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180k-Year-Old Mutation Allowed Humans To Become Vegetarians, Move Out of Africa
An anonymous reader writes "Early humans were able to move from Africa after a single genetic mutation allowed them to become vegetarians, scientists claim. The switch, which allowed humans to process vegetables, meant that humans were able to move away from water sources and spread across the continent. A team of geneticists compared DNA sequences from a variety of people around the world to see how different populations relate to one another and when they have gone their separate ways. The scientists found that a key genetic variant gave humans the ability to convert fats from plants into essential nutrients for the brain."
...but then I got an arrow to my DNA...
Wouldn't that be omnivores?
Vegetarians are more evolved than meat-eaters.
...NO, God just went CLICK
African Americans love Chicken
So vegetarians are mutants and humans are originally meat-eaters?
I thought that all of creation was a mere 6,000 years old. Or so. Oh my, I guess a lot of Anthropology and Geology books will have to be re-written.
That's where they settled.
Stick peas in your ear.
I'm always sensitive to any claims of "mutation X gave humans power Y" because mutations are so rarely beneficial, the majority of evolution comes from sexual inheritance and selection pressure.
So how do they know it was a mutation? Its not like suddenly humans got a hunkering for plants one day. It had to happen gradually, so this gene must have been kicking around for ages, and must have appeared in multiple tribes; one mutated birth isn't going to suddenly diffuse across an entire species.
Basically, I don't understand this article.
Any experts out there want to demystify this for me a little more? How one random gene in one birth suddenly afflicts an entire population?
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
Always knew vegetarianism is superior - now I have proof :D
Vegetarians. You keep using that word, but I don't think it means what you think it means.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I wonder what the time parallel is between this mutation in digestion, and the change in human teeth (the addition of 'grinding' teeth for plant products) that allowed for ingestion.
We'll never know (barring the unlikely discovery of Pastwatch like technology) but i really wonder about what happened with the first person who had this mutation and actually made use of it. I mean, if they couldn't process vegetables before they never would have thought of them as a food source, would they? So what caused this one person (or group of people) to change their mind? Was there some kind drought or other disaster that prevented them from finding game to kill, but for some reason there was still vegetable material around and they were just desperate enough to eat anything by that point?
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
... being able to eat vegetables is not unusual for ANY monkey or ape. What is more if not most interesting is a genetic mutation which allows us to eat grains. Chimpanzees, for example, simply cannot process grains and as far as I have heard humans are the only primates which can.
Wonder what one might find if they followed the money and inclinations of the researchers? Didn't man supposedly descend from apes? Weren't apes mostly vegetarian or omnivores to start with? Thought it was supposed to be tool creation driven intelligence improvements that added/increased the inclusion of meat into the diet for its higher concentration of of proteins etc? Seem to recall that was what I was taught a few decades ago in school.
Oh well, I am not a biologist, archaeologist etc but I am sure there are some here to work on clearing that up some.
The switch, which allowed humans to process vegetables, meant that humans were able to move away from water sources and spread across the continent.
Without water there's no plants, without water and plants there are no animals. But it seems to me that the mutation didn't make us herbivores, it made us able to greatly expand our sources of nutrition. We not only could eat meat, but veggies as well.
We're not herbivores, we're omnivores.
Free Martian Whores!
unless they mutated away to live without water, humans did NOT move away from water.
I'm pretty sure they still lived around water. Rivers, Springs, Oases, Wells, whatever, but they needed the water.
But what do i know?
Be seeing you...
... okay, prior to being vegetarian-capable, being omnivorous was the fixed state of early humans?
Let's imagine... travelling across the land... probably fleeing from another group in S.Africa who was strong enough to stay and keep their claim to the land they had... and finding themselves increasingly hungry... wild game of any sort becoming more scarce and harder to catch or kill... the ones that didn't adapt, died and didn't produce offspring. The ones that lived passed on whatever capacity to survive without dying of malnutrition. Classic natural selection we're talking about.
But here's the thing. Even today when people try to go vegetarian, some people simply can't make the change without nutritional complications while others are just fine with it.
I don't think ALL humans are equally mutated if you wish to call it that.
The scientists found that a key genetic variant gave humans the ability to convert fats from plants into essential nutrients for the brain."
To this?
180k-Year-Old Mutation Allowed Humans To Become Vegetarians, Move Out of Africa
People who don't know their scientific terms mis-quote scientific articles. News at 10.
The Slashdot headline is wrong and the initial website it links to has a wrong headline.
If you read the scientific paper, it says the mutation happened about 85,000 years ago, not 180,000 years ago. This makes it logically consistent with other biological discoveries, archaeological finds etc.
Every month it is more crap to blow out to the masses every time your fundamental evolutionary rules change. It's like watching a liar on trial and seeing him change his story as the judge rolls out the evidence. Until someone can show me how to make atoms out of dead empty space, you need to just accept the fact that there is a Creator, and you owe Him the decency to not insult Him by claiming we just popped out of thin air, or this thing or that thing happened because of some random event. I cannot wait to see the looks on your faces when Judgement Day arrives. Now go love thy brother as yourselves and forgive. PS. For those of you who demand a little more logic then ponder this one. We have an almost nu-numberable amount of life here on our little rock we call Earth. If any Life WAS out there and it was only even 10 minutes earlier in its (evolutionary)life stage, then we would have found it and/or it found us since we have been sending out hardware for 60 years. O yea. THE FUCKING MONKEYS ARE STILL HERE THAT WE SUPPOSEDLY EVOLVED FROM
The headline is flamebait. The editors know the Slashdot nerds will see the term "vegetarian," become furious, and click on the article, and post furious posts, which will generate more furious posts and more page views. Profit!
It doesn't explain that vegetables contain the necessary DHA. Is that the case? I can only infer that from TFA.
I also have to ask the question: do other primates not eat vegetables?
Proverbs 21:19
right there with you man.
So when is the next mutation going to happen that humans can survive from common fast food?
...my food eats plants, then I eat the food. *rimshot*
The game.
This is so wrong. You haven't been keeping up with your articles as the 'author' of the "out of Africa movement" is contradicting his own idea and that this is not what happened. But junk science followed by more junk science gives you slashdot science.
You're SO wrong, for starters, what do you MEAN, "Out of Africa"? Don't you mean, "Out of Africa, East Asia, and Australia?" And lastly, what do you mean "mutation"? If it wasn't for selective breeding it wouldn't have taken hold. Where you think you is, Waterworld?
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
I'm a mutant, you're a mutant, he's a mutant, we're all mutants here.
I'm fortunate to have the Northern European "able to digest milk as an adult" mutation, which gives me a few more dietary choices. (I rarely actually drink milk without lots of coffee in it, but having the option makes being a vegetarian a lot more convenient than it otherwise would be.)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Vegetarian, my foot...
Chimps and Gorillas are basically black, with lighter-colored palms of their hands. We didn't turn light-skinned till we moved north and needed the extra vitamin D.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I don't believe we've "evolved" one bit. Just a sign of the times. There are atheists who will say I never hurt anyone, but they smoke a quarter of an ounce of pot everyday(or name your posion) with their buddies. And there are Christians who say they never hurt anyone, but they do the same thing in some fashion. Throwing stones at each other as always. No matter how much you try not to hurt anyone you will, and this argument just got a few people killed. I'm not happy about that are you? I've hurt some people too you know. Technically, it's a sin to debate in a good number of cases. It's horribly saddening that we waste our time doing this.
"Studies suggest that anatomically modern humans arose in Africa approximately 150 thousand years ago (kya), expanded throughout Africa ~60–80 kya, and to most parts of Europe and Asia ~40 kya[1]–[6]. Numerous mitochondrial DNA studies support what Foster and Matsumera [5] describe as a ‘remarkable expansion’ from a small geographic region dating broadly to ~60–80 kya." see http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0044926
"Think globally, act locally".
I could do without veggies way easier than I could do without meat.
I broke up with the most incredible girl just after HS because I just could not eat another tofo burger.
Potatoes and my GF's occasional tossed salad is enough veggies for me. :)
This is Slashdot, thinking is optional.
Like she said, "Nothing is True, Everything is permitted." :)
Truth isn't Truth - Guliani
So you're saying that vegetarians are mutants?
Hey, Windows users, there is no such thing as "forward" slash, there is only slash and backslash.
to another article about E.Coli bacteria in a lab evolving the ability to absorb citrate instead of just glocuse:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2012/09/19/the-birth-of-the-new-the-rewiring-of-the-old/
Homo sapiens first appeared 180,000 years ago but stayed around bodies of water in central Africa for almost 100,000 years. Researchers explained that the location was critical because it had a ready supply of fish and shellfish that provided the necessary fatty acid Docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) necessary for brain development Read more at http://www.medicaldaily.com/articles/12261/20120921/180-000-year-old-mutation-allowed-human.htm#8CTvIV68ZBqJuuRV.99
Bertie was attributing the braininess of Jeeves to fish, and I thought he was being a dope as usual. Turns out there is something to that.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The Earth is only 6,000 years old, which means that everything these so-called scientists are saying is false and a lie.
The Bible is the only Truth, and those who turn away from the Word of the Lord will burn in Hell for all of eternity. Don't beLIEve the lies that these "people" are telling you. They are tools of Satan and they only want to create more soldiers for Hell's Army.
I praise Jesus every day that I am able to root out these false prophets and expose them for what they are. God bless those of you that aren't fooled.
The article begins by claiming it allowed them to "become vegetarians" but the content of the article says
"The change meant that humans no longer had to rely on just one food source, fish, for brain growth and development.
Not having to rely on just one food source (animals) doesn't sound like a vegetarian to me It reads much more like it allowed them to become omnivores and thus be able to move away from a purely animal protein based diet.
Its amazing how much prejudices of the authors can spin the results of a study.
Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of congress. But then I repeat myself. -- Mark Twain
The title is wrong, this was not about becoming vegetarian, it was about been less dependent on fishes for omega-3 intake
The brain needs an omega-3 fatty acid called DHA. We can get it by eating fishes, or create it by transforming alpha-linonenic acid we get from vegetables (good sources are flax, wallnuts, colza). The mutation they talk about is about transforming alpha-linonenic acid into DHA.
This does not make use vegetarian, as there are still many nutriments we are unable to get from vegetables. The point is that it let us have working brains without relying on eating fishes
An interesting point is that the enzymes that process omega-3 also process omega-6, and the mutation therefore also increased our ability to process omega-6. This was not a problem until we started eating animals fed with too much omega-6. The animal flavor of omega-6 is called arachidonic acid. Excess of that one lead to cardiovascular problems and it promotes cancers because of excessive inflamation.
Humans are omnivores not vegetarians. This mutation would have allowed them to be omnivores rather than carnivores.
Only a massive modern globally fueled artificial availability of things that can't grow in one place allowed people to be vegetarians and mostly skinny and malnourished vegetarians at that.
Meat on the other hand requires no exotic combinations or preparations to keep you nourished. You are made of meat, and all animal meats have everything you need to produce and maintain the meat that is your body.
So that explains why most vegetarian men are so emasculated, that same mutation must also have lessened their base testosterone levels.
Poor pale salad eaters, give me Meat.
An Indian friend of mine (with degrees from Stanford and from the Univ. of Chicago, so one could say a well educated person) pointed out to me that Indians hadn't won anything in some major sports event for decades (don't remember what it was, or if he was talking about all of them at once), and that Indians are usually much smaller than people in the West. We were talking about eating habits, but only a few sentences, nothing major (I would not do that, because I could not care less if YOU kill YOURSELF slowly (by not eating enough meat, haha :) ).
I must say those Asians are pretty short too, the majority.
So let me go and grab another steak...
"180k-Year-Old Mutation Allowed Humans To Become Vegetarians, Move Out of Africa" is a statement, followed by an order to move out of africa. Honestly, is it that hard to type two extra characters and turn the comma into an 'and'?
I wrote my first program at the age of six, and I still can't work out how this website works.
are "fundies". At some point when most people are children, their parents explain to them that repeating jokes ad nauseum isn't funny. Your comment isn't original, it isn't amusing, and isn't relevant to the conversation. That is probably why you were downmodded to a troll.
Apes don't require meat. Why would our hominid ancestors have required it?
Amino acids are builing blocks for proteins that make up most of our bodies.
Essential amino acids are amino acids that we don't produce in our body, that we must get from our food. The thing is that some of these amino acids don't exist in plants. Thus we must have animal proteins in our diet. We can't live only on plants.
I have ripe plums rolling into my yard right now from my neighbors trees. The light colored powder on the outside of them (easy to see on grapes and so on too) is yeast. I eat it. Lots of B vitamins. Plus I use the yeast for sourdough and wine and such. I just wash some off into the juice or flour and water mix.
There are plant sources for ALL needed nutrients. I was vegan for a long time.
You do know that umami flavor is just MSG, right? These yeast products are very high in it. Also, usually when you see "hydrolyzed soy protein" or "autolyzed yeast extract" you know that those ingredients were included for their high MSG load but allow the manufacturer to avoid having to list MSG in the ingredients.
And, given the perversity of the universe, you know that if something is enjoyable then it is also deleterious: glutamate is an excitotoxin that kills neurons, just like aspartame/nutrasweet.
RTFA. The mutation was ~85 kya. The popular article also gets this wrong in their title.
"Organized religion" seems to have turned some humans right back into the savages of 180,000 years ago
Do you really thing you can survive on a lonely island, without the industrial supplements and processed food like tofu. On a vegan diat only?
Fraud Alert: This may be a paid ad for the very un-respectable Medical Daily. Do you see the Medical Daily ad? "Lose inches AND pounds with no hunger or exercise. Lose 5 lbs/week on average and look great!"
... would have been...". When that is re-phrased by the Medical Daily article, it is written to sound much less scientific and much more certain.
The PLOS One article says, "Jointly, these two sets of data support the hypothesis..." and "suggesting" and "we can speculate that perhaps" and "Consequently, it is likely..." and "it is likely that
That's my opinion, but others feel the same way.