evolution" was in one sentence, and it the word means more than what you think. Languages also evolve. Does that mean they are Darwinistic as well? Anyone who believes this article was promoting the Natural Theory of Evolution is delusional.

[gore3000]

"Evolution" was in one sentence

Yup, at the end and in conclusion. Rice did not evolve - period. It has been perfected into a better more productive food source by human engineering. That is not evolution of any kind, it is human design that has wrought those changes, not chance.

[stands2reason]

You fail to understand the definition of "evolve". Just because you want to tailor that word to mean only what you think it means does not make it so.

[gore3000]

You fail to understand the definition of "evolve".

I understand it perfectly. I understand that it is used to mean whatever someone wants it to mean. When it is used about living things it means undesigned and rice was designed by human hands so it is a false use of the word.

[stands2reason]

When it is used about living things it means undesigned and rice was designed by human hands so it is a false use of the word.

And now I ask for your source.

[lizma]

The world "evolution" just means a process of change in a certain direction.
Whether it was done by humans or not, the definition of the word doesn't change.

[Tall_Texan]

Beat me to it!

[HiTech RedNeck]

Yeah, the lies called evolution.

[Junior]

Ping

[Ichneumon]

Rice did not evolve - period. It has been perfected into a better more productive food source by human engineering. That is not evolution of any kind, it is human design that has wrought those changes, not chance.

Unless you're going to try to tell us that mankind was whipping up specialized DNA sequences and using plasmids to insert them into the rice genome 10,000+ years ago, "chance" in the form of fortuitous mutations most certainly *was* the agent of novel features in rice varieties, and the fact that men liked certain kinds and planted them more than the other kinds doesn't make this any less a classic example of evolution.

Selective breeding is still selection, and any time there's selection acting upon variation of reproductive entities, you've got 100% real evolution occurring.