Top 10 Evolutionary Adaptations

oneill40 writes "The New Scientist has an interesting article up listing the Top 10 most amazing things to have evolved, including sex, death, the eye, language and parasites!" From the article:"Sponges are a key example of multicellular life, an innovation that transformed living things from solitary cells into fantastically complex bodies. It was such a great move, it evolved at least 16 different times. Animals, land plants, fungi and algae all joined in." J adds: Number four, Language, got a careful look from Carl Zimmer a while back. It's Pinker vs. Chomsky, winner take all, pass the popcorn!

Comments

What about the thumb?

[Jason_D_Berg]

Weird. I would have expected to see an opposable thumb on that list. I mean, isn't that kind of important for us? Or maybe I'm just being too human-centric.

More from Carl Zimmer: Resurrecting the Genome

[vivin]

Somewhat along the same lines, Carl Zimmer also talked about "resurrecting the genome" of a mammalian ancestor from about 80 million years ago. Snippets of the genome are present in all mammals today. By comparing the genomes of various mammals, they were able to come up with a pretty good approximate of the genome. This chart shows how much of the original genome different mammals have. Surprisingly, humans have lost only 25% of the original genome, whereas rats and mice have lost more than twice that. I would have thought otherwise since the earliest mammals were shrewlike... but I'm not a biologist/geneticist/whoever studies these things.

He also wrote this article some time ago that talked about Resurrecting the Genome. Here is another article (by him) on the same topic, that appeared on NY Times.

DNA didn't "evolve" as per the theory of evoluion.

[Dimensio]

It's what allows cells to copy the essence of themselves from one generation to the next, and allows them to continue on the platform from where the last generation left off.

And if you don't have DNA, you don't have imperfectly-replicating life forms, which means that you don't have evolution. As such, you cannot use evolution to go from the stage where there is no DNA to where there is, because it involves at least one step where you don't have reproducing life forms.

Re:Language genetic vs. memetic

[lgw]

I find it amusing that profanity is apparantly universal. Chimps/gorillas are never taught sign language for any profanity, but they regularly invent a sign for "shit" and use it as profanity. This is usually translated as "dirty" in scientific publication. ;)

sponges

[bcrowell]

Sponges are very cool -- you can put one through a sieve so fine that it's broken down into individual cells, and it will then reassemble itself into a complete sponge, but with every cell rearranged into a new position! Apparently the scientist who first did this (ca. 1900) then tried doing it with two separate sponges of different species at once, and was disappointed when they didn't reassemble into a hyrbid. Shows how little they knew about the microscopic basis of genetics at that time.

Re:Fascinating Food for Thought

[RatBastard]

1. What is [life's] purpose? - To successfully reproduce before you are eaten.
2. What is *our* purpose? - See #1.

That's it. That's all there is. Reproduction. Everything else is just strategies to help us reproduce or control reproduction. However, you have a massive brain that bestows upon you language and consciousness. This gives you the ability to do more with your life than simply have kids.

The purpose of your life is whatever you decide it will be. If you want a grand purpose then give yourself one. If all you want to do is watch TV until you fall over dead one day, go for it. There is no grand purpose. The universe doesn't give a wet slap what you do or if you live or die.

Re:Bad News

[ajs]

"And talk about missing options sheesh! Best evolutionary adaptation? I vote breasts!"

Are you referring to the original development of the lactating teat or the exaggerated secondary sexual characteristic in adult human females?

The latter is just a display trait, and other than the interesting matter of being tied to human females being effectively in a permanent state of heat (not sure if this is unique among mammals, but I know it's at least quite rare), it's fairly uninteresting.

The lactating teat on the other hand is quite a remarkable development, and while I'm not sure I'd put it up there with language, you could make the argument that things like language are possible BECAUSE of the developments (like this one) which allow the young to experience a prolonged development stage outside of the womb. This prolonged development in turn makes the development of a more complex brain far more practical.

So, I half agree with you, they're pretty darned important, though I consider the reduced number of young and proportionally reduced number of teats on primates to be a bit of a step backward...

Religions as evolving parasites ?

[TurretMaster]

Anybody else ever considered regigions as some kind of parasistic idea, living and propagating on the human mind, and subjected to the same kind of natural selection as living beings ?

Imagine that : religions appear and mutate randomly, and only the liveliest branches, the ones most able to hold out against reality and other religions gain followers and thus multiply...

Re:Why the Eye is not a proof of "intelligent desi

[mikael]

Not forgetting

4. Lost the ability to see in ultra-violet.

From a study of 'opsins', the chemical molecules that convert light into electrons, and enable vision to work, many small animals and insects have the ability see these wavelengths. Humans seem to have lost this ability, due to the increased refraction at short wavelengths caused by larger eyes.

5. To be able to visualize magnetic field lines.

Magnetically sensitive molecules have been found in avian retinas. The theory is that these could appear as some sort of overhead display in the bird's mind (although, nothing more than lines running across the field of view, or maybe a pair of light/dark spots).

6. To be able to visualize polarised light (as used by the octopus). Underwater, light is polarized by the reflection of light reflected off fish scales. Many fish try and camouflage themselves by trying to match the optical intensity of their surroundings. For simple predators this works, but more complex creatures
such as the octopus are not fooled.

Also, polarized light can be used to signal to other members of the species without attracting undue attention.

7. Or having 16 visual pigments like the Stomatopod, which is also known to use polarised light to signal to others of the same species (And which also has stereo vision using one eye).