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Did Snakes Help Build the Primate Brain?
sciencehabit writes "A new study of the monkey brain suggests that primates are uniquely adapted to recognize the features of snakes and react in a flash. What's more, by selecting for traits that helped animals avoid them, the reptiles ultimately endowed us with forward-facing eyes, for example, and enlarged visual centers deep in our brains that are specialized for picking out specific features in the world around us, such as the general shape of a snake's body camouflaged among leaves.The results lend support to a controversial hypothesis: that primates as we know them would never have evolved without snakes."
They are at least as important as snaaaaakes.
Surely, a basic consequence of the mechanisms involved in evolution is that all long term changes in individual species are effectively driven by factors of the environment they live in, whether that's predators or other dangers, or the needs of being able to acquire food or raise offspring, etc. Snakes are, we know, dangerous. So surely it's obvious rather than controversial that they should have had some effect on our evolution?
The bible was right after all... it was the snakes fault after all
(Yes, I was aiming for '+5 funny'... how did you know?)
I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
Seems also birds are afraid of snakes. I place rubber snakes on places like boat decks and balconies, they are very effective and birds stay away.
Cats are not thrilled with things like vacuum cleaner hoses and air hissing sounds.
I thought they were prevalent on hunting animals because stereoscopic vision was important to depth perception which is critical when attacking another animal. Are snakes the reason for raptors having forward facing eyes too?
Something else that looks like a snake? Vines used by primates to move through jungles.
yep, but unlike "angels" or "face of Jesus" [sic] that you quote, get it wrong with a snake, and you're naturally selected.
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
Compared with three other categories of stimuli (monkey faces, monkey hands, and geometrical shapes), snakes elicited the strongest, fastest responses,
They compared one high value stimulus with a number of low value stimuli. How about adding a few other possibilities to the mix; predators like lions or wolves, prey animals, spiders, birds, etc. We have no idea if these other stimuli would get a greater response and, by their theory, influence primate evolution more. The study is obviously flawed.
No, forward facing eyes are not to recognise snakes. Prey species, especially the ones that are "snake bite size" tend to have eyes on the sides of their heads, so they have a bigger peripheral to detect predators. Forward facing eyes are only seen in predators and omnivores that rely on eyesight to capture their prey.
Snakes are just one form of predator or danger to humans or mammals in general. Humans, as most mammals, are very inaccurate at detecting snakes, unless they move. They are not more accurate at detecting snakes than they are at detecting any other animal, providing the level of camouflage of that animal is similar to that of the snakes. Singling out snakes to come up with a bunch of generic treats that we and other mammals have as the cause of these is bullcrap and there is no way to prove any of it. Maybe this is the sort of research a recently converted creationist or someone with a snake phobia would come up with. Snakes are nothing more than lizards that evolved to have no legs and the development of mammals saw many more forms and shapes of predators and dangers throughout their evolution that required exactly the same sort of adaptation. I challenge the writers of this paper to do a double blind test and evolve mammals again, both with and without snakes in their world and see what differences occur. Only then I will accept their proof, until then, go back to school and read up before you publish.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
There is a niche for a small, fast, deadly predator. Snakes happen to have won the fight for that niche, and so it's them that we have evolved to spot. If it weren't for the snakes, we woud still exist because something else would exist that we had a need to spot and react really quickly to. Screw you, snakes, you're not all that.
all the animals and vegetation and geography in the environment have an effect on the evolution of all things therein, it has synergy
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
If this is true, it it might explain the evolution of lawyers. Under this hypothesis, lawyers would have evolved from snakes that preyed on monkeys. As the monkeys got smarter, the snakes evolved into monkey mimics that still had primates as their primary food source. Finally, it all makes sense.
Why is Snark Required?
Looks like the old question finally gets an answer. :)
you've had it with these motherfucking snakes on your motherfucking brain!
The random-face-generator in the brain is uncanny in its ability to amuse simple folk like myself. Also pretty tough on youngsters afraid of the dark.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
I agree, in a way I would have been more impressed if they had shown that these particular neurons are differentially stimulated by pictures of snakes and other snake-like objects. Darwin's ideas about many traits being sex-related may be relevant here - how about seeing whether these neurons can differentiate between pictures of snakes and cocks?
Korma: Good
But did snakes specifically evolve to lie in wait for primates and their delicious x-factor blood? Snakes as we know them would not have evolved without delicious primate blood. Which also explains vampires.
This is the problem with modern "science." Any consistency and color of shit can be shoveled as long as someone pulls something vaguely rational-sounding out of their ass and calls it science.
Forward-facing eyes evolved for predators, not prey. They allow for judging of distance and depth, something a predator needs in order to chase. See lions, raptors, wolves, bears, etc.
Side-facing eyes evolved for prey, so they can perceive a wide viewing angle for movement and differences in texture/shade. See antelope, horses, deer, rabbits.
Primates evolved to take advantage of their hands. Enlarged visual centers for climbing and enlarged heads for the brains required to start using tools.
Fuck, and I'm not even a scientist. This "let's see how much utter horseshit we can label science" routine is getting really tired.
So, snakes are responsible for our ability to recognize the difference between good (no snake) and evil (SNAKE!!!). Where have I heard that one before?
As a heterosexual male who doesn't like the outdoors, my brain would treat them the same.
Does anyone else remember being a child and playing "snakes in the grass"? That game always dug up what I would describe as a very primal fear that lives deep down in all of us.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Perhaps a more important differentiation to an arboreal animal would be snakes and branches. One represents safety, the other danger (and possibly lunch).
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
AC is so right - I was in a church the other day and looked up at a glass window panel and I was like "OMG it's full of angels and faces of Jesus!"
while (true != false) process_more_stupid_code();