Human Evolution:

The process of humanization

Fossil hominid evolution display at the Museum of Osteology, Oklahoma city, Oklahoma, USA

Contents
Prologue ........................................................................................................................................................ 5 1. A matter of different perspective ......................................................................................................... 8 Creationism vs. Evolution ......................................................................................................................... 8 Mutations .............................................................................................................................................. 9 Natural selection ................................................................................................................................. 12 Irreducible complexity ........................................................................................................................ 15 Intelligent design................................................................................................................................. 17 Microevolution vs. macroevolution ........................................................................................................ 20 Argument from ignorance ...................................................................................................................... 22 2. Lineages .............................................................................................................................................. 25 Dryopithecus ........................................................................................................................................... 26 Early hominids......................................................................................................................................... 28 Australopithecus ..................................................................................................................................... 29 Paranthropus .......................................................................................................................................... 30 Homo Erectus.......................................................................................................................................... 31 3. Interpretations .................................................................................................................................... 33 Identification ........................................................................................................................................... 33 Scarcity of fossils ................................................................................................................................. 33 Missing links ...................................................................................................................................... 36 An evolutionary tree vs. a web ....................................................................................................... 40 Speciation................................................................................................................................................ 51 Genetic divergence and convergence ................................................................................................. 53 Assimilation vs. Annihilation ............................................................................................................... 55 Molecular clocks ................................................................................................................................. 55 Evolutionary tunneling ........................................................................................................................ 57 Morphogenesis ................................................................................................................................... 61 Defining a species ............................................................................................................................... 63 The Cambrian explosion...................................................................................................................... 64 Attribution of physical characteristics .................................................................................................... 65

Bipedalism and encephalization ......................................................................................................... 67 Hair and skin color .............................................................................................................................. 70 Slanted- eyes and large- noses ....................................................................................................... 74 Palm- walking against knuckle- walking.............................................................................................. 77 The spirit of the womb ...................................................................................................................... 82 4. The two main hypotheses concerning modern humans .................................................................... 85 The out of Africa hypothesis ................................................................................................................... 87 Mitochondrial Eve ............................................................................................................................... 88 Y-chromosomal Adam ......................................................................................................................... 89 The multiregional hypothesis ................................................................................................................. 90 Genetic evidence................................................................................................................................. 91 5. Further considerations ........................................................................................................................ 96 Darwins paradox .................................................................................................................................... 96 The indefinitely last common ancestor .................................................................................................. 99 MRCA ................................................................................................................................................ 99 CHLCA .............................................................................................................................................. 101 LUCA ................................................................................................................................................ 102 ILCA ................................................................................................................................................. 104 A multitude of LUCAs ...................................................................................................................... 105 De- evolution......................................................................................................................................... 107 Evolutionary acceleration event ........................................................................................................... 111 Non- local interactions in evolution...................................................................................................... 115 Intelligent information .......................................................................................................................... 120 Information theory in evolution ....................................................................................................... 120 Intelligent design in information....................................................................................................... 123 Information and intelligent life ......................................................................................................... 133 The anthropic principle ......................................................................................................................... 136 Tangled hierarchy evolution ................................................................................................................. 140 The archetype of man ......................................................................................................................... 147 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................... 152 Appendices................................................................................................................................................ 156 An ancient garden of Eden.................................................................................................................... 156

A draft sequence of prime evolution .................................................................................................... 158 Complementary archeological and geological evidence ...................................................................... 162 Geological periods............................................................................................................................. 162 Stone technology .............................................................................................................................. 169 Links .......................................................................................................................................................... 174

Prologue
As I am not an expert on the subject of evolution, my approach will be from the point of view of a layman. My fascination about the subject was triggered apparently by the similarity we exhibit with apes. I was therefore very much inclined to prove one way or another that a miracle had occurred, turning us from ape- like into human- like creatures. I am not sure if the term miracle is valid under the positivistic framework of modern science, but I am certain about the fact that any sytem of logic finally rests on a set of pre- established truths lying beyond any procedure of proof. And the truth is that there may not be a single causal (logical) explantation why we and apes look so very much alike, apart from the fact that we are suppposed to share a single common ancestor, a creature which all kinds of humans and apes stem from. This of course does not mean that we evolved from apes. It just shows that we and apes evolved either from a common ancestor or from two separate lineages of species, and this may be the only similarity. From then on, evolution took its course, bringing us exactly where we stand right now.

Darwin was insightful enough to suggest that all humans must have come from Africa, since all primates had been living there and nowhere else. I guess, nobody denies this simple fact anymore, but argues instead about when it happened, and if it happened once or repeatedly. Lets suppose that some African ancestors of ours moved from Africa to Eurasia, where they became smart enough to return to Africa and conquer all their relatives that had been left behind. This hypothetical procedure may also explain why modern white people exhibit such a strong obsession to prove that they originate in Africa, true or false. But, whatever the alibies may be, what makes impression is the consequences of Darwins original argument reversed: Why apes never evolved outside Africa? Even elephants made it to India together with so many other species. Why not apes? This is certainly a paradox, that we could name Darwins paradox. According to a strong evolutionary principle, this absence should point directly to an extinction event that wiped out all great apes form ancient Eurasia some time ago. Moreover, this event should have taken place repeatedly; otherwise it would mean that primates had never made it out of Africa again. But we all know that not only primates finally made it to the Old World, but also that they evolved into humans. Should this conclusion point to the fact that thanks to this migration primates were able to evolve to humans? In fact the scarcity or absence of great apes

in the fossil record not only of Eurasia but also of North Africa implies an overwhelming or complete displacement that took place in these areas by the first humans, which should have systematically hunted all other creatures that looked alike. This process should have taken place soon enough in order not to leave any traceable remains in the fossil record.

In fact great apes lived in South Asia too, while monkeys, their predecessors, were spread all over the world. But what is more important to consider is the possibility that the first groups of humans didnt evolve one from another. However, even if they did, they would neither be white nor black. They should have been covered with hair, so that skin color would have been determined after the loss of hair, due or not to environmental conditions. According to Wikipedia, the loss of skin hair happened 1,200,000 years ago. This great period of time suggests that skin color as well as other fundamental physical differences, such as the shape of the nose or of the eyes, were determined independently of intelligence, even if the development of the human brain may have also been subject to the same environmental conditions. However, the basic characteristics that differentiate the three human races exhibit an archaic origin instead of being mutations caused by changes in the environment. For example, some people attribute the wide noses of the Neanderthal people to their need to condense humidity from the cold air. But wide noses are also characteristic of people living in warm climates. So, wide noses imply an archaic trait rather than an environmental local condition. The same goes for the slanted eyes of the Asians. Some people attribute them to the blinding reflection of light on ice. But again theres no ice in Tahiti for example, were natives exhibit such an Asian trait. Slanted eyes can be even found among the San people (Bushmen) in Africa. This nave and poor logical deductions cannot explain distinct traits within human races if they took place in the recent past, for example 100,000 years ago according to the out of Africa hypothesis. But even so, 100,000 years ago North- East Africa, which is thought to be the cradle of modern humans, should be quite different. So the first people living there should have a skin color analogous to the climate, while the basic characteristics of the races should have already been formed. From there on, these first people migrated from North- East Africa to the Near East, where the first civilizations appeared, and gradually occupied areas in the rest of the world. In Europe they met the Neanderthals. I am sure that anyone could trace Neanderthal traits in modern Europeans, at some percentage that is. As far as the Far East is concerned, evidence of a pre- existing

descendant of Homo Erectus is thought not to exist there, but to suppose that all Asia was uninhabited before the arrival of modern humans (or to adapt an absolute replacement hypothesis) does not really help us to solve the problem of our origin.

There is finally another point that we could make. Despite the absence of great apes from the fossil record of (most of) Eurasia, America is full of monkeys, in a land where great apes never made it (except us of course). If we now use strong causality to explain their presence, we will be forced to assume a hypothetical route through the Bering Strait towards the New World, following the same path that humans followed millions of years after. Of course, a migration by sea is outrageous. Even if humans could have made it by sea using rafts, monkeys could certainly not be able to have built them. So we are more prone to adopt a parallel approach here. Monkeys in America and monkeys in Asia could not have a common ancestor, a monkey that is. It seems that these two groups had lived separate from each other, and all their common features evolved in parallel. But even if the first monkeys had swum all the way from America to Africa (parts of the two continents may have been much closer together in the past), while the first humans had done the same in the opposite direction some millions of years later, the first pyramids in America were not built by Egyptians. We should keep in mind the falsity of such nave syllogisms when we try to find a straightforward biological relationship between different types of homo, which may not exist.

My personal opinion about the whole subject of human evolution is that it was not random, the probabilities of such a chance event been practically zero. On the other hand, if we assume a divine entity within the universe which created all living beings, we may keep in mind that this entity is subject to evolution too. The universe itself is expanding; it is not stationary and undifferentiated. Evolution through natural selection sets the rules of the game, but we also need a general plan so that our models wont fall apart or make nonsense. An evolutionary event that takes place here may affect an evolutionary event that takes place there, without any direct biological interaction. Even the simultaneous nature of these events may be relative, as the times of biological and physical change may differ. This is an example of what we could call parallel evolution. In this case there is no gene flow or any other physical interaction between two or more events- populations. The whole process resembles the entangled states of quantum

mechanics, but I would rather offer a simpler example here. Consider the fact that when the pyramids of South America where found, the first reaction was to suppose a common ancient civilization that built both the pyramids of America and Egypt. Those were the supposed inhabitants of Atlantis. Later on it was found that the pyramids of America were built at least two thousand years later from those in Egypt. So we have two events happening in parallel, simultaneously in some frame of history, but with a significant lapse in space- time with reference to our present point of view.

1. A matter of different perspective

Creationism vs. Evolution
Darwins Theory of Evolution is the widely held notion that all life is related and has descended from a common ancestor: the birds and the bananas, the fishes and the flowers- all related. Darwins general theory presumes the development of life from non- life and stresses a purely naturalistic (undirected) descent with modification. That is, complex creatures evolve from more simplistic ancestors naturally over time. In a nutshell, as random genetic mutations occur within an organisms genetic code, the beneficial mutations are preserved because they aid survival- a process known as natural selection. These beneficial mutations are passed on to the next generation. Over time, beneficial mutations accumulate and the result is an entirely different organism.

The proposal that one type of animal could descend from an animal of another type goes back to some of the first pre- Socratic Greek philosophers, such as Anaximander and Empedocles. In contrast to these materialistic views, Aristotle understood all natural things, not only living things, as being imperfect actualizations of different fixed natural possibilities, known as forms, ideas, or (in Latin translations) species. This was part of his teleological understanding of nature in which all things have an intended role to play in a divine cosmic order. The Roman poet and philosopher Titus Lucretius Carus proposed the possibility of evolutionary changes of organisms. Variations of this idea became the standard understanding of

the Middle Ages, and were integrated into Christian learning, but Aristotle did not demand that real types of animals corresponded one- for- one with exact metaphysical forms, and specifically gave examples of how new types of living things could come to be. [1]
Mutations

Mutations are changes in the DNA sequence of a cells genome. When mutations occur, they can either have no effect, alter the product of a gene, or prevent the gene from functioning. Based on studies in the fly Drosophila melanogaster, it has been suggested that if a mutation changes a protein produced by a gene, this will probably be harmful, with about 70% of these mutations having damaging effects, and the remainder being either neutral or weakly beneficial. [2]

The mutation rate is a measure of the rate at which various types of mutations occur during some unit of time. Every time human DNA is passed from one generation to the next it accumulates 100- 200 new mutations, according to a DNA- sequencing analysis of the Y chromosome. This number- the first direct measurement of the human mutation rate- is equivalent to one mutation in every 30 million base pairs, and matches previous estimates from species comparisons and rare disease screens. [3]

But if mutations occur so often and most of them are harmful, how come they comprise a mechanism of life preservation? Biologists are uncovering thousands of examples of how mutations lead to new traits and even new species. For example, most people lose the ability to digest milk by their teens. A few thousand years ago, however, after the domestication of cattle, several groups of people in Europe and Africa independently acquired mutations that allow them to continue digesting milk into adulthood. Genetic studies show there has been very strong selection for these mutations, so they were clearly very beneficial.

Most biologists would see this as a gain in information: a change in environment (the availability of cows milk as food) is reflected by a genetic mutation that lets people exploit that change (gaining the ability to digest milk as an adult). Creationists, however, dismiss this as a malfunction, as the loss of the ability to switch off the production of the milk- digesting enzyme

after childhood. Rather than get bogged down trying to define what information is, lets just look at a few other discoveries made by biologists in recent years. For instance, it has been shown a simple change in gene activity in sea squirts can turn their one- chambered heart into a working two- chambered one. Surely this counts as increasing information.

The duplication of genes or even entire genomes is turning out to be ubiquitous. Without a duplication of the entire genome in the ancestor of modern- day brewers yeast, for instance, there would be no wine or beer. It is becoming clear that every one of us has extra copies of some genes, a phenomenon called copy number variation. The evolution of more complex body plans appears to have been at least partly a result of repeated duplications of the Hox genes that play a fundamental role in embryonic development. Biologists are slowly working out how successive mutations turned a pair of proto- Hox genes in the simple ancestors of jellyfish and anemones into the 39 Hox genes of more complex mammals.

But can mutation really lead to the evolution of new species? Yes. Several species of abalone shellfish have evolved due to mutations in the protein key on the surface of sperm that binds to a lock on the surface of eggs. This might appear impossible, but it turns out that some eggs are prepared to be penetrated by deviant sperm. The same thing can happen in fruit flies, and likely in many other groups too. In yeasts, the mutations that led to some new species forming have not only been identified, they have even been reversed.

The list of examples could go on and on, but consider this. Most mutations can be reversed by subsequent mutations- a DNA base can be turned from an A to a G and then back to an A again, for instance. In fact, reverse mutation or reversion is common. For any mutation that results in a loss of information, logically, the reverse mutation must result in its gain. So the claim that mutations destroy information but cannot create it not only defies the evidence, it also defies logic. [4]

So according to the previous data, mutations can lead to changes within a species or even to new species. Yet, one may not be convinced. In fact natural processes are not reversible, according to the second law of thermodynamics. Entropy is loss of information. We always try to regain this

information by assuming small, infinitesimal, reversible steps backwards to some initial or fundamental state of a system, but this never truly happens. What we really do is to assume a general situation according to which the system will evolve. We then follow step by step the process. But these infinitesimal steps never lead us to something more than variations within the range of a species. In order to have a new species we need a holistic consideration of the process. In other words, we need a considerable change not of some part of an organism but of the whole. Otherwise we could also face the problem of creating new information.

Eventually, mutations represent a random recombination of the genome instead of targeted evolutionary traits. These traits seem well established by physical properties of matter. Furthermore, the high rate of mutation within a species lifetime shows that it cannot be responsible for any biological transformation of the species. If mutations were significant, a couple of them would suffice. It seems that mutations just follow patterns of recombination of information (not really gain or loss) which do not lead to new species but to variations within the range of a species. Why is that? Because we have simply reached a stage of evolution far away from ontogenesis; we do not have new species created, but already existing species preserved. And this state of preservation is achieved by information conservation. In order to have new information, that is a new species, we would need an extinction event, in other words a new creation.

Consequently, what really matters is the processes of gene recombination, which is expressed by mutations but not guided by them. The plan according to which the evolution of the genome unfolds could be regarded as either deterministic or probabilistic. This is an unsolved dilemma. On the one hand, a completely random process of mutations or of interactions between biological molecules is highly doubtful that could lead to specific, organized forms of life. On the other hand, to suppose that life as we know it already existed as a perfect form at the beginning of the universe is an assumption that leaves us little space to breathe. This is why we should admit that whatever the cause may be, evolution is the process which can tell us the course of our natural history.

Natural selection

Natural selection is the gradual, non- random process by which biological traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of differential reproduction of their bearers. It is a key mechanism of evolution. The term natural selection was popularized by Darwin who intended it to be compared with artificial selection, what we now call selective breeding.

Natural variation occurs among the individuals of any population of organisms. Many of these differences do not affect survival (such as differences in eye color in humans), but some differences may improve the chances of survival of a particular individual. For example, the peppered moth exists in both light and dark colors in the United Kingdom, but during the industrial revolution many of the trees on which the moths rested became blackened by soot, giving the dark- colored moths an advantage in hiding from predators. This gave dark- colored moths a better chance of surviving to produce dark- colored offspring, and in just fifty years from the first dark moth being caught, nearly all of the moths in industrial Manchester were dark. The balance was reversed by the effect of the Clean Air Act 1956, and the dark moths became rare again, demonstrating the influence of natural selection on peppered moth evolution.

If the traits that give an individual a reproductive advantage are also heritable, that is, passed from parent to child, then there will be a slightly higher proportion of them in the next generation. This is known as differential reproduction. Even if the reproductive advantage is very slight, over many generations any heritable advantage will become dominant in the population. In this way the natural environment of an organism selects for traits that confer a reproductive advantage, causing gradual changes or evolution of life. This effect was first described and named by Darwin.

The concept of natural selection predates the understanding of genetics, the mechanism of heredity for all known life forms. In modern terms, selection acts on an organisms phenotype, or observable characteristics, but it is the organisms genetic make- up or genotype that is inherited. The phenotype is the result of the genotype and the environment in which the organism lives. This is the link between natural selection and genetics, as described in the modern evolutionary

synthesis. Although a complete theory of evolution also requires an account of how genetic variation arises in the first place (such as by mutation and sexual reproduction) and includes other evolutionary mechanisms (such as genetic drift and gene flow), natural selection appears to be the most important mechanism for creating complex adaptations in nature. [5]

What we should note here is that natural selection is a determinist approach to the process of evolution. Either you have the necessary trait and survive a crisis or you dont have it and you will die. Even if you survive, your offspring wont prevail, so your lineage will be lost. Natural selection doesnt tell us how someone may survive and ensure his offspring survival too. It only suggests what the mechanism of genetic prevalence might be. But we all know that in reality not only the fittest survive. In fact most of us are weak, in comparison with some commonly accepted standard of strength, but, one way or another, we all have an equal chance of survival. For example, an artist, which is generally considered a sensitive person, may enjoy equal preference and acceptance as a powerful politician or military man might do. The point here is not to assume the environmental, social factors that can lead evolution to very different paths than those our biological traits would suggest, but to recognize processes within our genes, and within the context of natural selection, that are random enough so that they can lead evolution to a high degree of differentiation by strictly biological means.

The theory of evolution was contemporary with the research of Mendel on the idea of heredity, so that natural selection was widely accepted after the beginning of the 20th century, when the theory of evolution was integrated with genetics and statistics. The research on these fields has shown that mutations and other processes that take place at the biological level exhibit a high degree of randomness. To suggest that this randomness is lost, by some means, at the macroscopic level of everyday social life, is as if someone played a game of backgammon and moved the pieces regardless of the roll of dice. So a strict determinist approach to the processes of nature could only reveal hasty or subjective interpretations imposed on the diverse kinds of nature. Furthermore, the process of natural selection produces the diversity of species either we accept a deterministic or a probabilistic point of view. To reject natural selection on the whole, it is as if we denied the existence of space- time itself.

At the other edge of the theory of evolution is lying creationism. It is the religious belief that humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe are the creation of a supernatural being, most often referring to the Abrahamic God. As science developed from the 18th century onwards, various views developed which aimed to reconcile science with the Abrahamic creation narrative. At this time those holding that species had been created separately (such as Philip Gosse in 1847) were generally called advocates of creation but they were occasionally called creationists in private correspondence between Charles Darwin and his friends. As the creation- evolution controversy developed, the term anti- evolutionists became more common, then in 1929 in the United States the term creationism first became specifically associated with Christian fundamentalist disbelief in human evolution and belief in a young Earth, though its usage was contested by other groups, such as old earth creationists and evolutionary creationists, who believed in various concepts of creation.

Today, the American Scientific Affiliation recognizes that there are different opinions among creationists on the method of creation, while acknowledging unity on the Abrahamic belief that God created the universe. Since the 1920s, literalist creationism in America has contested scientific theories, such as that of evolution, which derive from natural observations of the universe and life. Literalist creationists believe that evolution cannot adequately account for the history, diversity, and complexity of life on Earth. When scientific research produces empirical evidence and theoretical conclusions which contradict a literalist creationist interpretation of scripture, young earth creationists often reject the conclusions of the research or its underlying scientific theories or its methodology. Two offshoots of creationism- creation science and intelligent design- have been characterized as pseudoscience by the mainstream scientific community. The most notable disputes concern the evolution of living organisms, the idea of common descent, the geological history of the Earth, the formation of the solar system and the origin of the universe. However, the beliefs of evolutionary creationism (theistic evolution), a form of old earth creationism, embrace the findings of modern science and uphold classical religious teachings about God and creation. [6]

Irreducible complexity

Darwins Theory of Evolution may be a theory in crisis in light of the tremendous advances weve made in molecular biology, biochemistry and genetics over the past fifty years. We now know that there are in fact tens of thousands of irreducibly complex systems on the cellular level. Specified complexity pervades the microscopic biological world. Molecular biologist Michael Denton wrote, Although the tiniest bacterial cells are incredibly small, weighing less than 10-12 grams, each is in effect a veritable micro- miniaturized factory containing thousands of exquisitely designed pieces of intricate molecular machinery, made up altogether of one hundred thousand million atoms, far more complicated than any machinery built by man and absolutely without parallel in the non- living world.

And we dont need a microscope to observe irreducible complexity. The eye, the ear and the heart are all examples of irreducible complexity, though they were not recognized as such in Darwins day. Nevertheless, Darwin confessed, To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree.[7]

Michael Behe, the originator of the term irreducible complexity, defines it as follows: By irreducibly complex I mean a single system composed of several well- matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning. An irreducibly complex system cannot be produced directly (that is, by continuously improving the initial function, which continues to work by the same mechanism) by slight, successive modifications of a precursor system, because any precursor to an irreducibly complex system that is missing a part is by definition nonfunctional. An irreducibly complex biological system, if there is such a thing, would be a powerful challenge to Darwinian evolution. [8]

The mousetrap example

Behe uses the mousetrap as an illustrative example of this concept. A mousetrap consists of five interacting pieces- the base, the catch, the spring, the hammer and the hold- down bar. All of these must be in place for the mousetrap to work, as the removal of any one piece destroys the function of the mousetrap. Likewise, he asserts that biological systems require multiple parts working together in order to function. Intelligent design advocates claim that natural selection

could not create from scratch those systems for which science is currently unable to find a viable evolutionary pathway of successive, slight modifications, because the selectable function is only present when all parts are assembled.

Behe argues that organs and biological features which are irreducibly complex cannot be wholly explained by current models of evolution. In explicating his definition of irreducible complexity he notes that, An irreducibly complex system cannot be produced directly (that is, by continuously improving the initial function, which continues to work by the same mechanism) by slight, successive modifications of a precursor system, because any precursor to an irreducibly complex system that is missing a part is by definition nonfunctional. Irreducible complexity is not an argument that evolution does not occur, but rather an argument that it is incomplete. Mainstream critics, however, argue that irreducible complexity, as defined by Behe, can be generated by known evolutionary mechanisms.

Potentially viable evolutionary pathways have been proposed for allegedly irreducibly complex systems such as blood clotting, the immune system and the flagellum, which were the three examples Behe used. Niall Shanks and Karl H. Joplin have shown that systems satisfying Behes characterization of irreducible biochemical complexity can arise naturally and spontaneously as the result of self- organizing chemical processes. They also assert that what evolved biochemical and molecular systems actually exhibit is redundant complexity- a kind of complexity that is the product of an evolved biochemical process. They claim that Behe overestimated the significance of irreducible complexity because of his simple, linear view of biochemical reactions, resulting in his taking snapshots of selective features of biological systems, structures and processes, while ignoring the redundant complexity of the context in which those features are naturally embedded. They also criticized his over- reliance of overly simplistic metaphors, such as his mousetrap. In addition, research published in the peer- reviewed journal Nature has shown that computer simulations of evolution demonstrate that it is possible for complex features to evolve naturally. [9]
Intelligent design

Intelligent design refers to a scientific research program as well as a community of scientists, philosophers and other scholars who seek evidence of design in nature. The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection. Through the study and analysis of a systems components, a design theorist is able to determine whether various natural structures are the product of chance, natural law, intelligent design, or some combination thereof. Such research is conducted by observing the types of information produced when intelligent agents act. Scientists then seek to find objects which have those same types of informational properties which come from intelligence. Intelligent design has applied these scientific methods to detect design in irreducibly complex biological structures, the complex and specified information content in DNA, the life- sustaining physical architecture of the universe, and the geologically rapid origin of biological diversity in the fossil record during the Cambrian explosion approximately 530 million years ago.

Is intelligent design the same as creationism? No. The theory of intelligent design is simply an effort to empirically detect whether the apparent design in nature acknowledged by virtually all biologists is genuine design (the product of an intelligent cause) or is simply the product of an undirected process such as natural selection acting on random variations. Creationism typically starts with a religious text and tries to see how the findings of science can be reconciled to it. Intelligent design starts with the empirical evidence of nature and seeks to ascertain what inferences can be drawn from that evidence. Unlike creationism, the scientific theory of intelligent design does not claim that modern biology can identify whether the intelligent cause detected through science is supernatural.

Is intelligent design a scientific theory? Yes. The scientific method is commonly described as a four- step process involving observations, hypothesis, experiments, and conclusion. Intelligent design begins with the observation that intelligent agents produce complex and specified information (CSI). Design theorists hypothesize that if a natural object was designed, it will contain high levels of CSI. Scientists then perform experimental tests upon natural objects to determine if they contain complex and specified information. One easily testable form of CSI is irreducible complexity, which can be discovered by experimentally reverse- engineering

biological structures to see if they require all of their parts to function. When ID researchers find irreducible complexity in biology, they conclude that such structures were designed. [10]

Beyond the debate over whether intelligent design is scientific, a number of critics argue that existing evidence makes the design hypothesis appear unlikely, irrespective of its status in the world of science. For example, Jerry Coyne asks why a designer would stock oceanic islands with reptiles, mammals, amphibians, and freshwater fish, despite the suitability of such islands for these species. Coyne also points to the fact that the flora and fauna on those islands resemble that of the nearest mainland, even when the environments are very different as evidence that species were not placed there by a designer. Previously, in Darwins Black Box, Behe had argued that we are simply incapable of understanding the designers motives, so such questions cannot be answered definitively. Odd designs could, for example, have been placed there by the designer... for artistic reasons, to show off, for some as- yet undetectable practical purpose, or for some not guessable reason. Coyne responds that in light of the evidence, either life resulted not from intelligent design, but from evolution; or the intelligent designer is a cosmic prankster who designed everything to make it look as though it had evolved.

Intelligent design proponents such as Paul Nelson avoid the problem of poor design in nature by insisting that we have simply failed to understand the perfection of the design. Behe cites Paley as his inspiration, but he differs from Paleys expectation of a perfect Creation and proposes that designers do not necessarily produce the best design they can. Behe suggests that, like a parent not wanting to spoil a child with extravagant toys, the designer can have multiple motives for not giving priority to excellence in engineering. He says that the argument for imperfection critically depends on a psychoanalysis of the unidentified designer. Yet the reasons that a designer would or would not do anything are virtually impossible to know unless the designer tells you specifically what those reasons are. This reliance on inexplicable motives of the designer makes intelligent design scientifically untestable. Asserting the need for a designer of complexity also raises the question What designed the designer? Intelligent design proponents say that the question is irrelevant to or outside the scope of intelligent design. Richard Wein counters that the unanswered questions an explanation

creates must be balanced against the improvements in our understanding which the explanation provides. Invoking an unexplained being to explain the origin of other beings (ourselves) is little more than question- begging. The new question raised by the explanation is as problematic as the question which the explanation purports to answer. Richard Dawkins sees the assertion that the designer does not need to be explained, not as a contribution to knowledge, but as a thoughtterminating clich. In the absence of observable, measurable evidence, the very question What designed the designer? leads to an infinite regression from which intelligent design proponents can only escape by resorting to religious creationism or logical contradiction. [11]

Microevolution vs. macroevolution

Microevolution is used to refer to changes in the gene pool of a population over time which result in relatively small changes to the organisms in the population- changes which would not result in the newer organisms being considered as different species. Examples of such microevolutionary changes would include a change in a species coloring or size. Macroevolution, in contrast, is used to refer to changes in organisms which are significant enough that, over time, the newer organisms would be considered an entirely new species. In other words, the new organisms would be unable to mate with their ancestors, assuming we were able to bring them together.

Creationists frequently argue that they accept microevolution but not macroevolution- one common way to put it is to say that dogs may change to become bigger or smaller, but they never become cats. Therefore, microevolution may occur within the dog species, but macroevolution never will. When scientists do use the terms microevolution and macroevolution, they dont use them in the same way as creationists. The terms were first used in 1927 by the Russian entomologist Yuri Filipchenko in his book on evolution Variabilitt und Variation. However, they remain in relatively limited use today. You can find them in some texts, including biology texts, but in general most biologists simply dont pay attention to them because for biologists, there is no relevant difference between microevolution and macroevolution. Both happen in the same way and for the same reasons, so there is no real reason to differentiate them. When biologists do use different terms, it is simply for descriptive reasons. When creationists use the

terms, however, it is for ontological reasons- this means that they are trying to describe two fundamentally different processes. The essence of what constitutes microevolution is, for creationists, different from the essence of what constitutes macroevolution. Creationists act as if there is some magic line between microevolution and macroevolution, but no such line exists as far as science is concerned. Macroevolution is merely the result of a lot of microevolution over a long period of time. [12]

It is believed that the difference between microevolution and macroevolution is one of approach: a case of reductionism versus holism. The basic argument of creationists is that macroevolution cannot produce new species. There is debate as to the rate at which speciation events occur over geologic time. While some evolutionary biologists claim that speciation events have remained relatively constant over time, some paleontologists such as Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould have argued that species usually remain unchanged over long stretches of time, and that speciation occurs only over relatively brief intervals, a view known as punctuated equilibrium. [13]

As far as the difference between microevolution and macroevolution is concerned, we could make the following distinction: Microevolution may refer to slight changes taking place locally, at a small area of the genetic code, while macroevolution may have to do with significant changes occurring non- locally, on the whole of the DNA. I dont know if such a distinction could be justified by observations and experiments in the field of genetics, but otherwise we would find it hard to explain how miniscule and random local processes could affect the speciation of an organism at the large scale. Nevertheless, the truth is that we should accept the fact that most species appeared during a certain geological phase in the past, the so- called Cambrian explosion. In other words, speciation, if it really occurs, is not continuous, but is characterized by certain irregular gaps, during which extraordinary natural events lead to high rates of genetic variation. The same holds true for the creation of matter and energy in the universe, as far as physics is concerned. We never see the creation of new species of particles at present, as the universe has already passed through its high energy phase. Furthermore, the appearance of new particles at the present state of the universe could also be interpreted as violation of energy conservation. New information would be created out of nowhere, even

though this happened once at the Big Bang. So, in an analogous way, we might not expect to see new biological species being created at present, in the sense that all or most of them appeared at a certain stage of evolution back in the distant past, and that since then we experience a rate of decline in the number of them.

Argument from ignorance

An argument from ignorance is one which says, You havent figured out the answer to the problem, therefore you cant, therefore I am right. Of course such an argument doesnt give the other side the opportunity to continue to research the solution to the problem. Is intelligent design such an argument from ignorance?

Unfortunately it is a common misperception about intelligent design theory that it is merely an argument from ignorance against evolution, and usually mischaracterizes intelligent design as follows: Intelligent design theorists argue that evolutionists have not figured out how irreducibly complex structures could have arisen, therefore they wont figure it out, and they must have been designed. In reality intelligent design proponents do not claim that evolutionists will not figure out how irreducibly complex structures evolved because they have tried and failed, but rather because irreducibly complex structures are in principle not evolvable. Consider the following quote from Charles Darwin in The Origin of Species: If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. Irreducibly complex structures represent such a fundamental challenge to Darwin's theory, because if they are changed slightly, they cease to function. Irreducible complexity is not something that is possible to evolve under Darwinian evolution, for Darwinian evolution requires that structures are functional along every step of their evolution, and if you change an irreducibly complex structure slightly, it cease to function. Thus, intelligent design does not claim that evolutionists just havent yet figured out how to evolved irreducible complexity but rather that, Darwinists havent figured out how to evolve irreducible complexity because irreducible

complexity is in principle impossible to evolve. Irreducible complexity is a fundamental falsifier of Darwinism.

However, intelligent design theory does not merely depend on irreducible complexity being impossible to evolve. Intelligent design begins with positive predictions based upon our observational experience of how intelligent designers operate. An essay by William Dembksi lays out in detail how we can understand the products of intelligent design by examining how designers work: CSI is a reliable indicator of design because its recognition coincides with how we recognize intelligent causation generally. In general, to recognize intelligent causation we must establish that one from a range of competing possibilities was actualized, determine which possibilities were excluded, and then specify the possibility that was actualized. Whats more, the competing possibilities that were excluded must be live possibilities sufficiently numerous so that specifying the possibility that was actualized cannot be attributed to chance. In terms of probability, this means that the possibility that was specified is highly improbable. In terms of complexity, this means that the possibility that was specified is highly complex. All the elements in the general scheme for recognizing intelligent causation find their counterpart in complex specified information- CSI. CSI pinpoints what we need to be looking for when we detect design.

To rephrase and translate this excerpt from a somewhat technical article, Dembski notes that intelligent agents can choose from one of many competing possibilities. Designer choices tend to be unlikely to occur and complex, and if they are then we can safely recognize that the choice made (which yielded the present object) was the result of design. In these high informationsituations, intelligent design theorist Stephen C. Meyer also emphasizes many of the positive predictions of intelligent design: Experience teaches that information- rich systems invariable result from intelligent causes, not naturalistic ones. Yet origin- of- life biology has artificially limited its explanatory search to the naturalistic nodes of causation chance and necessity. Finding the best explanation,

however, requires invoking causes that have the power to produce the effect in question Indeed, in all cases where we know the causal origin of high information content, experience has shown that intelligent design played a causal role Intelligent design provides a sufficient causal explanation for the origin of large amounts of information, since we have considerable experience of intelligent agents generating informational configurations of matter.

Intelligent design is thus a cause sufficient to produce the high levels of information, i.e. irreducible complexity, found in biology. Intelligent design is not merely an argument from ignorance against evolution, but is inferred because of its positive predictions of how we understand designers to operate. [14]

In the previous approach we see that despite the fact proponents of intelligent design say that it is not an argument from ignorance, they conclude that it cannot be explained by the process of evolution, which means that it is non- falsifiable argument, therefore an argument from ignorance. Its just as if someone tells you: You are free to search for yourself, but finally youll see that I was right from the beginning. What chances does such an approach leave us? It seems like a self- referring argument using logic to prove that logic is false.

The whole problem about irreducible complexity and intelligent design is characterized by strong causality, and is subject to a mechanistic approach to nature. The best analogy to illustrate this is a clock. If we remove one of its parts then this complex instrument will stop working. But biological beings are not operating like clocks. Instead, every cell in an organism is a miniscule clock that operates in unison with all other cells. But each cell contains the information about the whole body of the organism, so that even if we remove one or more cells, the organism still can function as a whole. This holistic aspect of living organisms and nature is the key point. If irreducible complexity was correct then if somebody had lost a leg, his offspring should have been born crippled, baring one leg. But this dont really occur because information about both legs is not lost, whether one loses a leg or not.

Furthermore, beyond the world of genes and biochemical processes lies the world of atoms. If irreducible complexity was correct, objects could not be analyzed into the fundamental particles

which all matter consists of. Instead of atoms there would have been indivisible fundamental forms, as some ancient philosophers had suggested. So the real problem is not one of complexity but of reducibility. And we all know that modern science has reached the point where the basic components of matter have been discovered. At this point, even if someday it is proved that matter is not further divisible (which is highly doubtful), at the level of quarks and so on, there would be nothing complex left to talk about.

As far as intelligent design is concerned, the question is if the properties and laws of nature are sufficient to explain the distribution and organization of information in the form of intelligent life. In other words, even if we rely on a creation event in order to explain the origin of us and the universe, this event doesnt necessarily depend on divine providence, because it could equally depend on the spontaneous character of natural processes. Intelligence in any form could be produced by this spontaneity of nature, so that a divine entity may be identified with the universe itself. As far evolution is concerned, it is exactly the unfoldment of spontaneous, random physical processes at a biological scale, according to a handful of properties of matter. To attribute the existence of these properties to a cosmic designer leaves us with a paradoxthat we will have then to explain how the designer was designed without the properties on which he was based too.

2.

Lineages

Before taking the next step to enumerate different human or human- like species through time, lets keep in mind what we have already considered: Firstly, evolution exists either way, directed or undirected. Secondly, we didnt evolve from apes, but both we and apes stem from parallel lineages of a common ancestor; a different lineage for each different primate. Thirdly, from an evolutionary point of view, there is no point asking if the first humans were black or white, or if they lived in Africa or Eurasia. It is good to know so, but it doesnt really make any sense, because in the distant past the environment, the continents, and our ancestors were completely different.

Dryopithecus

Dryopithecus is an extinct group of apes. Fossils about 20 million years old have been found in Africa, Asia, and Europe. Dryopithecus had a semi- erect posture and is generally believed to be ancestral to modern apes and man. Proconsul, a group of fossil apes that may have been the ancestor of the chimpanzee, is considered by some authorities to be a subgroup of Dryopithecus. Sivapithecus, which was found in India, may have been the ancestor of the orangutan, while Kenyapithecus, which was found in Kenya, may have been the precursor of the later Eurasian dryopithecus. The latest species of the genus, which were found in Europe, may fill the gap till the next generation of hominids, which were later found in Africa.

Aegyptopithecus

35- 33 million years ago

Egypt

It is known from a single species Aegyptopithecus Zeuxis

Proconsul

25- 15 million years ago

Kenya and Uganda

Probably the common ancestor of both apes and Old World monkeys

Ugandapithecus major

20 million years ago

Uganda

Kenyapithecus

14 million years ago

Kenya

Maybe one of the first hominoid species out of Africa

Sivapithecus/ Ramapithecus

12.5- 8.5 million years ago

India

Probably the ancestor of modern orangutans

Dryopithecus

13- 10 million years ago

France, Hungary, Spain

Covers a gap in the fossil record between 14 - 7 million years ago

Ouranopithecus

8 million years ago

Greece

Perhaps the last common ancestor of great apes and humans

Early hominids
Between 10-7 million years ago a large number of the first apes had blossomed into a huge radiation of species that reached across Europe and much of Asia. Over subsequent time the majority of them became extinct, mostly due to climate changes and extensive glaciation. Further geological upheavals now occurred as the sub- continent of India moved north to collide with

Asia. This created the Himalayas, causing weather patterns to change. Massively increased rainfall in India (the Monsoon) stripped the air of moisture so that the air currents that reached Africa were no longer wet, but dry. Conditions in Africa between around 11 million to 5 million years ago were very detrimental to the preservation of fossils. There are very few finds made from this period, and very little evidence from which to build up an accurate picture of evolutionary events. However, some finds have been made more recently, such as those of Sahelanthropus, Orrorin and Ardipithecus. [15]

Sahelanthropus tchadensis

6.7- 6.3 million years ago

Chad

Based on a single cranium. Initially considered the oldest known hominid, but now thought as a sub- species of gorilla Its discoverers have claimed it to be a direct human ancestor, instead of the australopithecines Because of its small brain and other ape like characteristics, some believe its an ancestor of chimpanzees instead of humans

Orrorin tugenensis

6.2- 5.8 million years ago

Kenya

Ardipithecus ramidus

5.6 - 4.4 million years ago

Ethiopia

Australopithecus
About 4.4 million years ago, a different type of primate emerged. The first bipedal primates are classified by Paleontologists as hominids, and these first hominids had not yet developed the large brain, teeth structure, and skeletal features identified as Homo. Instead, they predate, and sometimes overlap the first Homo species and are known as the Australopithecines. [16]

Australopithecus Australopithecus anamensis 4.2- 3.9 million years ago Kenya The combination of apelike cranial traits with probable bipedality is reminiscent of Ardipithecus ramidus

Australopithecus afarensis

4.0- 2.7 million years ago

Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania

Lucy: 1.1 meters tall, weighed 30 kilograms. Bipedal, yet with the cranial capacity of an ape

Kenyanthropus platyops

3.5- 3.2 million years ago

Kenya

Probably a different version of A. afarensis instead of a new species. May also be connected to the later H. rudolfensis

Australopithecus africanus

3- 2 million years ago

South Africa

Overlaps the first Homo; maybe evolved into Paranthropus robustus

Australopithecus garhi

2.5 million years ago

Ethiopia

Maybe the first species to use stone tools. May also be similar to A. afarensis

Australopithecus sediba

2 million years ago

South Africa

Overlaps the appearance of the first Homo

Paranthropus

The robust australopithecines, members of the extinct hominin genus Paranthropus, were bipedal hominids that probably descended from the gracile australopithecine hominids

(Australopithecus). They are characterized by robust craniodental anatomy, including gorillalike cranial crests, which suggest strong muscles of mastication, without the transverse cranial crest also present on modern gorillas. [17]

Paranthropus Paranthropus aethiopicus 2.7- 2.4 million years ago Kenya Could be compared to a modern gorilla

Paranthropus boisei

2.6- 1.1 million years ago

Tanzania

May have used crude stone tools, although they might have been the products of contemporaneous Homo

P. robustus

2.3- 1.2 million years ago

South Africa

Homo Erectus
Early African Homo erectus fossils (sometimes called Homo ergaster) are the oldest known early humans to have possessed modern human- like body proportions with relatively elongated legs and shorter arms. These features are considered adaptations to a life lived on the ground, indicating the loss of earlier tree- climbing adaptations, with the ability to walk and possibly run long distances. Compared with earlier fossil humans, note the expanded braincase relative to the size of the face. The most complete fossil individual of this species is known as the Turkana Boy, dated around 1.6 million years old. Generally considered to have been the first species to have expanded beyond Africa, Homo erectus is considered a highly variable species and possibly

the longest lived early human species. The appearance of Homo erectus in the fossil record is often associated with the earliest handaxes, the first major innovation in stone tool technology. There is fossil evidence that this species cared for old and weak individuals. [18]

Note: In the following diagram H. sapiens is included as a descendant either of the Eurasian H. erectus or of the African H. ergaster (or perhaps as a hybrid of both). In fact, 2 - 1.8 million years ago there may have been as much as three species coexisting in East Africa (H. habilis, H. Ergaster and H. Rudolfensis), or even more if we include the West- Asian H. georgicus and the East- Asian Java Man as, more or less, contemporaneous lineages of early Homo species.

Homo habilis

2.3 - 1.4Mya

Kenya, Tanzania

The earliest findings of H. habilis overlap those of A. garhi. Recent findings indicate he coexisted with H. erectus for about 500,000 years

Homo rudolfensis

1.9Mya

Kenya

Maybe contemporary with H. habilis. Could also be related to Kenyanthropus platyops

Homo ergaster

1.8 - 1.4Mya

East and South Africa

Probably the ancestor of modern humans

Homo erectus

1.8Mya - 300kya

All over the Old World

Either the Eurasian clade of the African H. ergaster or a separate Eurasian species. Handaxes; first use of fire

H. antecessor

1.2Mya - 800kya

Spain

An evolutionary link between H. ergaster and H. heidelbergensis

Homo heidelbergensis

600 - 350kya

Europe

Probable descendant of H. erectus and ancestor of both H. neaderthalensis and H. sapiens

Homo rhodesiensis

300 - 125kya

Zambia

Considered the African clade of H. heidelbergensis

Homo neanderthalensis

350 - 30kya

Western Eurasia

1- 4% of modern nonAfrican human genome might come from the Neanderthals

Homo sapiens

195kya- present

Worldwide

3. Interpretations
Identification
Scarcity of fossils

Most lineages of our species are represented by a small number of fossils, while many of them by just a scull or a bone. So the general set of assumptions is rather poor to lead us to decisive and unambiguous conclusions. This does not mean that the whole interpretation of our origins and evolution is wrong, but the filling of gaps could have an interesting and, in some cases, different story to tell.

Australopithecus afarensis (Lucy), Kenya ~2.3Mya

Homo habilis (Twiggy), OH 24 Tanzania,1.8Mya

Fossils of A. afarensis and H. habilis give us some idea about these species. A. afarensis also offers a good chance to identify an intermediate species between humans and apes while the existing skulls of H. habilis show an early human with the brain of a modern little child, but handy enough to use primitive tools which have been occasionally found nearby. All H. habilis needed was a growth hormone I guess (his species was short), and of course more evolutionary time.

Homo ergaster, KNM ER 3733, Kenya, ~ 1.7Mya

H. rudolfensis, KNM ER 1470, Kenya, ~1.9Mya

Another significant discovery was the skull of H. ergaster, which is impressively modern, more well- shaped and rounded than the skull of H. habilis. Also impressive is the skull of H. rudolfensis, which, despite its flat face, looks as much human.

H. Neanderthalensis, Gibraltar 1, Gibraltar, ~40kya H. heidelbergensis, Steinheim skull, Germany, 350 250kya

Skulls, skeleton bones and other artifacts have also been found with regard to later human species, such as those of H. neanderthalensis and H. heidelbergensis. Despite the large brow ridges, which are also found in H. erectus, the skulls become more round in shape, which is a feature of modern H. sapiens.

Missing links

(A) Pan troglodytes, chimpanzee, modern; (B) Australopithecus africanus, STS 5, 2.6 My; (C) Australopithecus africanus, STS 71, 2.5 My; (D) Homo habilis, KNM-ER 1813, 1.9 My; (E) Homo habilis, OH24, 1.8 My; (F) Homo rudolfensis, KNM-ER 1470, 1.8 My; (G) Homo erectus, Dmanisi cranium D2700, 1.75 My; (H) Homo ergaster (early H. erectus), KNM-ER 3733, 1.75 My; (I) Homo heidelbergensis, Rhodesia man, 300,000 - 125,000 y; (J) Homo sapiens neanderthalensis, La Ferrassie 1, 70,000 y; (K) Homo sapiens neanderthalensis, La Chappelle-auxSaints, 60,000 y; (L) Homo sapiens neanderthalensis, Le Moustier, 45,000 y; (M) Homo sapiens sapiens, CroMagnon I, 30,000 y; (N) Homo sapiens sapiens, modern

First of all, we can notice the similarity between the skull of a chimpanzee and that of an Australopithecus. Secondly, we can also see the similarity between the skull of Australopithecus and H. habilis. Logic says that if A equals B and B equals C then A must equal C. Nevertheless, phenomenological similarity does not imply genetic relationship. In other words, the first humans could have evolved side- by- side with the Australopithecines, being a separate lineage instead of descending from them.

A. garhi, 2 - 2.5Mya, Ethiopia, 450cc

A. africanus, STS 5 (Mrs. Ples), ~2Mya, South Africa, 485 cc

StW 53, H. gautengensis (or H. habilis/A.africanus?), 1.5 - 2Mya, S. Africa, ~500cc H. habilis (or A. africanus/A. garhi?), OH 24 (Twiggy), ~1.8Mya, Tanzania, ~600 cc

KNM ER 1813, H. habilis, ~1.9Mya, Kenya, ~510 cc

KNM-ER 3733, H ergaster, ~1.7Mya, Kenya, ~850cc

In fact there is a gap between A. afarensis, 3Mya, and the first Homo, 1.9Mya. It is believed that during this period a new ice age started (~2.8Mya). Australopithecus africanus, which covers the period till the appearance of H. habilis, has been found in South Africa, further south from East

Africa where the cradle of humans is considered to be. So either A. Africanus represents a dead clade of the Australopithecines instead of the human clade, or it can be connected to an evolutionary bottleneck and a retreat of human ancestors southwards, before they reappeared in East Africa. Furthermore, some link the appearance of stone tools and early Homo with the buildup of ice sheets in the northern hemisphere which resulted in major global cooling. But the fist stone tools, which are dated about 2.5Mya are found in East Africa, not in South Africa. The use of these first tools is connected to another species, A. garhi, in East Africa, Ethiopia. Yet, this species is not well documented. It is defined on the basis of 1 fossil cranium and 4 other skull fragments. It has been suggested that if A. garhi is ancestral to Homo, human anatomy would have undergone a rapid evolutionary change in a short period of roughly 200,000 or 300,000 years (cf. Wikipedia or the Smithsonian Institute on A. garhi).

Furthermore, it is astounding the fact that the oldest chimpanzee fossils, found in Kenya together with fossils of early humans, are only 500ky old, while the divergence between humans and chimpanzees supposedly took place 6Mya. Where are all the intermediate fossils? Do they represent the Australopithecines? Could we say that one or more Australopithecine lineages evolved into humans while others evolved into modern day great apes? In this case, chimpanzees would be an example of devolution. The matter is still unsettled, whether gracile Australopithecines evolved into humans and robust ones into the Paranthropus genus, or if all Australopithecines evolved into Paranthropus and the other great apes, while humans come from another species. The evidence suggests that the gracile Australopithecines, or at least a similar creature from this period yet to be discovered or distinguished from other Australopithecines, evolved into us. Otherwise, humans and great apes would have split further back in time, before

the Australopithecines. In such a case, all Australopithecines would be the ancestors of the great apes while our own ancestors are to be found outside the Australopithecus genus. So the whole problem has to do not only with the absence of evidence but also with the interpretation of the existing evidence.

An evolutionary tree vs. a web

While people used to think that there was a single line of human species, with one evolving after the other in an inevitable march towards modern humans, we now know this is not the case. Like most other mammals, we are part of a large and diverse family tree. Fossil discoveries show that the human family tree has many more branches and deeper roots than we knew about even a couple of decades ago. In fact, the number of branches our evolutionary tree, and also the length of time, has nearly doubled since the famed Lucy fossil skeleton was discovered in 1974.

While the existence of a human evolutionary family tree is not in question, its size and shape- the number of branches representing different genera and species, and the connections among themare much debated by researchers and further confounded by a fossil record that only offers fragmented look at the ancient past. The debates are sometimes perceived as uncertainty about evolution, but that is far from the case. The debates concern the precise evolutionary relationships- essentially, who is related to whom, and how. [19]

Darwins first inkling (1837)

Charles Darwin had been back less than a year from his tour on the HMS Beagle and he had been thinking furiously about the paradoxical diversity and commonality of life when he had a flash of insight. He reached for his B notebook and scribbled this sketch showing species branching and sub- branching from each other. This is one of the most famous images in science and a popular tattoo among scientists. It does not, however, look a great deal like a tree; it looks like a leftover grape stalk. Darwin does not use the word tree or branch in his notebook; instead he refers to gradation and greater distinction. What is most important about this sketch is often edited out of images and tattoos. The large letters at the very top read, I think: simultaneously a recognition of his own uncertainty and an expression of his way of working through problems. Darwin was 28 years old.

The Origin of Species (1859)

By the time Darwin came to publish The Origin of Species, he had been thinking about evolution for a further 22 years. The concept of speciation was more than just a cluster of splitting lines, it was a fully grown Tree Metaphor. The image above is the only diagram in the first edition of Origin. Instead of being a map of branches, Darwin has now added time as an axis to his map so that the early life forms begin at the bottom and move through time towards the top, branching as they go. Each horizontal line represents a thousand generations; but it would have been better if each had represented ten thousand generations. The diagram has also

expanded its ambition to include extinctions and evolutionary cul-de-sacs. The diagram still does not look much like a tree. River weeds, maybe. In the text, though, Darwin waxes prolix on the concept of the Tree of Life: The affinities of all the beings of the same class have sometimes been represented by a great tree. I believe this simile largely speaks the truth. What follows is one of his most memorable passages: From the first growth of the tree, many a limb and branch has decayed and dropped off; and these lost branches of various sizes may represent those whole orders, families, and genera which have now no living representatives, and which are known to us only from having been found in a fossil state. As we here and there see a thin straggling branch springing from a fork low down in a tree, and which by some chance has been favored and is still alive on its summit, so we occasionally see an animal like the Ornithorhynchus or Lepidosiren, which in some small degree connects by its affinities two large branches of life, and which has apparently been saved from fatal competition by having inhabited a protected station. As buds give rise by growth to fresh buds, and these, if vigorous, branch out and overtop on all sides many a feebler branch, so by generation I believe it has been with the great Tree of Life, which fills with its dead and broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the surface with its ever branching and beautiful ramifications.

Beautiful ramifications, indeed. Gorgeous writing, and also very precise. From the diagram and from the text Darwin was very careful to neither imply nor refute a universal common ancestor. The Tree of Life referred to all the beings of the same class and not to all life on Earth. There might be one Tree or several. Darwin could not know and does not proffer an answer. Darwin wanted the reader to be very, very clear that the Tree of Life is a metaphor. In one sentence he calls it a representation and in the next a simile.
Ernst Haeckels Grand Oak (1879)

Darwin wrote The Origin of Species for other naturalists. Popularizing the theory of evolution fell to others, possibly because Darwins gentle disposition did not lend itself to the rough-and-

tumble of public debate where more combative personalities such as Thomas Huxley were to shine. Among the great popularizers was Ernst Haeckel, a German biologist who is best remembered today for his artworks. Haeckels illustrations are still considered among the most beautiful scientific drawings in history. Wikipedia hosts a small sample of his prolific output. In 1866, Haeckel wrote the first great popular book explaining evolution, and it includes this image of the Tree of Life:

Unlike Darwins streamlined diagram, Haeckel created a work of art. In the process, Haeckel lost two important features of Darwins Tree. First, Haeckel implied a universal common ancestor. Today we have good reason to hypothesize a universal common ancestor or at least a set of universal common ancestors, but most of the evidence upon which this rests was unimaginable in

Haeckels time. Haeckel guessed right, but it was still a guess that he should not have dressed up as a certainty. Second, Haeckel abandoned the depiction of extinctions. Where Darwin laid out a number of dead branches on his evolutionary Tree, Haeckel ignores them altogether. What appear to be dead ends are not extinctions at all- those dead ends include mollusks and lichens and amphibians, creatures very much alive today. In fact, the dead ends dont represent anything at all; they are simply the artists way of squeezing a lot of branches inside a rectangular border. Despite Haeckels great contributions to art and science, his legacy is controversial today. He is the creator of a famous illustration of embryological development that his detractors consider fraudulent and even his most admiring apologists consider sloppy. Even harder to swallow, Haeckel came to be one of the foremost exponents of polygenism, a particularly revolting pseudoscientific formulation of racism that was directly at odds with everything Darwin stood for. Thirteen years later, Haeckel returned to the Tree of Life in a book called The Evolution of Man. The Tree, as you can see, has flourished. It has grown from a bush into a massive oak that could have come from the deepest glades of the great forests of Europe. As art it is more aweinspiring than Haeckels straggly bush of 1866, but as science it is even more flawed. The extinctions are still missing from the picture and the unwarranted assumption of a universal common ancestor persists; compounding his errors Haeckel has implied a hierarchical structure to the tree with humans at the top. We even get a box around us to remind us how important we are.

According to Haeckel, the mammalian section of the tree grew out of the trunk marked Amphibia while the reptiles branch off to the side. Actually, mammals and reptiles diverged from common ancestors called the mammal- like reptiles. Humans, snakes, ostriches, as well as the long- gone dinosauria: we are all amniota, but amphibians are not. As errors go this is forgivable given the lack of information available to Haeckel at the time, but the way he has gone about his error shows his bias towards humanity. Amphibia get their own massive- girthed trunk while the reptiles and birds get a scrawny branch, all because Haeckel didnt intuit the

correct sequence of divergences that lead to natures crowning glory (Western European human males, in case you hadnt guessed).

Against the Tree of Life

The problem with Darwins metaphorical Tree of Life is that he derived it from the small subset of living creatures that were available to his observations. For animals, plants, fungi, and other macroscopic creatures, the Tree of Life is a very good representation of the sequence of divergences and extinctions that make up their history. But life goes back a long way before animals and plants and fungi. The oldest fossils known in Darwins time came from the Cambrian era, so Darwin only had access to the last sixth of lifes history.

When we look at our smaller cousins, the ones we need microscopes to observe, we notice that they do not reproduce as we do. Bacteria freely swap clusters of genes between each other. Scientists call this sexual transmission, but it is nothing like sexual reproduction in the animal and plant kingdoms. Bacteria even swap these gene clusters between individuals of completely different orders. Unlike mammals, who can only spread their genes into the next generation and only by mating with mammals of the same species, bacteria live in a massive orgy of DNAmixing. Some biologists even question whether we should use the term species when describing bacteria.

As a result, the Tree of Life for micro- organisms such as bacteria and archeans is a swirl of interlocking pathways. In the more extreme cases, not only do organisms swap packets of DNA, but one organism colonizes another and comes to live permanently in a state of symbiosis with its host. The early microbes that swallowed chloroplasts and mitochondria became the true bacteria. Those that became nucleated and swallowed mitochondria became the eukaryotesthats us, by the way, along with plants and fungi and protists.

One of the most vocal advocates of this view of life is W. Ford Doolittle. His map of evolution looks more like a mesh than a tree. He calls it the web of life. There is little doubt that Doolittles web is a much better representation of single- celled evolution than Haeckels oak. It is also very up-to-date. It really does represent the best current knowledge. I think he has overplayed his hand by assuming the deep roots of the web are a Common Ancestral Community of Primitive Cells. Its not that I disagree with Doolittle. I think a community of primitive cells is a vastly more likely progenitor of life than a single species, but we know so little about that phase of life that I think it is presumptuous to map it as factual. [20]

A web of life

Is there a human evolution tree? If so, then no one has been able to determine its configuration, nor what its branches might be. When it comes to relationships among hominids, there is no consensus. There seems to be a different tree for each different researcher in the field.

Of course, its generally assumed that some true tree does exist, which could be determined if only enough data were available. But perhaps the notion of a human evolution tree is only wishful thinking. Its entirely possible that the topology of human origins is fundamentally different from the one traditionally proposed. Perhaps the truth about human ancestry is that it takes the shape of a web?

If the view of evolution presented by stabilization theory is correct, then new types of organisms arise, typically, as the products of hybridization between two or more preexisting types. Under this view, there would be no tree of human evolution. Instead, there would be an interconnected

network of hybridizing types extending back through time. This topology of evolution would look more like the figure at right, where hominids C and E, cross to produce hominid D and, later, hominids A and C, hybridize to create hominid B. Under these circumstances there is no tree. Paleontological research has clearly shown that multiple hominids existed concurrently over much of the history of human evolution. So there would, at most times, be multiple types of hominids to hybridize to produce new types. Perhaps its really a waste of time trying to reconstruct the true tree of human evolution, as so many scientists have tried to do, because the true pattern of descent is not even like a tree. Indeed, the fact that so many mutually contradictory trees have been proposed over the years is entirely consistent with the conclusion that no real tree exists. [21]

The whole previous analysis is very clarifying. I dont know anything about stabilization theory but what I understand is that it has to do with hybridization. This surely provides an acceleration mechanism for evolution, but I wouldnt expect it to be the rule. Evolution has its mechanisms on its way but it is like time: it will meet the future anyway. Acceleration events are another story. Hybridization is just a gear. What is more fundamental, relative to the Tree of Life, is the assumption that all life stems from a single universal ancestor, as he is called. We will talk about this subject later on more extensively. For now we could consider the case that humans did not evolve from apes, or more correctly from a common ancestor of both humans and apes, but all along the trunk of the evolutionary tree, or along one of the fundamental branches of the

corresponding evolutionary web. In other words, the question is if there was a human- like creature before the time of the apes, during the time of the dinosaurs, if it existed before the dinosaurs at the time of amphibians and fishes, and so on. We see that at some point we must accept the fact that humans began to evolve. Even if there existed a fish called Wanda, it is hard to observe any human- like traits. So there must have been some point of divergence of the human family tree (hominoids, hominins, homids, etc.). There is a point at the course of evolution where we may discern the first human- like characteristics. We might run backwards from the Australopithecines to the Dryopithecines, even earlier to macaques or to the common marmoset of the previous picture, but we already see at this point that the similarity fades away.

Furthermore, when we move to the level of microorganisms, it is very hard or even senseless to search for a common ancestor. Even if there exists an organism which all animals or even plants come from, at the level of microbes we can hardly make such a distinction. Which microbes evolved into plants and animals, which into fungi, and which became bacteria or remained the same? So when we find the ground of the web or shrub of life, we find the roots, which consist of various undifferentiated microorganisms, from which all forms of life evolved. We could make a comparison with the world of physics, where all objects, as well as living beings, consist of atoms. Clusters of atoms may evolve into a chair or a cat. But we can hardly say that a proton or an electron is our last common ancestor. This comparison is not irrelevant: As life depends on physical processes, biology is described by the same physical laws. If we want to find a God, an intelligent design or divine providence, or a universal common ancestor within these processes, its fine by me. But if we want to avoid the model of an egocentric universe we would rather regard life as a process that evolves at many places at the same time. So the notion of the Tree of Life just makes us see the Forest for the Trees.

Speciation

Speciation is the evolutionary process by which new biological species arise. Orator F. Cook seems to have been the first to coin the term speciation for the splitting of lineages or cladogenesis. Whether genetic drift is a minor or major contributor to speciation is the subject matter of much ongoing discussion.

An example of natural speciation is the diversity of the three- spined stickleback, a marine fish that, after the last ice age, has undergone speciation into new freshwater colonies in isolated lakes and streams. Over an estimated 10,000 generations, the sticklebacks show structural differences that are greater than those seen between different genera of fish including variations in fins, changes in the number or size of their bony plates, variable jaw structure, and color differences. Humans have genetic similarities with chimpanzees and bonobos, their closest relatives, suggesting common ancestors. Analysis of genetic drift and recombination suggests humans and chimpanzees speciated apart 4.1 million years ago.

Theodosius Dobzhansky, who studied fruit flies in 1930s, speculated that parts of chromosomes that switch from one location to another might cause a species to split into two different species. He mapped out how it might be possible for sections of chromosomes to relocate themselves in a genome. Those mobile sections can cause sterility in inter- species hybrids, which can act as a speciation pressure. In theory, his idea was sound, but scientists long debated whether it actually happened in nature. Eventually a competing theory involving the gradual accumulation of mutations was shown to occur in nature so often that geneticists largely dismissed the moving gene hypothesis. However, 2006 research shows that jumping of a gene from one chromosome to another can contribute to the birth of new species. This validates the reproductive isolation mechanism, a key component of speciation.

Hybridization between two different species sometimes leads to a distinct phenotype. This phenotype can also be fitter than the parental lineage and as such natural selection may then favor these individuals. Eventually, if reproductive isolation is achieved, it may lead to a separate species. However, reproductive isolation between hybrids and their parents is particularly difficult to achieve and thus hybrid speciation is considered an extremely rare event.

The mechanisms of reproductive isolation or hybridization barriers prevent the members of two different species that cross or mate from producing offspring, or which ensure that any offspring that may be produced is not fertile. These barriers maintain the integrity of a species over time,

reducing or directly impeding gene flow between individuals of different species, allowing the conservation of each species characteristics. [22]
Genetic divergence and convergence

A hypothetical scenario of genetic convergence and divergence at the early stages of human evolution

Genetic divergence is the process in which two or more populations of an ancestral species accumulate independent genetic changes (mutations) through time, often after the populations have become reproductively isolated for some period of time. The genetic differences among divergent populations can involve silent mutations (that have no effect on the phenotype) or give rise to significant morphological and/or physiological changes. Genetic divergence will always accompany reproductive isolation, either due to novel adaptations via selection or due to genetic drift, and is the principal mechanism underlying speciation. [23]

The problem here is how hybridization can explain speciation if it is, firstly, a rare event, and secondly, it leads to sterility of hybrids. How can a new hybrid species be sustainable? Furthermore, if mutations can explain genetic isolation, it is very unlikely that this sort of isolation can explain speciation. As in the case of hybridization, mutants are rare and can hardly be considered a new, fertile species. Genetic divergence may explain the production of new

lineages within a species, but it is very doubtful whether these lineages will stay separated for ever. Since speciation must take a long time to occur, a periodic contact would reinforce gene flow between the separate lineages and lead to a recombination of their DNA. But if only one of the lineages survived, for one reason or another, then this lineage could not be considered as a new species, because there wouldnt be any other lineage to be compared with.

A genetic convergence loop

This process of recurrent interaction between separate lineages of a species may be related to genetic converge. It is depicted in the previous diagram, where a species splits into two lineages which in turn converge to form a new species (formally and more generally, genetic convergence may occur in unrelated lineages). Furthermore, the diagram in the beginning, depicting different human lineages, shows such a process. At least two distinct species of early Homo are attested some 2Mya (H. habilis and H. rudolfensis). We could suppose genetic convergence through hybridism between these two lineages of Homo, which produced another species, Homo ergaster, which in turn split into Homo heidelbergensis and Homo rhodesiensis. However, species from the same period of time separated by distance (for example H. georgicus from Georgia or Homo erectus yuanmouensis from China) may show the same traits as their African partners, without any physical interaction between them.

Assimilation vs. Annihilation

What really happens when two or more separate lineages of a species meet? This is the case of the later subspecies of H. Neanderthalensis and H. sapiens. The split with their probable common ancestor, H. heidelbergensis, took place perhaps 200-300kya, when some Heidelbergs may have returned to Africa, while those that stayed in Europe became the Neanderthals. But if the first H. sapiens evolved in Africa directly from an indigenous population of H. erectus, while H. heidelbergensis was a clade that migrated to Europe, the split could have occurred even earlier, 600-800kya. Still, when H. sapiens met the Neanderthals, about 100kya, their lineages converged, even if the genetic contribution of the Neanderthals is thought to have been about 5%. The two subspecies could still interbreed, although they might not have many things in common anymore. So even in the cases of evolutionary dead clades we most often have at some stage their genetic contribution, small or large, to the overall genetic pool of their species.
Molecular clocks

Since its proposal in the 1960s, the molecular clock has become an essential tool in many areas of evolutionary biology, including systematics, molecular ecology, and conservation genetics. The molecular clock hypothesis states that DNA and protein sequences evolve at a rate that is relatively constant over time and among different organisms. A direct consequence of this constancy is that the genetic difference between any two species is proportional to the time since these species last shared a common ancestor. Therefore, if the molecular clock hypothesis holds true, this hypothesis serves as an extremely useful method for estimating evolutionary timescales.

The molecular clock hypothesis was originally proposed by researchers Emile Zuckerkandl and Linus Pauling on the basis of empirical observations, but it soon received theoretical backing when biologist Motoo Kimura developed the neutral theory of molecular evolution in 1968. Kimura suggested that a large fraction of new mutations do not have an effect on evolutionary fitness, so natural selection would neither favor nor disfavor them. Eventually, each of these

neutral mutations would either spread throughout a population and become fixed in all of its members, or they would be lost entirely in a stochastic process called genetic drift. Kimura then showed that the rate at which neutral mutations become fixed in a population is equivalent to the rate of appearance of new mutations in each member of the population (the mutation rate). Provided that the mutation rate is consistent across species, the substitution rate would remain constant throughout the tree of life.

Subsequent research has shown that Kimuras assumption of a strict molecular clock is too simplistic, because rates of molecular evolution can vary significantly among organisms. However, there has been a general reluctance to abandon the molecular clock entirely, because it represents such a valuable tool in evolutionary studies. Instead, researchers have undertaken efforts to retain some aspects of the original clock hypothesis while relaxing the assumption of a strictly constant rate. Such efforts have led to the development of so- called relaxed molecular clocks, which allow the molecular rate to vary among lineages, albeit in a limited manner. There are currently two major types of relaxed- clock models. The first type assumes that the rate varies over time and among organisms, but that this variation occurs around an average value. The second type allows the evolutionary rate to evolve over time, based on the assumption that the rate of molecular evolution is tied to other biological characteristics that also undergo evolution.

When using either a strict- or relaxed- clock method of genetic analysis, the most important consideration is how to calibrate the molecular clock. Indeed, there is a countless range of possible combinations of rate and time, and with access to only percentage data, the researchers will not be able to determine which combination is correct. Thus, to calibrate the molecular clock, one must know the absolute age of some evolutionary divergence event, such as the split between mammals and birds. An estimate of the timing of this event can be gained by examining the fossil record, or by correlating this particular instance of evolutionary divergence with some geological event of known antiquity (such as the formation of a mountain range that split the geographic range of a species in two, thus initiating a process of speciation). Once the evolutionary rate is calculated using a calibration, this calibration can then be applied to other organisms to estimate the timing of evolutionary events.

A recent study by Weir and Schluter (2008) demonstrates the use of different calibration techniques. To estimate the evolutionary rate of the mitochondrial gene encoding cytochrome b in birds, Weir and Schluter chose 90 different calibrations derived from dated fossils and from the formation ages of land bridges, oceanic islands, and mountain ranges. They then used a statistical method to check each of these calibrations and discarded 16 that were found to be inconsistent. Using the remaining 74 calibrations, the duo estimated that cytochrome b genes in birds evolve at an average rate of approximately 1% per 1 million years, meaning that any two bird species are diverging from each other at a rate of 2% per 1 million years. This has long been regarded as a standard quantity in genetic studies of birds and is known as the 2% rule. For example, the 2% rule has been used to test the hypothesis that many modern songbird species originated during pronounced glacial cycles over the past 250,000 years.

The findings of Weir and Schluter demonstrate that it can be unwise to calculate an evolutionary rate using one group of organisms and then extrapolate that rate to another group, even when one is comparing relatively similar species. If applied correctly, however, the molecular clock can yield enlightening date estimates for evolutionary events that would otherwise be difficult to study from the fossil record alone. Scientists can use relaxed- clock methods to deal with variation in the rate of the molecular clock. By measuring the patterns of evolutionary rate variation among organisms, they can also gain valuable insight into the biological processes that determine how quickly the molecular clock ticks. [24]
Evolutionary tunneling

Punctuated equilibrium, bottom, consists of morphological stability and rare bursts of evolutionary change

There is debate as to the rate at which speciation events occur over geologic time. While some evolutionary biologists claim that speciation events have remained relatively constant over time, some paleontologists such as Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould have argued that species usually remain unchanged over long stretches of time, and that speciation occurs only over relatively brief intervals, a view known as punctuated equilibrium.

The sudden appearance of most species in the geologic record and the lack of evidence of substantial gradual change in most species- from their initial appearance until their extinctionhas long been noted, including by Charles Darwin who appealed to the imperfection of the record as the favored explanation. When presenting his ideas against the prevailing influences of catastrophism and progressive creationism, which envisaged species being supernaturally created at intervals, Darwin needed to forcefully stress the gradual nature of evolution in accordance with the gradualism promoted by his friend Charles Lyell. He privately expressed concern, noting in the margin of his 1844 Essay, Better begin with this: If species really, after catastrophes, created in showers world over, my theory false.

Punctuated equilibrium (also called punctuated equilibria) is a theory in evolutionary biology which proposes that most species will exhibit little net evolutionary change for most of their geological history, remaining in an extended state called stasis. When significant evolutionary change occurs, the theory proposes that it is generally restricted to rare and geologically rapid events of branching speciation called cladogenesis. In 1972, paleontologists Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould published a landmark paper developing this theory and called it punctuated equilibria. Their paper built upon theories of geographic speciation, of developmental and genetic homeostasis, as well as their own empirical research. Eldredge and Gould proposed that the degree of gradualism commonly attributed to Charles Darwin is virtually nonexistent in the fossil record, and that stasis dominates the history of most fossil species.

Before Eldredge and Gould alerted their colleagues to the prominence of stasis in the fossil record, most evolutionists considered stasis to be rare or unimportant. The fossil record includes well documented examples of phyletic gradualism and punctuational evolution. Evidence for the existence of stasis has also been corroborated from the genetics of sibling species, species which are morphologically indistinguishable, but whose proteins have diverged sufficiently to suggest they have been separated for millions of years. According to Gould stasis may emerge as the theorys most important contribution to evolutionary science. Many hypotheses have been proposed to explain the putative causes of stasis. Much confusion has arisen over what proponents of punctuated equilibrium actually argued, what mechanisms they advocated, how fast the punctuations were, what taxonomic scale their theory applied to, how revolutionary their claims were intended to be, and how punctuated equilibrium related to other ideas like quantum evolution, saltationism, and mass extinction.

Quantum evolution was a controversial hypothesis advanced by paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson, whose conjecture was that, according to the geological record, on very rare occasions evolution would proceed very rapidly to form entirely new families, orders, and classes of organisms. In his Major Features of Evolution Simpson stated, Evolutionary change is so nearly the universal rule that a state of motion is, figuratively, normal in evolving populations. The state of rest is the exception and it seems that some restraint or force must be required to maintain it.

Richard Dawkins dedicated a chapter in The Blind Watchmaker to correcting, in his view, the wide confusion regarding rates of change. His first point is to argue that phyletic gradualismunderstood in the sense that evolution proceeds at a single uniform rate of speed, called constant speedism by Dawkins- is a caricature of Darwinism and does not really exist. His second argument, which follows from the first, is that once the caricature of constant speedism is dismissed, we are left with one logical alternative, which Dawkins terms variable speedism. Variable speedism may also be distinguished one of two ways: discrete variable speedism and continuously variable speedism. Eldredge and Gould, believing that evolution jumps between stability and relative rapidity, are described as discrete variable speedists, and in this respect they are genuinely radical. They believe that evolution generally proceeds in bursts, or not at all. Continuously variable speedists, on the other hand believe that evolutionary rates fluctuate continuously from very fast to very slow and stop, with all intermediates. They see no particular reason to emphasize certain speeds more than others. In particular, stasis, to them, is just an extreme case of ultra- slow evolution. To a punctuationist, there is something very special about stasis. [25]

Richard Dawkins believes that the apparent gaps represented in the fossil record document migratory events rather than evolutionary events. However, what we should note here is the fact that evolution is not a continuous process. And how could it be, since geological history shows periods of great upheaval, like volcanic eruptions, ice ages, tectonic phenomena, diseases and extinction events, caused either naturally or imposed by one species to another. Uniformity in the fossil record is certainly an assumption made for simplicity, but it is the least thing that really happens. This discreteness in the evolutionary process could not even be regarded as gradual, which would mean a geometrically progressing process. Some discrete steps in the process of evolution could really be back steps, leading to the reappearance of primitive characteristics instead of more advanced ones. If the gap is huge and insurmountable, a species may even become extinct.

We have already noted that speciation should have taken place mainly at an evolutionary stage when organisms were primitive enough in order to be able to diversify into several forms of

species. These species represent the different lineages of living beings that we encounter today, humans included. Not all species made it to the present, and for every day that passes, more species become extinct. There is a certain pattern of reduction in the number of species that goes on, instead of an increased number due to speciation. The whole structure reminds of a pyramid, leading from a great diversity at the bottom to just one species at the top, which apparently is our own species.

As far as the discreteness or discontinuity in the natural processes is concerned, this is not a new idea in quantum mechanics. Action is transmitted through quanta, discrete quantities of a specified amount of energy. Furthermore, the process of the so quantum tunneling may suggest vanishing forms of life here and their instantaneous reappearance there. Of course, this sort of quantum teleportation may be true for atoms and small clusters of molecules; nevertheless it could be suggestive about macroscopic processes that take place in nature, which cannot be fully understood by strictly linear biological interactions. I dont know if a direct analogy with biology would be valid, but the gaps appearing in microscopic interactions somehow reappear in every day macroscopic events. So giving a causal explanation to evolutionary gaps always presupposes natural processes that occur at a more fundamental level. Consequently I believe that we should always consider these more or less spontaneous and without a cause situations in order to build a more uniform and solid theory of evolution.
Morphogenesis

Some of the earliest ideas and mathematical descriptions on how physical processes and constraints affect biological growth, and hence natural patterns such as the spirals of phyllotaxis, were written by D Arcy Wentworth Thompson and Alan Turing. These works postulated the presence of chemical signals and physico- chemical processes such as diffusion, activation, and deactivation in cellular and organismic growth. The fuller understanding of the mechanisms involved in actual organisms required the discovery of DNA and the development of molecular biology and biochemistry.

The science of pattern formation deals with the visible, (statistically) orderly outcomes of selforganization and the common principles behind similar patterns in nature. In developmental biology, pattern formation refers to the generation of complex organizations of cell fates in space and time. Pattern formation is controlled by genes. The role of genes in pattern formation is best understood in the anterior- posterior patterning of embryos from the model organism Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly).

A.G.Gurwitsch analyzed the embryonic development of the sea urchin as a vector field, as if the proliferation of cells into organs were brought about by putative external forces

The concept of the morphogenetic field, fundamental in the early twentieth century to the study of embryological development, was first introduced in 1910 by Alexander G. Gurwitsch. Experimental support was provided by Ross Granville Harrisons experiments transplanting fragments of a newt embryo into different locations. Harrison was able to identify fields of cells producing organs such as limbs, tail and gills and to show that these fields could be fragmented or have undifferentiated cells added and a complete normal final structure would still result. It was thus considered that it was the field of cells, rather than individual cells, that were patterned for subsequent development of particular organs. The field concept was developed further by Harrisons friend Hans Spemann, and then by Paul Weiss and others.

By the 1930s, however, the work of geneticists, especially Thomas Hunt Morgan, revealed the importance of chromosomes and genes for controlling development, and the rise of the new

synthesis in evolutionary biology lessened the perceived importance of the field hypothesis. Morgan was a particularly harsh critic of fields since the gene and the field were perceived as competitors for recognition as the basic unit of ontogeny. With the discovery and mapping of master control genes, such as the homeobox genes the pre- eminence of genes seemed assured. But in the late twentieth century the field concept was rediscovered as a useful part of developmental biology. It was found, for example, that different mutations could cause the same malformations, suggesting that the mutations were affecting a complex of structures as a unit, a unit that might correspond to the field of early 20th century embryology. Scott Gilbert proposes that the morphogenetic field is a middle ground between genes and evolution. That is, genes act upon fields, which then act upon the developing organism. Jessica Bolker describes morphogenetic fields not merely as incipient structures or organs, but as dynamic entities with their own localized development processes, which are central to the emerging field of evolutionary development. [26]

Do genes contain unique information or act as storage devices of external information coming from morphogenetic fields? A cell contains the whole of the genome. So the way a cell behaves depends on its environment. If the field changes then the expression of genes should change. The field may be initially produced by biochemical means controlled by genes, but the fields expand afterwards beyond limited areas of the genome and interact with other fields, such as the electric and the electromagnetic field. Genes or units of genes may comprise the morphogenetic field. The field may act non- locally at distant areas of the genome causing corresponding effects. These widespread effects may explain speciation.
Defining a species

In fact there isnt any common acceptance about the definition of a species. Nevertheless, we may say that two species are distinct if they cannot mate with each other, or at least they dont have the potential to do so. However, it is highly doubtful whether genetic divergence can lead to something more than one or more distinct, separate lineages within a species, rather than a new species. Furthermore, the possibility of genetic convergence implies that two or more separated

lineages of a species cannot be indefinitely apart, so that hybridism should take place at some point in time. Even then, since hybridism leads to sterile offspring, the prevailing lineage can hardly be considered a new species. Lets use here the example of the evolutionary tree. A new branch cannot be considered a new tree. We need to stick the new branch in the ground in order to grow. In the same way, changes that take place within a species should be of a fundamental nature in order to produce speciation. Since evolved organisms are highly complex and diversified, we should expect speciation to have occurred at the distant past, at the stage of simple organisms. In other words, speciation should have taken place once, when conditions of a lowest degree of complexity have existed.

The Cambrian explosion

Such a period to have existed in the past is the so- called Cambrian explosion. Cambrian explosion or Cambrian radiation was the relatively rapid appearance, around 530 million years ago, of most major animal phyla, as demonstrated in the fossil record, accompanied by major diversification of organisms including animals, phytoplankton, and calcimicrobes. Before about 580 million years ago, most organisms were simple, composed of individual cells occasionally organized into colonies. Over the following 70 or 80 million years the rate of evolution accelerated by an order of magnitude (as defined in terms of the extinction and origination rate of species) and the diversity of life began to resemble that of today.

The Cambrian explosion has generated extensive scientific debate. The seemingly rapid appearance of fossils in the Primordial Strata was noted as early as the 1840s, and in 1859 Charles Darwin discussed it as one of the main objections that could be made against his theory of evolution by natural selection. The long- running puzzlement about the appearance of the Cambrian fauna, seemingly abruptly and from nowhere, centers on three key points: whether there really was a mass diversification of complex organisms over a relatively short period of time during the early Cambrian; what might have caused such rapid change; and what it would imply about the origin and evolution of animals. Interpretation is difficult due to a limited supply of evidence, based mainly on an incomplete fossil record and chemical signatures remaining in Cambrian rocks.

The explosion may not have been a significant evolutionary event. It may represent a threshold being crossed: for example a threshold in genetic complexity that allowed a vast range of morphological forms to be employed. Whatever triggered the early Cambrian diversification opened up an exceptionally wide range of previously unavailable ecological niches. When these were all occupied, limited space existed for such wide ranging diversifications to occur again, because strong competition existed in all niches and incumbents usually had the advantage. If a wide range of empty niches had continued, clades would be able to continue diversifying and become disparate enough for us to recognise them as different phyla; when niches are filled, lineages will continue to resemble one another long after they diverge, as limited opportunity exists for them to change their lifestyles and forms. [27]

There were two similar explosions in the evolution of land plants: after a cryptic history beginning about 450 million years ago, land plants underwent a uniquely rapid adaptive radiation during the Devonian period, about 400 million years ago. Furthermore, Angiosperms (flowering plants) originated and rapidly diversified during the Cretaceous period. Of course we should forget to mention the latest evolutionary explosion, as far as the appearance of Homo is concerned. Why is there a species so different from all others which managed to evolve not only its intelligence but also to create an artificial environment of its own? Even if we regard this uniqueness form our point of view, it is still difficult to explain it by a recurrent and smooth process of natural selection. On the contrary it should be considered as a unique and unrepeatable event that was based not on mere chance but on some conditions which at that point of time were to be met.

Attribution of physical characteristics

Four different depictions of H. erectus which show the diversity of represantations and the high degree of personal taste

Human evolution is characterized by a number of morphological, developmental, physiological, and behavioral changes that have taken place since the split between the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees. The most significant of these adaptations are 1. bipedalism, 2. increased brain size, 3. lengthened ontogeny (gestation and infancy), 4. decreased sexual dimorphism. The relationship between all these changes is the subject of ongoing debate. Other significant morphological changes included the evolution of a power and precision grip, a change first occurring H. erectus. [28]

Facal reconstruction of early Homo species, as we can see in the previous figure, is made mostly according to ape resemblance rather than human resemblance. This may point to the fact that most people still believe that we evolved from apes. Humans of course at an early stage would look primitive enough, and it may even be difficult to distinguish them from other primates or great apes. However, they were human- like apes; otherwise apes would have evolved into humans! This is what evolutionary bias is all about. We attribute some physical characteristics to the first humans according to some racist (or anti- racisist) critiria rather than pure scientific facts. I wonder if the first humans bothered about their at all. This bias is found all along the verterbra of evolution, as we know it. Even the best researchers may succumb to this temptation of selective objectivism.

Bipedalism and encephalization

Estimated brain capacity of hominids Species Sahelanthropus tchadensis Orrorin tugenensis Ardipithecus kadabba Ardipithecus ramidus Australopithecus anamensis Australopithecus afarensis Kenyanthropus platyops Australopithecus africanus Paranthropus aethiopicus Australopithecus garhi Homo habilis Homo rudolfensis Homo ergaster Up to 1.9m 30kg 1.3m 30-40kg 1.0-1.5m 30-40kg 1.0-1.5m ~400cc ~350 ~450 500-550cc 450cc 600cc 700cc 800cc 50kg 1.2m 300-350cc Body weight Body height Brain size ~350cc

Homo erectus H. antecessor Homo heidelbergensis Homo neanderthalensis Homo sapiens

40-70kg Up to 90kg 50-60kg 65-75kg 60-80kg

Up to 1.8m ~1.7m ~1.70m 1.55-1.65m ~1.65m

850cc 1000-1150cc 1100-1400cc 1300-1600cc 1150-1250cc

What we see from the previous table is a gradual increase in brain size, as brain capacity doubled from H. habilis to H. sapiens. Furthemore, we see a significant increase in body weight and height, from H habilis, who was quite short and thin, to H. ergaster or H. erectus, who were about as robust as we are. For the sake of comparison, a modern chimpanzee has a brain capacity of about 400cc, the same as Australopithecus, while gorillas have an average brain capacity of 550cc, the same as Paranthropus. Of course, brain capacity on its own may not tell the whole story. But as a matter of fact, even when we compare brain size to body size, the analogy is somewhat constant. For example, humans and mice have the same brain- to- body mass ratio, 1:40, while this analogy starts to deviate in the case of large animals, elephants for example (1:560). [29], [30]

Encephalization is defined as the amount of brain mass exceeding that related to an animals total body mass. Quantifying an animals encephalization has been argued to be directly related to that animals level of intelligence. Aristotle wrote in 335 B.C.: Of all the animals, man has the brain largest in proportion to his size. Also, in 1871, Charles Darwin wrote in his book The Descent of Man: No one, I presume, doubts that the large proportion which the size of mans brain bears to his body, compared to the same proportion in the gorilla or orang, is closely connected with his mental powers.

However, as we already said, mice have exactly the same brain- to body size ratio, so that we if take literally the previous assumptions then mice and men should be equally intelligent. There are many views about what caused the growth of the human brain during its evolution. In 2004, Dennis Bramble and Daniel Lieberman proposed that early Homo were scavengers that used stone tools to harvest meat off carcasses and to open bones. They proposed that humans

specialized in long- distance running to compete with other scavengers in reaching carcasses. It has been suggested that such an adaptation ensured a food supply that made large brains possible. [31]

I personally believe that the generalized complex social organization of our species made this possible. This can be based on the fact that human brains grow larger after birth, on the contrary to what happens with chimpanzees, for example. This after birth brain enlargement may be related to adaptive non- biological processes, such as nurture. As far as our conversation is concerned, bipedalism is considered another crucial factor, although evidence suggests that it followed and not preceded brain growth.

So it seems that bipedalism is not directly related to intelligence. In fact there are a lot of extinct or extant species that are bipeds. Within mammals, habitual bipedalism has evolved multiple times, with the macropods, kangaroo mice, dipodids, springhare, hopping mice, pangolins and hominine apes, as well as various other extinct groups evolving the trait independently. In the Triassic period some groups of archosaurs (a group that includes the ancestors of crocodiles) developed bipedalism; among their descendants the dinosaurs, all the early forms and many later groups were habitual or exclusive bipeds; the birds descended from one group of exclusively bipedal dinosaurs. Bipedalism is also considered to offer a species several advantages. Bipedalism raises the head; this allows a greater field of vision with improved detection of distant dangers or resources, access to deeper water for wading animals and allows the animals to reach higher food sources with their mouths. While upright, non- locomotory limbs become free for other uses, including manipulation (in primates and rodents), flight (in birds), digging (in giant pangolin), combat (in bears and the large monitor lizard) or camouflage (in certain species of octopus). Bipedality in kangaroo rats has been hypothesized to improve locomotor performance, which could aid in escaping from predators. [32]

So I guess the previous facts are enough to conclude that intelligence does not presuppose bipedalism, and vice versa. The reason why humans are bipeds may be evolutionary connected to some sort of atrophy or diversified use of the upper limbs, just as in the case of the tyrannosaur or bears, respectively. The point, however, is that this handier use of upper limbs

gave us the opportunity to express our intelligence even more. But we should consider the fact that both bipedalism and brain size evolved for a much longer time; since the great serpents and even earlier. Not only humans but also other species evolved a larger brain, since all species come from small and less complex animals. So the reason why humans present such an evolutionary exception against all other species should have to do with environmental factors, related of course to biological ones. It is just that our species, instead of another, satisfied some conditions at a certain point during the evolutionary course.

Hair and skin color

Map of indigenous skin color distribution in the world based on Von Luschan's chromatic scale

Hair has its origins in the common ancestor of mammals, the Synapsids, or possibly a subclade, the Sphenacodontoidea, about 310 million years ago. It is currently unknown at what stage the synapsids acquired mammalian characteristics such as body hair and mammary glands, as the fossils only rarely provide direct evidence for soft tissues. An exceptionally well- preserved skull of Estemmenosuchus, a therapsid from the Upper Permian shows smooth, hairless skin with what appears to be glandular depressions. The oldest known fossil showing unambiguous imprints of hair is the Callovian (late middle Jurassic) Castorocauda, an early mammal. The more advanced therapsids could have had a combination of naked skin, whiskers and scutes. A full pelage likely did not evolve until the therapsid- mammal transition. The more advanced,

smaller therapsids could have had a combination of hair and scutes, a combination still found in some modern mammals, such as rodents and the opossum.

Historically, some ideas have been advanced to explain the apparent hairlessness of humans, as compared to other species. Several hypotheses explained hairlessness as a thermoregulartoy adaptation to hot and dry savanna. The most known thermoregulatory hypothesis in modern paleoanthropology was proposed by Peter Wheeler (1984, 1985). He suggests that a need for decreased body hair originated as a response to climate change that began approximately 3 million years ago. At this time, the earth entered a period of global cooling that had a dehumidifying effect on the main early human habitats in East and Central Africa. Lush, wooded forests gave way to dry, grassland savannah; because of this, early humans were required to travel farther in search of food and water. As early humans diverged from their chimpanzeelineage, they also became omnivorous in order to maximize calorie intake, an important distinction in a nutrient- scarce environment. Prey, however, are moving targets, and though early humans changed the traditionally ape- like appearance of the australopithecines and adapted long, strong legs to facilitate sustained running, dense, hairy coats still posed a potentially fatal risk of causing overheating during the chase. It is posited that thick hair got in the way of the sweat evaporating, so humans evolved a sparser coat of fur. Although hair provides protection against harmful UV radiation, since our hominin ancestors were bipedal, only our heads were exposed to the noonday sun. Humans kept the hair on our head which reflects harmful UV rays, but our body hair was reduced. The rise in eccrine glands occurred on the genes that determine the fate of epidermal stem cells in human embryonic development.

Another hypothesis for the thick body hair on humans proposes that Fisherian runaway sexual selection played a role (as well as in the selection of long head hair), (see types of hair and vellus hair), as well as a much larger role of testosterone in men. Sexual selection is the only theory thus far that explains the sexual dimorphism seen in the hair patterns of men and women. On average, men have more body hair than women. Males have more terminal hair, especially on the face, chest, abdomen, and back, and females have more vellus hair, which is less visible. The halting of hair development at a juvenile stage, vellus hair, would also be consistent with the neoteny evident in humans, especially in females, and thus they could have occurred at the same

time. This theory, however, has significant holdings in today's cultural norms. There is no evidence that sexual selection would proceed to such a drastic extent over a million years ago when a full, lush coat of hair would most likely indicate health and would therefore be more likely to be selected for, not against, and not all human populations today have sexual dimorphism in body hair.

A final hypothesis is that human hair was reduced in response to ectoparasites. The ectoparasite explanation of modern human nakedness is based on the principle that a hairless primate would harbor fewer parasites. When our ancestors adopted group- dwelling social arrangements roughly 1.8 mya, ectoparasite loads increased dramatically. Early humans became the only one of the 193 primate species to have fleas, which can be attributed to the close living arrangements of large groups of individuals. While primate species have communal sleeping arrangements, these groups are always on the move and thus are less likely to harbor ectoparasites. Because of this, selection pressure for early humans would favor decreasing body hair because those with thick coats would have more lethal- disease- carrying ectoparasites and would thereby have lower fitness. However, early humans were not able to compensate for the loss of warmth and protection provided by body hair with clothing, and no other mammal lost body hair to reduce parasite loads. [33]

As it is possible that the development of body hair came retrospectively to cover the first naked mammals, hairlesness in humans may be the initial condition, long before they started to wear clothes. Harsh, dry conditions existed repeteadly before the appearance of the first humans or the great apes, so that the loss of hair cover in mammals should have occurred at an early evolutionary stage. Furthermore, the loss of hair due to sexual selection is unsustainable because at an early, primitive stage it would seem an advantage, as already noted. As far as the aforementioned ectoparasite hypothesis is concerned, it seems to be the more plausible. Yet, all extant hairy animals, as well as the great apes, carry parasites and they deal with them with the help of their immune system. Parasites may also prove themselves worthy regulators of natural selection because of their co- existence only with the most immune hosts. Consequently, it seems that hairlesness and light body skin go all the way back at the early stages of evolution, when rough skin could make the same job as thick hair. Under certain conditions, body hair could

become thicker or lighter but there isnt any strong evidence to suggest a massive hair loss at a certain stage. Rather, hairlesness seems to have been a gradual process leading to the first dressed humans. From this point onwards of course, any body- hair coverage would be proved useless.

As far as skin color is concerned, Rogers et al. (2004) performed an examination of the variation in MC1R nucleotide sequences for people of different ancestry and compared the sequences of chimpanzees and humans from various regions of the Earth. Rogers concluded that roughly five million years ago, at the time of the evolutionary separation of chimpanzees and humans, the common ancestors of all humans had light skin that was covered by dark hair. Additionally, our closest extant relative, the chimpanzee, has light skin covered by thick body hair. It is theorized that about 1.5 million years ago, the earth endured a megadrought that drove hominids from lush rainforests into arid, open landscapes. This, coupled with the loss of dense body hair, caused early human skin to endure excess UV-B radiation and xeric stress. Human hair gradually disappeared to allow better heat dissipation through sweating and the skin tone grew darker to increase the epidermal permeability barrier and protect from folate depletion due to the increased exposure to sunlight. By 1.2 million years ago, around the time of homo ergaster and homo erectus, the ancestors of all people living today had exactly the same receptor protein as modern Africans. Evolutionary pressure meant that any gene variations that resulted in lighter skin were less likely to survive under the intense African sun, and human skin remained dark for the next 1.1 million years.

About 70,000-100,000 years ago some modern humans began to migrate away from the tropics to the north where they were exposed to less intense sunlight, possibly in part due to the need for greater use of clothing to protect against the colder climate. Under these conditions there was less photodestruction of folate and so the evolutionary pressure stopping lighter- skinned gene variants from surviving was reduced. In addition, lighter skin is able to generate more vitamin D (cholecalciferol) than darker skin so it would have represented a health benefit in reduced sunlight if there were limited sources of vitamin D. Hence the leading hypothesis for the evolution of human skin color proposes that:

From ~1.2 million years ago to less than 100,000 years ago, the ancestors of all people alive were dark- skinned Africans. As populations began to migrate, the evolutionary constraint keeping skin dark decreased proportionally to the distance north a population migrated, resulting in a range of skin tones within northern populations.

At some point, northern populations experienced positive selection for lighter skin due to the increased production of vitamin D from sunlight and the genes for darker skin disappeared from these populations. [34]

The genetic mutations leading to light skin, though different among East Asians and Europeans, suggest that the two groups experienced a similar selective pressure due to settlement in northern latitudes. However, the key factor that produces dark skin is the well- know melanine that is contained in the human skin. Futhermore, as already noted, the drop of body hair revealed a pale skin underneath. So the original process was from light skin to dark skin, apparently with the help of melanine production, and not the opposite. Furthermore, as the table about the distribution of skin color shows, native South Americans are not black, as Africans and native Australians are. If skin colour is attributed only to environmental conditions, we cannot explain why native South American indians are not black. So it seems that skin color has not only to do with circumstantial differential gene expression, but also with enduring physical traits which have to do with the general skin structure. Otherwise, it would be hard to explain how the first light skined, hairless humans became black Africans, and then turned back into white Asians and Europeans.

Slanted- eyes and large- noses

From left to right and from top to bottom: San people (Bushmen), Australian Aborigines, and Northern Kenyans

Slant- eye, or epicanthic fold, is a skin fold of the upper eyelid, covering the inner corner (medial canthus) of the eye. One of the primary facial features often closely associated with the epicanthic folds is the nose bridge; all else equal, a lower- based nose bridge is more likely to cause epicanthic folds, and vice versa. There are various factors influencing whether someone has epicanthic folds, including geographical ancestry, age, and certain medical conditions.

Epicanthic folds are common among Bushmen groups in Southern Africa and are also typical in many peoples of Eastern and Central Asian populations. There are also found in significant numbers among Indigenous Americans. Additionally, European ethnic groups that tend to have epicanthus relatively frequently are Scandinavians, Samis, Poles, Germans, the Irish and British. They are most prominent in women and children and tend to become less distinct with age.

Humans initially develop epicanthic fold in the womb. Some fetuses lose their epicanthic folds after three to six months of gestation or before birth. In other young children it is visible before

the nasal bridge elevates. It is hypothesized that epicanthic folds are caused by climatic factors and it may have originated more than once during human evolution. Sexual selection may have also influenced the evolution of the trait. The genetic basis of the adaptation is not well known. [35]

As far as the trait of a large nose is concerned, its more likely a generalization. Not all Africans have large noses and lips. Characteristic facial feature vary from region to region in Africa. In West and South and some parts of Central Africa, those characteristics are what the majority of the Africans look like. But most East Africans, North Africans, and some Central Africans have thin noses, normal thin lips and can have straight/wavy hair. This is not because of mixing with non- Africans, its because Africans are a diverse people.

In fact, many Africans, especially East Africans, tend to marry and have children with people within their country, so that their genes are concentrated. This is proved through genetic tests. The oldest human fossils in the world are found in East Africa, mainly Ethiopia, which suggests that the human race began there. According to many evolution theories, as the human community grew, some migrated to other regions in Africa, to Asia and to Europe. The physical characteristics of these races are a result of mutations and climate adaptation after migration. An example is white skin which was a mutation that aided humans living in colder regions, so that their skin could absorb more vitamin D into their bodies from the sun. As to the large noses and lips of some Africans, its not certain what purpose they served as East Africans living in the same climate do not typically have these features. But there are differences in every group. Its more due to genes being kept within a gene pool (or community) because there are no new dominant genes to override these genes. Also, no one died from having these characteristics as they did not hinder their survival. [36]

After the previous conversation I am sure that everybody would agree that these traits are ubiquitous among different populations and they couldnt be attributed solely to interbreeding, because not all of these populations have been in contact. One should be impressed with the beautiful slanted eyes of the Bushmen, the blonde hair of some Australian aborigines, or the fine

white- like characteristics of some Kenyans and wonder how come the same traits are found all over the world. Probably the answer is that evolution is not only linear, but also parallel. Even if all extant people derive from a small group of people that existed some time ago, these traits could have evolved by themselves in a universal manner.

Furthermore, as we have already said, traits tend to be preservative, so we shouldnt be based on random mutations to explain them. Even if skin color is a flexible characteristic that could be altered within the period of a hundred or thousand generations, other prominent anatomical features suggest differences that are conserved in place and time. The point here is not to make a division between different races but to acknowledge the apparent differences, which could lead us to the journeys of the first groups of people throughout time periods and continents. Different appearances among different groups of people have nothing to do with intelligence, and, as we have already seen, even the most prominent features, like brain size and bipedalism, that may distinguish humans form other creatures, are not to be considered as definite factors of intelligence superiority. However, from the point of view of evolution, they gave some advantages (or disadvantages) with respect to certain environmental or even social conditions. So to interpret any kind of research on the diversity of groups of humans or any other species as a condition for racist superiority, at least falsifies the argument of superiority itself, and nevertheless has nothing to do with the reasons and methods of science.

(I was thinking about albinism as a possible explanation for a mutation that may have taken place a long time ago and turned black skin color into white, or black curly hair to blonde and straight. This could be possible, but from the point of view of genetics albinism is an abnormality. It is equally probable that black skin evolved from white skin, as there isnt any preferred direction for skin color. Environmental conditions cannot explain everything too. Polar bears for example are not white to keep themselves warm, but it is a good camouflage. Penguins backs instead are black. This sort of causal, to the letter, interpretations are to be blamed for all false conclusions that have often led to scientific inaccuracies and social discrimination.)
Palm- walking against knuckle- walking

Human babies are palm- walkers before they stand up on their two feet. I personally dont remember when I first stood up, but my mother used to tell me that it occurred suddenly one day when she was ready to leave and I tried to follow her. If this is so, bipedalism seemed, in my case, something like an instinct, ready to be expressed, by a sudden, circumstantial event, in due time. Chimps and the other great apes are knuckle- walkers instead, as they use the back of their hands to walk and run. Monkeys are palm- walkers, just like human babies. Following this logic, if we consider palm- walking in humans at the first stages of their lives as a remainder of their past, then they shouldnt have evolved from a knuckle- walking ancestor, and it seems more likely that they evolved from an earlier monkey- like creature, instead of an ape- like one, as it is usually assumed to have happened at a later time. Nevertheless, we should also consider the probability that there may have been a change in our evolutionary past from palm- walking to knuckle- walking, perhaps repeatedly, even if evidence for such a transmutation doesnt exist, nor it seems plausible.

We will now examine two early representatives of each category; Australopithecus afarensis and Ardipithecus ramidus, nicknamed Lucy and Ardi, respectively, according to some different, even opposite, opinions:
Lucy

News media releases of the latest scientific discovery about human origins herald the finding that the fossil Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis) has the same wrist anatomy as knuckle- walking chimpanzees and gorillas. Some of the media said this was a surprise to evolutionists, who now have to abandon their theory that our early tree- dwelling ancestors came down from the trees and were already adapted to walking upright. But evolutionists who insist that Lucy walked upright have already modified their story to accommodate the new information on Lucys wrist anatomy. Refusing to concede anything other than upright walking they say that her knucklewalking wrist joints are a leftover from an early ancestor who came down from the trees and walked on her knuckles as chimpanzees and gorillas do.

But did australopithecines like Lucy walk upright? Careful study of the skeletal anatomy of australopithecine fossils indicates a stooped gait, probably similar to the rolling knuckle- walk of chimps. Sadly, in this regard the public are often misled by inaccurately reconstructed statues and images of Lucy displayed as her feet (and hands, for that matter) are often portrayed as startlingly human- like. Many evolutionists themselves concede such errors, acknowledging that australopithecine hands and feet were not at all like human hands and feet; rather, they have long curved fingers and toes- even more so than apes today that live mostly in the trees. A serious reconstruction error is to wrongly align Lucys big toe alongside the smaller toes, like a human foot. In fact, using multivariate analysis, the anatomist Dr. Charles Oxnard has shown that the big toe actually sticks out as in chimpanzees. This is a key point, for evolutionists point to the famous fossil footprints at Laetoli (which look just like human footprints but are claimed to pre- date humans), and they say See, Lucy walked upright! But the (correctly reconstructed) australopithecine fossil foot bones show that Lucy could not possibly have made those footprints. Also, CAT scans of australopithecine inner ear canals (reflecting posture and balance) by anatomist Dr. Fred Spoor and his colleagues at University College, London, showed they did not walk habitually upright. So what was Lucy? Oxnards multivariate analysis showed that Lucy could not possibly be an intermediate missing link between humans and knuckle- walking ape- like ancestors. He found that the australopithecine fossils clearly differ more from both humans and African apes, than do these two living groups from each other. The australopithecines are unique. The latest evidence not only confirms this, but it also indicates that Lucy was a knuckle- walker, like todays great apes. [37]

On the other hand, Lucy finds support according to the following point of view:

There is a number of claims that Lucy was not capable of bipedality and may have been a knuckle walker. This is totally unsupportable. For example, McHenry (1986) points out that the feet, knees, legs and pelvises of australopithecines are strongly adapted to bipedality, while the hands and wrists show no adaptations to knuckle- walking or any other form of quadrupedality.

(More recently, Richmond and Strait (2000) did find evidence of a trait associated with knucklewalking in Lucy's wrist, but they still believe she was bipedal.) The only evidence for non- bipedality is that they lacked the stabilizing tubercles in their heels necessary for long- term erect posture (Howells 1993). However to claim this shows that Lucy was not bipedal badly misrepresents Howells, who is emphatic that Lucy was most definitely bipedal: The Afar hominids were unquestionably erect: their pelves, spines, and knees show it. In any case, the Laetoli- Afar creatures were clearly erect- walking australopithecines. (Howells 1993)

There have also been claims the bones show it to have been a knuckle walker. How was this determined from a pelvis, femur, ribs and vertebrae, especially in light of the fact that scientists overwhelmingly find them to be convincing evidence of bipedality? These claims are based on quotes by Oxnard (1975) and Zihlman (Herbert 1983) which are commonly seen in creationist collections of out- of- context quotes. While these authors do claim some similarities with orangutans and chimps respectively, their papers do not say that they were 100% orangutan or chimpanzee, and in fact disprove any such assertion. Finally, Richard Leakey (1994) has never claimed australopithecines were brachiators, nor does he deny that they were bipeds. [38]
Ardi

As far as Ardi is concerned, we have the following view:

It has long been assumed that our hands must have evolved from hands like those of African apes. When they are knuckle- walking, their long forelimbs angle their trunks upward. This posture has therefore long been viewed by some as pre- adapting our ancestors to holding their trunks upright. Two views of the left hand of Ardipithecus ramidus showing primitive features absent in specialized apes. (A) Short metacarpals; (B) lack of knuckle- walking grooves; (C) extended joint surface on fifth digit; (D) thumb more robust than in apes; (E) insertion gable for long flexor tendon (sometimes absent in apes); (F) hamate allows palm to flex; (G) simple wrist joints; (H) capitate head promotes strong palm flexion.

Until now, this argument was unsettled, because we lacked an adequate fossil record. Even Lucy, the most complete Australopithecus skeleton yet found, had only two hand bones- far short of the number needed to interpret the structure and evolution of the hand. The Ardipithecus skeleton reported here changes that. Not only is it more than 1 million years older than Lucy (4.4 million versus 3.2 million years old), its hands are virtually complete and intact. They show that Ardipithecus did not knuckle- walk like African apes and that it lacked virtually all of the specializations that protect great ape hands from injury while they climb and feed in trees.

Ardipithecus hands were very different from those of African apes. Its wrist joints were not as stiff as those of apes, and the joints between their palms and fingers were much more flexible. Moreover, a large joint in the middle of the wrist (the midcarpal joint) was especially flexible, being even more mobile than our own. This would have allowed Ardipithecus to support nearly all of its body weight on its palms when moving along tree branches, so that it could move well forward of a supporting forelimb without first releasing its grip on a branch.

This discovery ends years of speculation about the course of human evolution. Our ancestors hands differed profoundly from those of living great apes, and therefore the two must have substantially differed in the ways they climbed, fed, and nested. It is African apes who have evolved so extensively since we shared our last common ancestor, not humans or our immediate

hominid ancestors. Hands of the earliest hominids were less ape- like than ours and quite different from those of any living form.

Ardipithecus also shows that our ability to use and make tools did not require us to greatly modify our hands. Rather, human grasp and dexterity were long ago inherited almost directly from our last common ancestor with chimpanzees. We now know that our earliest ancestors only had to slightly enlarge their thumbs and shorten their fingers to greatly improve their dexterity for tools- using. [39]

Consequently, it seems that knuckle- walking was a later stage adaptation to life on the ground, after the ancestors of great apes and humans left their forest- dwelling habitats. If we take for granted that humans had an evolutionary stage living on the trees, then when they came down from the trees they would look like semi- erect creatures, gradually evolving an upright anatomy. So knuckle- walking seems to have happened at a spilt during which some hominoids kept on living at the edges of forested areas, while others moved to savanna territories. The latter should have evolved knuckle- walking and became the modern great apes, while the former may have evolved an upright stature which helped them gradually to spread around their forested lands. We may support this hypothesis by the fact that humans remained hunter- gatherers living in forests or near- by them essentially until they became farmers, just a few tens of thousands years ago.

As far as Lucy is concerned (since Ardi already seems to be adopted as a bipedal ancestor of ours), if she doesnt represent our ancestor then we are faced with a huge 2-3 million years gap, between Ardipithecus and the first Homo, so that, even if Lucy isnt our ancestor, another Australopithecus- like creature must be. Otherwise humans would seem to have appeared 2 million years ago out of the blue, which is both evolutionary and logically absurd. So it is a matter of time until new fossil evidence will settle this matter for good.

The spirit of the womb

Comparison between the male (left) and the female (right) skull and pelvis of humans

Comparison between human, australopithecine and chimpanzee pelvis; Note the more female- like pelvis of Australopithecus (if depictions correspond to the same sex)

In the course of evolution of the Homininae, the human brain has grown in volume from about 600 cc in Homo habilis to about 1500 cc in Homo sapiens neanderthalensis. Subsequently, there has been a shrinking over the past 28,000 years. The male brain has decreased from 1,500 cc to 1,350 cc while the female brain has shrunk by the same relative proportion. For comparison, Homo erectus, a relative of humans, had a brain size of 1,100 cc. However, the little Homo floresiensis, with a brain size of 380 cc, a third of that of their proposed ancestor H. erectus, used fire, hunted, and made stone tools at least as sophisticated as those of H. erectus. As large as you need and as small as you can, has been said to summarize the opposite evolutionary constraints on human brain size. [40]

I was just wondering, why brain- size is so important when considering the intelligence of a species. It seems that there must be a lowest limit, under which one shouldnt expect any sort of remarkable information- processing capabilities. But, at the other end, a huge brain would be nothing more than a problem for those carrying it. So I guess intelligence is found somewhere in the middle, between tiny and large brains.

Furthermore, the rounded shape of the human skull is really impressive, in comparison with the elongated skulls of apes. Adaptations regarding a smaller jaw may explain this, but there are other creatures with small jaws and elongated faces. So we have a necessary but not sufficient condition here in order to explain our rounded heads.

Feeding could also explain the increase of our brain size, a change in diet that provided a sufficient amount of meat. This would also make us the hunters instead of the hunted ones. Still, I cannot realize how the hunted can escape if he doesnt become cleverer than the hunter. I mean that the whole process is symmetrical. So meat is good, although the cleverest modern people are considered to be vegetarians.

What we already know is that bipedalism, for example, preceded brain growth. We also know that the human brain increases in size mostly after birth, on the contrary to chimpanzees. Otherwise it would be tormenting, if not impossible, for women to give birth. So the size of the human brain is regulated at the beginning by conditions taking place in the womb. Afterwards,

our brain grows enough in order to be able to host the processes and cope with the demands of complex thought. Bipedalism may also explain the round shape of our heads because otherwise we couldnt see anything under our noses. Still it is possible that as with brain growth, skull shape may have already formed at the stage of a semi- erect ancestor. It is a rather straightforward statement that we may think as we walk but we realize what we think when we stand.

In fact what more likely made us as clever as we are is the ability not only to stand but also to sit. When our forest- dwelling ancestors left the forest and settled in open territory, they may have had a lot more free time to relax. They should feel more protected by predators in open places than in thick woodlands. Women should also have more time to occupy themselves with household jobs, using the first stone- tools, while males used the same tools for huntinggathering. It is possible that this sort of easy life led to a drastic change in the shape of the

female pelvis, making it more triangular and wide so that embryos could evolve a more rounded head.

This is just a hint. But in fact, a more comfortable life could explain the relatively over- sized pelvis of women. Since they had no longer to run, they paid all their attention to a safe gestation. Men on the other side, who did the hunting, kept a pelvis comparatively thin. So the human spirit may have been originally born not by bipedalism or by an increased meat consumption but by conditions set by the change of the shape of the female pelvis, which was in turn shaped according to a, still nomadic but, considerably more sedentary lifestyle. If not Lucy, then another ancient mother bore the modern brains that we carry.

4. The two main hypotheses concerning modern humans

mt-DNA migration map

Y-DNA migration map

The out of Africa hypothesis

The recent African origin of modern humans, frequently dubbed the Out of Africa theory, is the most widely accepted model describing the geographic origin and early migration of anatomically modern humans. The hypothesis that humans have a single origin (monogenesis) was published in Charles Darwins Descent of Man (1871). The concept was speculative until the 1980s, when it was corroborated by a study of present- day mitochondrial DNA, combined with evidence based on physical anthropology of archaic specimens.

Genetic and fossil evidence is interpreted to show that archaic Homo sapiens evolved to anatomically modern humans solely in Africa, between 200,000 and 150,000 years ago, that members of one branch of Homo sapiens left Africa by between 125,000 and 60,000 years ago,

and that over time these humans replaced earlier human populations such as Neanderthals and Homo erectus. The date of the earliest successful out of Africa migration (earliest migrants with living descendants) has generally been placed at 60,000 years ago as suggested by genetics, although migration attempts out of the continent may have taken place as early as 125,000 years ago according to Arabian archaeology finds of tools in the region.

Although mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomal DNA are particularly useful in deciphering human history, data on the genomes of dozens of population groups have also been studied. In June 2009, an analysis of genome- wide SNP data from the International HapMap Project (Phase II) and CEPH Human Genome Diversity Panel samples revealed that the population groups studied fell into just three genetic groups: Africans, Eurasians (which includes natives of Europe and the Middle East, and Southwest Asians east to present- day Pakistan), and East Asians, which includes natives of Asia, Japan, Southeast Asia, the Americas, and Oceania. The study determined that most ethnic group differences can be attributed to genetic drift, with modern African populations having greater genetic diversity than the other two genetic groups, and modern Eurasians somewhat more than modern East Asians. The study suggested that natural selection may shape the human genome much more slowly than previously thought, with factors such as migration within and among continents more heavily influencing the distribution of genetic variations. [41]

Mitochondrial Eve

Mitochondrial Eve refers to the matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of modern humans. In other words, she was the most recent woman from whom all living humans today descend, on their mothers side, and through the mothers of those mothers and so on, back until all lines converge on one person. Because all mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is generally passed from mother to offspring without recombination, all mtDNA in every living person is directly descended from hers by definition. Mitochondrial Eve is the female counterpart of Ychromosomal Adam, the patrilineal most recent common ancestor, although they lived thousands of years apart. Mitochondrial Eve is estimated to have lived around 200,000 years ago, most

likely in East Africa, when Homo sapiens sapiens- anatomically modern humans- were developing as a population distinct from other human sub- species.

The mitochondrial clade which Mitochondrial Eve defines is the species Homo sapiens sapiens itself, or at least the current population or chronospecies as it exists today. In principle, earlier Eves can also be defined going beyond the species, for example one who is ancestral to both modern humanity and Neanderthals, or, further back, an Eve ancestral to all members of genus Homo and chimpanzees in genus Pan. According to current nomenclature, Mitochondrial Eves haplogroup was within mitochondrial haplogroup L because this macro- haplogroup contains all surviving human mitochondrial lineages today, and she must predate the emergence of L0. [42]
Y-chromosomal Adam

Y-chromosomal Adam (Y-MRCA) is the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) from whom all living people are descended patrilineally (tracing back only along the paternal lines of their family tree). Recent studies report that Y-chromosomal Adam lived as early as around 142,000 years ago. Older studies estimated Y-MRCA as recent as 60,000 years ago. All living humans are also descended matrilineally from Mitochondrial Eve who is thought to have lived earlier, about 190,000-200,000 years ago. Y-chromosomal Adam and Mitochondrial Eve need not have lived at the same time.

Initial studies implicated East Africa and Southern Africa as the likely sources of human Ychromosome diversity. This was because the basal lineages, Haplogroup A and Haplogroup B achieve their highest frequencies in these regions. But according to Cruciani et al. 2011, the most basal lineages have been detected in West, Northwest and Central Africa. In a sample of 2204 African Y-chromosomes, 8 chromosomes belonged to either haplogroup A1b or A1a. Haplogroup A1a was identified in two Moroccan Berbers, one Fulbe and one Tuareg from Niger. Haplogroup A1b was identified in three Bakola pygmies from Southern Cameroon and one Algerian Berber. Cruciani et al. 2011 suggest a Y-chromosomal Adam, living somewhere in Central- Northwest Africa, fits well with the data. In November 2012, a new study by Scozzari et al. reinforced the hypothesis of an origin in the north- western quadrant of the African continent for the A1b haplogroup, and, together with recent findings of ancient Y-lineages in central-

western Africa, provided new evidence regarding the geographical origin of human MSY diversity. [43]

The multiregional hypothesis

The recent single origin of modern humans in East Africa is the predominant position held within the scientific community. There are differing theories on whether there was a single exodus or several. A multiple dispersal model involves the Southern Dispersal theory, which has gained support in recent years from genetic, linguistic and archaeological evidence. A growing number of researchers also suspect that long- neglected North Africa, was the original home of the modern humans who first trekked out of the continent.

The multiregional hypothesis is a scientific model that provides an explanation for the pattern of human evolution. The hypothesis holds that humans first arose near the beginning of the Pleistocene two million years ago and subsequent human evolution has been within a single, continuous human species. This species encompasses archaic human forms such as Homo erectus and Neanderthals as well as modern forms, and evolved worldwide to the diverse populations of modern Homo sapiens sapiens. The theory contends that humans evolve through a combination of adaptation within various regions of the world and gene flow between those regions. Proponents of multiregional origin point to fossil and genomic data and continuity of archaeological cultures as support for their hypothesis. The term multiregional hypothesis was coined in the early 1980s by Milford H. Wolpoff and colleagues, and has its roots in Schwalbes 1904, Gorjanovi- Kramberger's 1906 and Hrdlikas 1927 theory that archaic Neanderthals were the direct ancestors of modern humans. This led Reginald Ruggles Gates to theorize in 1929 that Neanderthals were regionally ancestral to modern Europeans. Java Man was discovered in 1891, and Klaatsch in 1908, Dubois in 1922 and Oppenoorth in 1932 proposed that Java man was ancestral regionally to modern Australian aborigines based on what they saw as similar features in the crania. Franz Weidenreich published a paper in 1939 proposing a sequence from archaic human Peking man fossils to modern humans in China. This theory was based on similarities between the archaic H. erectus soloensis fossils

and modern Chinese, such as facial flatness and shovel shaped incisor teeth. In 1940, Weidenreich extended his theory to Neanderthals and modern Europeans, and in 1943 to Java Man and modern Australian Aborigines, seeing a continuation of regional archaic morphological traits in these modern races or populations, along with substantial interregional gene flow. While Weidenreich used the term polycentric rather than multiregional to describe his evolution model, his work had a strong influence on Wolpoff. Other theories, such as those of Carleton Coon, also adopted modified forms of Weidenreichs polycentric origin of the races. [44]

Genetic evidence

As we can see, the multiregional hypothesis has been set on a totally wrong basis. Neither Neanderthals are the ancestors of modern Europeans, nor the Asian H. erectus gave rise to modern Chinese, at least not directly. On the other hand, the monogenetic approach of the out of Africa hypothesis cannot explain variations between different populations occurring through interbreeding or genetic isolation. As usual, the answer should be somewhere in the middle, while the current methodologies concerning genetics need to dramatically improve in the future.

An early analysis of 15 noncoding sites on the X chromosome found inconsistencies with the recent African replacement hypothesis. The analysis found a multimodal distribution of coalescence times to the most recent common ancestor for those sites, contrary to the predictions for recent African replacement; in particular, there were more coalescence times near 2 million years ago than expected, suggesting an ancient population split around the time humans first emerged from Africa as Homo erectus, rather than more recently as suggested by the mitochondrial data: The human RRM2P4 pseudogene has a pattern of nucleotide polymorphism that is unlike any locus published to date. A gene tree constructed from a 2.4-kb fragment of the RRM2P4 locus sequenced in a sample of 41 worldwide humans clearly roots in East Asia and has a most- recent common ancestor approximately 2 My before present. The presence of this basal lineage exclusively in Asia results in higher nucleotide diversity among non- Africans than among Africans. A global survey of a single- nucleotide polymorphism that is diagnostic for the basal,

Asian lineage in 570 individuals shows that it occurs at frequencies up to 53% in south China, whereas only one of 177 surveyed Africans carries this archaic lineage. We suggest that this ancient lineage is a remnant of introgressive hybridization between expanding anatomically modern humans emerging from Africa and archaic populations in Eurasia. [45]

In a 2005 review and analysis of the genetic lineages of 25 chromosomal regions, Alan Templeton found evidence of more than 34 occurrences of gene flow between Africa and Eurasia. Of these occurrences, 19 were associated with continuous restricted gene exchange through at least 1.46 million years ago; only 5 were associated with a recent expansion from Africa to Eurasia. 3 were associated with the original expansion of Homo erectus out of Africa around 2 million years ago, 7 with an intermediate expansion out of Africa at a date consistent with the expansion of Acheulean tool technology, and a few others with other gene flows such as an expansion out of Eurasia and back into Africa subsequent to the most recent expansion out of Africa. Templeton rejected a hypothesis of recent African replacement with greater than 99% certainty (p < 1017): A haplotype is a multisite haploid genotype at two or more polymorphic sites on the same chromosome in a dened DNA region. An evolutionary tree of the haplotypes can be estimated if the DNA region had little to no recombination. Haplotype trees can be used to reconstruct past human gene- ow patterns and historical events, but any single tree captures only a small portion of evolutionary history, and is subject to error. A fuller view of human evolution requires multiple DNA regions, and errors can be minimized by cross- validating inferences across loci.

An analysis of 25 DNA regions reveals an out-of-Africa expansion event at 1.9 million years ago. Gene ow with isolation by distance was established between African and Eurasian populations by about 1.5 million years ago, with no detectable interruptions since. A second outof- Africa expansion occurred about 700,000 years ago, and involved interbreeding with at least some Eurasian populations. A third out- of- Africa event occurred around 100,000 years ago, and was also characterized by interbreeding, with the hypothesis of a total Eurasian replacement strongly rejected (p < 1017).

This does not preclude the possibility that some Eurasian populations could have been replaced, and the status of Neanderthals is indecisive. Demographic inferences from haplotype trees have been inconsistent, so few denitive conclusions can be made at this time. Haplotype trees from human parasites offer additional insights into human evolution and raise the possibility of an Asian isolate of humanity, but once again not in a denitive fashion. Haplotype trees can also indicate which genes were subject to positive selection in the lineage leading to modern humans. Genetics provides many insights into human evolution, but those insights need to be integrated with fossil and archaeological data to yield a fuller picture of the origin of modern humans. [46]

By 2006, extraction of DNA directly from some archaic human samples was becoming possible. The earliest analyses were of Neanderthal DNA, and indicated that the Neanderthal contribution to modern human genetic diversity was no more than 20%, with a most likely value of 0%. By 2010, however, detailed DNA sequencing of the Neanderthal specimens from Europe indicated that the contribution was nonzero, with Neanderthals sharing 1- 4% more genetic variants with living non-Africans than with living humans in sub- Saharan Africa.

In late 2010, a recently discovered non-Neanderthal archaic human, the Denisova hominin from southern Siberia, was found to share 4- 6% more of its genome with living Melanesian humans than with any other living group, supporting lateral gene transfer between two regions outside of Africa. In August 2011, human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles from the archaic Denisovan and Neanderthal genomes were found to show patterns in the modern human population demonstrating origins from these non- African populations; the ancestry from these archaic alleles at the HLA-A site was more than 50% for modern Europeans, 70% for Asians, and 95% for Papua New Guineans. (cf. [45])

Another 2011 study based on DNA samples and on a two- model and three- model inferential approach showed genetic evidence for archaic admixture in Africa: A long- debated question concerns the fate of archaic forms of the genus Homo: did they go extinct without interbreeding with anatomically modern humans, or are their genes present in contemporary populations? This question is typically focused on the genetic contribution of

archaic forms outside of Africa. Here we use DNA sequence data gathered from 61 noncoding autosomal regions in a sample of three sub- Saharan African populations (Mandenka, Biaka, and San) to test models of African archaic admixture. We use two complementary approximatelikelihood approaches and a model of human evolution that involves recent population structure, with and without gene flow from an archaic population. Extensive simulation results reject the null model of no admixture and allow us to infer that contemporary African populations contain a small proportion of genetic material (~2%) that introgressed ~35 kya from an archaic population that split from the ancestors of anatomically modern humans ~700 kya. Three candidate regions showing deep haplotype divergence, unusual patterns of linkage disequilibrium, and small basal clade size are identified and the distributions of introgressive haplotypes surveyed in a sample of populations from across sub- Saharan Africa. One candidate locus with an unusual segment of DNA that extends for >31 kb on chromosome 4 seems to have introgressed into modern Africans from a now- extinct taxon that may have lived in central Africa. Taken together our results suggest that polymorphisms present in extant populations introgressed via relatively recent interbreeding with hominin forms that diverged from the ancestors of modern humans in the Lower- Middle Pleistocene. [47]

What we see from the previous discussion is that a single out-of-Africa migration hypothesis is oversimplifying. First of all, it sets an arbitrary initial point, about 200kya, defining at that particular time modern man. But anatomically modern humans appear in the fossil record at least 2Mya. To suppose that each time a different wave of humans living in Africa was completely replacing previous waves of humans everywhere else, is as if saying that all previous migratory waves never existed. Such a recurrent- replacement hypothesis would not be able to describe the diversity of the first humans which is attested in the fossil record, in the same sense that differences between extant groups of people cannot be adequately explained by a handful of a founding population, searching and destroying every other human being standing in its way.

Furthermore, when we say that the Neanderthals contributed just 5% to the modern human DNA, we should be aware that H. sapiens evolved from H. heidelbergensis, who was also ancestral to the Neanderthals. If H. sapiens evolved from the African clade of H. heidelbergensis, then the Neanderthals represent the European counterpart. So while the Neanderthals contributed 5%, H.

Heidelbergensis contributed the rest 95%. But H. Heidelbergensis was the offspring of H. erectus, who, after supposedly having settled in Eurasia about 2 Mya, returned to Africa to evolve into H. heidelbergensis.

According to the new data, it seems more likely that the first H. erectus evolved in parallel in Africa and in Eurasia. H. georgicus in Georgia, Java Man in Indonesia and H. erectus in Africa date from about the same time (1.8Mya). Even if Africa has a slight temporal advantage (H. ergaster and H. rudolfensis date from about 1.9Mya), this difference of approximately 100kya may not explain anatomical differences found in the aforementioned species. Most probably some of these species (or all of them) came from the older H. habilis, even though it seems that H. habilis is a generic description of different kinds of Australopithecines- proto- humans (lets say the first apes that had started to look human) that had already spread throughout the Old World. About 1.4Mya ago, both H. habilis and H. ergaster disappear from the African fossil record, together with the genera of Paranthropus. Sometime afterwards, around 1Mya, H. erectus is found all over the Old World (the 1.2My old H. antecessor from Spain fills somehow the in between gap). I believe that at this stage the fundamental anatomical traits of different groups of people should have already formed. So H. heidelbergensis seems to have been the European clade of H. erectus, a kind of a Neanderthal of his time, the African clade was renamed H. rhodesiensis, while the Asian clade of H. erectus remained relatively stable until recently. It was H. rhodesiensis, or African H. heidelbergensis, the next generation of humans descended from H. erectus, which apparently evolved into H. sapiens.

This human journey back and forth between Africa and Eurasia and according to environmental conditions fills repeatedly the evolutionary gaps and shows that there is not a privileged species in the process of evolution. Also, this must be the meaning of biological introgression: repeated episodes of progressive interbreeding instead of complete replacement. The more the technology of ancient DNA extraction and analysis advances, the more affinities with ancient species of humans should emerge. Genetic isolation, like replacement, cannot explain the evolutionary acceleration events that led to the human species in the first place. It is well attested that during the early stages of human evolution at least two species of Homo coexisted, H. habilis and H. rudolfensis; even three species if we consider H. erectus as a separate one. But here comes the

advantage of interbreeding: a small creature, like H. habilis, joining with a robust one, like H. rudolfensis, could produce a normal- sized creature, like H. erectus ergaster. Furthermore, H. ergaster and H. habilis co- existed for about 500kya, so it is very difficult to explain the appearance and expansion of H. erectus solely by replacement. Interbreeding of course is not necessary, but it is something that happens very naturally between different members of the same species. Therefore, considering this possibility may bring about new, intriguing evolutionary aspects.

5. Further considerations
Darwins paradox

In the Descent of Man, Darwin speculated that humans had descended from apes which still had small brains but walked upright, freeing their hands for uses which favoured intelligence. Further, he thought such apes were African: In each great region of the world the living mammals are closely related to the extinct species of the same region. It is, therefore, probable that Africa was formerly inhabited by extinct apes closely allied to the gorilla and chimpanzee; and as these two species are now man's nearest allies, it is somewhat more probable that our early progenitors lived on the African continent than elsewhere. But it is useless to speculate on this subject, for an ape nearly as large as a man, namely the Dryopithecus of Lartet, which was closely allied to the anthropomorphous Hylobates, existed in Europe during the Upper Miocene period; and since so remote a period the earth has certainly undergone many great revolutions, and there has been ample time for migration on the largest scale. [48]

But if the presence of great apes only in Africa suggests the descent of modern humans there, then the absence of greats apes at the same period all over the rest of the world disproves the initial argument: Apes may have evolved into humans away from Africa, and this may explain why apes are not found outside Africa. In fact, as the fossil record suggests, an evacuation of motherland Africa had taken place more than once in the past. It happened between 13-7Mya, when Dryopithecus reigned in Eurasia. It happened again between about 1.5-1Mya, when H. ergaster and H. habilis disappear from the fossil record and H. antecessor appears in the Mediterranean, in Spain. And it happened once again in modern times, when Africa was heavily depopulated because of the slave trade.

There is a very interesting story narrated by Alan Templeton in his study which we previously reffered to, about a tribe in Africa that has been claiming to descent from Jews. The story goes like this: Thomas et al. (2000) identified several Y-chromosomal haplotypes from the tips of the Y-DNA haplotype tree that were also of restricted geographical distribution. They surveyed Ychromosomal variation in the Lemba, a southern African group who speak a variety of Bantu languages but claim Jewish ancestry (Wilson and Goldstein, 2000). According to their oral traditions, the Lemba are descended from a group of Jewish males who centuries ago came down the eastern coast of Africa by boat. Many were lost at sea, but the remainder interbred with local Bantu women, thereby establishing the ancestors of the current Lemba, who are now found mostly in South Africa and Zimbabwe. Thomas et al. (2000) showed that about two-thirds of the Lemba Y chromosomes have a Middle Eastern origin, and one-third a Bantu origin. Moreover, one particular Y-chromosomal haplotype is found in frequencies ranging from 0.100-0.231 in various Jewish populations, but is very rare or absent from most other human populations. Yet the frequency of this newly arisen, globally rare haplotype is 0.088 in the Lemba of southern Africa, consistent with a genetic interconnection between the Lemba and Jews of Middle Eastern origin. In contrast to the Y haplotypes, there is no evidence of Semitic admixture with the maternally inherited mtDNA (Soodyall 1993), a pattern also consistent with the oral traditions of the Lemba that the original admixture involved Jewish men and Bantu women.

These studies illustrate the richness of detailed inference that studies on newly arisen haplotypes can provide about recent movements of individuals and populations through space. However, what about more ancient movements? Because these haplotypes are young in an evolutionary sense, they offer little to no insight into older movements and historical events. Rare, tip haplotypes sire useful in humans only for inferences going back a few thousand years at the most, and often less.

Analogous stories took place all over the world during the colonization period. The black women that were taken as slaves from Africa to America and to the rest of the world interbred with white males, and not the opposite (black men with white women). So, a genetic analysis of the mtDNA would show an African origin, while an analysis of the Y-DNA would show a European descend. Of course we know that Y-Adam of all H. sapiens came from Africa. But was he an African, or was he a conqueror that came from the North? Since not all modern humans are Africans, the latter case seems more probable. Otherwise, it would be very hard to explain how come a Scandinavian and an Australian Aborigine belong to the same tribe of people.

The point here is not to insist on some sort of artificial discrimination. But if the Neanderthals could not extensively mate with H. sapiens, the differences having arisen in a time period of about 200ky- from the time the clade of H. heidelbergensis broke into the Neanderthals in Europe and H. rhodesiensis in Africa, 300kya, till the appearance of H. sapiens in Africa and his return to Eurasia, 100kya,- seem so fundamental that any kind of interbreeding between H. sapiens and the remaining populations of H. erectus would look absurd. But if we follow a model of imposed gene flow by a dominant group on the vassal one, we may explain basal anatomical differences between modern groups of people through a process of gradual assimilation instead of replacement. So Darwins paradox has to do with this process of gradual, continuous or discontinuous, peaceful or violent, absorption of traits between human clades, which led to a unified human race exhibiting inhomogeneity in its parts, rather than a homogenous population produced by replacement, whose only differences would be those of random mutations. Darwin was insightful

enough to give a hint about the possible role of Dryopithecus in human evolution. So he may have wondered why apes, which are only found in Africa, had never evolved.

The indefinitely last common ancestor

MRCA

(Most recent common ancestor)

In genetics, the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of any set of organisms is the most recent individual from which all organisms in the group are directly descended. The term is often applied to human genealogy. The MRCA of a set of individuals can sometimes be determined by referring to an established pedigree. However, in general, it is impossible to identify the specific MRCA of a large set of individuals, but an estimate of the time at which the MRCA lived can often be given. Such time to MRCA (TMRCA) estimates can be given based on DNA test results and established mutation rates as practiced in genetic genealogy, or by reference to a nongenetic, mathematical model or computer simulation. The term MRCA is usually used to describe a common ancestor of individuals within a species. It can also be used to describe a common ancestor between species. To avoid confusion, last common ancestor (LCA) or the equivalent term concestor is sometimes used in place of MRCA when discussing ancestry between species. Because ancestors of the MRCA are by definition also common ancestors, we can find (less recent) common ancestors by pushing further back in time to ancient common ancestors of all people alive. Eventually we reach a point in the past where all humans can be divided into two groups: those who left no descendants today and those who are common ancestors of all living humans. This point in time is termed the identical ancestors point.

Estimating time to MRCA of all humans based on the common genealogical usage of the term ancestor is much harder and less accurate compared to estimates of patrilineal and matrilineal MRCAs. Researchers must trace ancestry along both female and male parental lines, and rely on historical and archaeological records. Depending on the survival of isolated lineages without admixture from modern migrations and taking into account long-isolated peoples, such as historical societies in central Africa, Australia and remote islands in the South Pacific, the human

MRCA was generally assumed to have lived in the Upper Paleolithic period. With the advent of mathematical models and computer simulations, some researchers have argued that the MRCA of all humans lived remarkably recently, between 2,000 and 4,000 years ago. Rohde, Olson and Chang (2004), for example, constructed a mathematical model that considered the tendency of individuals to choose mates from the same group, as well as the relative geographical isolation of such groups. The mathematical model with one particular set of parameters showed that the MRCA lived about the year 300 BC and yielded an identical ancestor point (IAP) of 3,000 BC. The same 2004 Rohde paper also presented results from a computer program based on Monte Carlo simulation designed to overcome some of the limits of the mathematical model. The program took into consideration realistic population substructure and migration patterns, allowing the researchers to simulate historical human demography. A conservative simulation yielded a mean MRCA date of 1,415 BC and a mean IA date of 5,353 BC. A less conservative simulation gave an MRCA date of AD 55 and an IA date of 2,158 BC.

An explanation of this recent MRCA date is that, while humanitys MRCA was indeed a Paleolithic individual up to early modern times, the European explorers of the 16th and 17th centuries would have fathered enough offspring so that some mainland ancestry by today pervades remote habitats. The possibility remains that an isolated population with no recent mainland admixture persists somewhere, which would immediately push back the date of humanitys MRCA by many millennia. While simulations help estimate probabilities, the question can be resolved only by genetically testing every living human individual. An assumption that there are no isolated populations is questionable in view of the existence of various uncontacted peoples, who are suspected to have been isolated for many millennia, including the Sentinelese who have been isolated from the western world and also from the Asian mainland. [49]

What we see is that the estimations about the MRCA vary considerably in comparison with the dates given for mt-Eve and Y-Adam. But as already explained, this probably has to do with the rapid expansion of humans during the last centuries, so that ancient chromosome lineages will have been buried. So, new genetic methods are needed in order to retrieve this information. As far as the consestor is concerned- a supposed ancestor of two or more different species- I

believe that the existence of such a person or animal is absurd. Differentiation within a species does not comprise speciation of any degree or in any time scale. In order to find such a consestor, we have to go back at the stage of microbes and amoebas, so that if we try to trace back all the intermediate stages, we will face something like an evolutionary Zenos paradox.
CHLCA

(Chimpanzee- human last common ancestor)

As far as the age of the supposed common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees (CHLCA) is concerned, it is an estimate. The fossil find of Ardipithecus kadabba, Sahelanthropus tchadensis, and Orrorin tugenensis are closest in age and expected morphology to the CHLCA and suggest the LCA is older than 7 million years. The earliest studies of apes suggest the CHLCA may have been as old as 25 million years; however, protein studies in the 1970s suggested the CHLCA was less than 8 million years in age. Genetic methods based on Orangutan/Human and Gibbon/Human LCA times were then used to estimate a Chimpanzee/Human LCA of 6 million years, and LCA times between 5 and 7 million years ago are currently used in the literature. Richard Dawkins, in his book The Ancestors Tale, proposes that robust australopithecines such as Paranthropus are the ancestors of gorillas, whereas some of the gracile australopithecines are the ancestors of chimpanzees, but I believe that this is an oversimplification of the whole situation: why all robust apes stayed apes while gracile ones became human, and in what sense can an ape be gracile? It is found that there are no proto-chimpanzee or proto-gorilla fossils that have been clearly identified, which, I think, enforces the case that modern apes are a product of devolution, after the appearance of the first humans.

A source of confusion in determining the exact age of the Pan- Homo split is evidence of a more complex speciation process than a clean split between the two lineages. Different chromosomes appear to have split at different time, possibly over as much as a 4 million year period, indicating a long and drawn out speciation process with large scale hybridization events between the two emerging lineages. Particularly the X-chromosome shows very little difference between humans and chimpanzees, though this effect may also partly be the result of rapid evolution of the X-

chromosome in the last common ancestors. Complex speciation and incomplete lineage sorting of genetic sequences seem to also have happened in the split between our lineage and that of the gorilla, indicating messy speciation is the rule rather than exception in large-bodied primates. Such a scenario would explain divergence age between the Homo and Pan has varied with the chosen method and a single point has been so hard to track down. [50]

Consequently, genetic similarity should not always be interpreted as genetic affinity. Any sort of hybridism should be considered within the context of australopithecines that existed in parallel, and with respect to only those which evolved into humans. In other words, the human species may have resembled to one or more species of Australopithecus, but it should also be considered as distinct. As far as extant great apes are concerned, they seem to have evolved- devolved in reality- much later than the first humans, so that any assumption of hybridization between humans and apes should be considered ridiculous.
LUCA

(Last universal common ancestor)

The three- domain system

Charles Darwin proposed the theory of universal common descent through an evolutionary process in his book On the Origin of Species, saying, Therefore I should infer from analogy that probably all the organic beings which have ever lived on this earth have descended from some primordial form, into which life was first breathed.

The last universal ancestor (LUA), also called the last universal common ancestor (LUCA), or the cenancestor, is the most recent organism from which all organisms now living on Earth descend. Thus it is the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of all current life on Earth. The LUCA is estimated to have lived some 3.5 to 3.8 billion years ago (sometime in the Paleoarchean era). The idea that life-forms share a common ancestor is a central pillar of evolutionary theory, says Douglas Theobald, a biochemist at Brandeis University. Because microorganisms of different species often swap genes, some scientists have proposed that multiple primordial life forms could have tossed their genetic material into life's mix, creating a web, rather than a tree of life. To determine which hypothesis is more likely correct, Theobald put various evolutionary ancestry models through rigorous statistical tests. The results come down overwhelmingly on the side of a single ancestor.

For his analysis, Theobald selected 23 proteins that are found across the taxonomic spectrum but have structures that differ from one species to another. He looked at those proteins in 12 speciesfour each from the bacterial, archaeal and eukaryotic domains of life. Then he performed computer simulations to evaluate how likely various evolutionary scenarios were to produce the observed array of proteins. Theobald found that scenarios featuring a universal common ancestor won hands down against even the best- performing multi- ancestor models. A model that had a single common ancestor and allowed for some gene swapping among species was even better than a simple tree of life. Such a scenario is 103,489 times more probable than the best multiancestor model, Theobald found. [51]

ILCA

(Indefinitely last common ancestor)

We have already noted that if a common ancestor exists then he should be found at a primordial state of life. As far as we are concerned, such a state, together with the necessary conditions, had existed at the Cambrian Epoch. However, a horizontal gene swap between species even during that early stage suggests that the LUCA is not to be found there. (In any case the ~103500 result given by Theobald is abnormal- even the age of the universe is of the order ~109.) But what we really see from the previous discussion is that the search for a LUCA is like a ghost search.

Take for example the following diagram, depicting the supposed split between chimpanzees and humans. It is dated on average about 6Mya. But then Sahelanthropus was discovered. So if we consider this species as ancestral to ours, we should redefine the aforementioned split at an earlier time. But then again another species may be discovered comprising a missing link with our genus. So the split would be set back in time again and again. Finally, we will reach a date

when the first mammals arose, or even earlier during the time of the mammal- like serpents, or even at the time of the first viviparous amphibians or arthropods. (Viviparity is the ability of a species to carry embryos instead of eggs (oviparity), and interestingly enough viviparous creatures include, besides mammals and humans, some fish, amphibians, arthropods (like scorpions), and insects (like aphids).)

Have we found by now the ancestor of humans or the last common ancestor of all species, and does it worth to go on with this process indefinitely? Could we identify our first steps with the traces left by the first primordial animals in the rocks, or our body cells with the first bacteria? If we drop a spoonful of salt into a lake of fresh water, can we trace any change in its salinity? This infinitely regressive process may be of philosophical, or even mathematical, interest but hasnt got any effect on a biological, practical level. Those searching for an ultimate cause in nature (such as a LUCA) are always left with probabilities representing a multitude of species, which seem to have been produced spontaneously, at many different places and without an apparent cause. The first bacteria that evolved into modern cells would represent a multitude of species, like material particles. I really cant find any reason why one of them was the super- bacterion which produced the rest of them, nor why such an aspect would explain the extant biodiversity better. I guess that such monistic approaches are fundamentally anthropocentric, and they neither promote science, nor explain nature at all.

A multitude of LUCAs

The most commonly accepted location of the root of the tree of life is between a monophyletic domain Bacteria and a clade formed by Archaea and Eukaryota of what is referred to as the traditional tree of life based on several molecular studies starting with Carl Woese. A very small minority of studies have concluded differently, namely that the root is in the Domain Bacteria, which is basal to a clade with Archaea and Eukaryotes and the rest of Bacteria as proposed by Thomas Cavalier-Smith.

The colonial theory

One explanation of multicellular organisms is the Colonial Theory proposed by Haeckel in 1874. This theory claims that the symbiosis of many organisms of the same species (unlike the symbiotic theory, which suggests the symbiosis of different species) led to a multicellular organism. The mechanism of this colony formation can be as simple as incomplete cytokinesis, though multicellularity is also typically considered to involve cellular differentiation. The advantage of the Colonial Theory hypothesis is that it has been seen to occur independently in 16 different protoctistan phyla. For instance, during food shortages the amoeba Dictyostelium groups together in a colony that moves as one to a new location. Some of these amoebas then slightly differentiate from each other. Other examples of colonial organisation in protista are Volvocaceae, such as Eudorina and Volvox, the latter of which consists of up to 500- 50,000 cells (depending on the species), only a fraction of which reproduce. However, it can often be hard to separate colonial protists from true multicellular organisms, as the two concepts are not distinct.

In 1998, Woese proposed that (1) no individual organism can be considered a LUA, and (2) that the genetic heritage of all modern organisms derived through horizontal gene transfer among an ancient community of organisms. In 2010, based on the vast array of molecular sequences now available from all domains of life, a formal test of universal common ancestry was published. The formal test favored the existence of a universal common ancestor over a wide class of alternative hypotheses which included horizontal gene transfer. However, the formal test was ambiguous with respect to the community of organisms hypothesis, since it did not require that the last universal common ancestor be a single organism, but allowed it to be a population of organisms with different genotypes that lived in different places and times. The formal test was also consistent with multiple populations with independent origins gaining the ability to exchange essential genetic material effectively to become one species. [52]

De- evolution

Devolution, de-evolution, or backward evolution is the notion that a species can change into a more primitive form over time. The concept was used by scientists in the 19th century. In 1857 the physician Bndict Morel influenced by Lamarckism claimed that environmental factors such as taking drugs or alcohol would produce degeneration in the offspring of those individuals,

and would revert those offspring to a primitive state. Morel had believed that mankind had started in perfection, contrasting modern humanity to the past, and claimed there had been morbid deviation from an original type.

The theory of devolution, was later advocated by some biologists. One of the first to suggest devolution was Ray Lankester, who explored the possibility that evolution by natural selection may in some cases lead to devolution, an example he studied was the regressions in the life cycle of sea squirts. He was a critic of progressive evolution, pointing out that higher forms existed in the past which have since degenerated into simpler forms. Lankester argued that if it was possible to evolve, it was also possible to devolve, and that complex organisms could devolve into simpler forms or animals.

Anton Dohrn also developed a theory of degenerative evolution based on his studies of vertebrates. According to Dohrn many chordates are degenerated because of their environmental conditions. Dohrn claimed cyclostomes such as lampreys are degenerate fish as there is no evidence their jawless state is an ancestral feature but is the product of environmental adaptation due to parasitism. According to Dohrn if cyclotomes would devolve further then they would resemble something like an Amphioxus (lancelet). Johann Friedrich Blumenbach and other monogenists were believers in the Degeneration theory, which claims that races can degenerate into primitive forms. Blumenbach claimed that Adam and Eve were white and that other races came about by degeneration from environmental factors such as the sun and poor diet. He also claimed Negroid pigmentation arose because of the result of the heat of the tropical sun. The cold wind caused the tawny color of the Eskimos and the Chinese were fair skinned compared to the other Asian stocks because they kept mostly in towns protected from environmental factors. Compte de Buffon believed that the degeneration could be reversed if proper environmental control was taken and that all contemporary forms of man could revert to the original Caucasian race.

An early creationist to discuss devolution was the ornithologist Douglas Dewar, writing about the subject of the fossil record for the carboniferous period: A few of the carboniferous insects

were larger than any now existing; one of the dragon-flies had a wing-span of 28 inches. This suggests devolution rather than evolution. The term was also related to the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial and , when a report in The New York Times said it was not man who evolved from the anthropoid, but the anthropoid which devolved from man. The suggestion of ape degenerating from man had already been brought up by George McReady Price in a work published before the trial: Accordingly, by every just rule of comparison and analogy, we may well declare that if there is any blood relationship between man and the anthropoid apes, it is the latter which have degenerated from the former, instead of the former having developed from the latter. I do not say that this is the true solution of this enigma; but I do say that there is far more scientific evidence in favor of this hypothesis than there ever has been in favor of the long popular theory that man is a developed animal.

Claims have also be made by Ken Ham that Adam and Eve were made into a state of perfection, with perfect DNA, no mistakes or mutations, and the incredible amount of genetic information that God had created at the beginning has been devolving ever since. According to Ham, mutations lead to a loss of genetic information and this is evidence for devolution. Joseph Mastropaolo, has argued that Change over time actually describes devolution to extinction, the exact opposite of evolution.... actual epidemiological data from human genetic disorders and fatal birth defects, identify natural selection, the alleged primary mechanism for evolution, as actually a mechanism for devolution to extinction, the exact opposite of evolution; and elsewhere, Evolution is the development of an organism from its chemicals or primitive state to its present state. Devolution is the sequence toward greater simplicity or disappearance or degeneration.

Furthermore John C. Sanford, a plant geneticist and creationist, claimed that the genome is deteriorating and therefore could not have evolved in the way specified by the modern evolutionary synthesis. Sanford has published two peer reviewed papers modeling genetic entropy. Peter Stoner, another creationist, claimed that the universe was immensely old, and, by the fact that every star is losing energy and mass, he claimed that the second law of thermodynamics proves cosmic devolution. [53]

Still, from a biological perspective, there is no such thing as devolution. All changes in the gene frequencies of populations- and quite often in the traits those genes influence- are by definition evolutionary changes. The notion that humans might regress or devolve presumes that there is a preferred hierarchy of structure and function- say, that legs with feet are better than legs with hooves or that breathing with lungs is better than breathing with gills. But for the organisms possessing those structures, each is a useful adaptation.

Nonetheless, many people evaluate nonhuman organisms according to human anatomy and physiology and mistakenly conclude that humans are the ultimate product, even goal, of evolution. That attitude probably stems from the tendency of humans to think anthropocentrically, but the scholarship of natural theology, which was prominent in 18th and 19th century England, codified it even before Lamarck defined biology in the modern sense. Unfortunately, anthropocentric thinking is at the root of many common misconceptions in biology.

Chief among these misconceptions is that species evolve or change because they need to change to adapt to shifting environmental demands; biologists refer to this fallacy as teleology. In fact, more than 99 percent of all species that ever lived are extinct, so clearly there is no requirement that species always adapt successfully. As the fossil record demonstrates, extinction is a perfectly natural- and indeed quite common- response to changing environmental conditions. When species do evolve, it is not out of need but rather because their populations contain organisms with variants of traits that offer a reproductive advantage in a changing environment.

Another misconception is that increasing complexity is the necessary outcome of evolution. In fact, decreasing complexity is common in the record of evolution. For example, the lower jaw in vertebrates shows decreasing complexity, as measured by the numbers of bones, from fish to reptiles to mammals. (Evolution adapted the extra jaw bones into ear bones.) Likewise, ancestral horses had several toes on each foot; modern horses have a single toe with a hoof. Evolution, not devolution, selected for those adaptations. [54]

According to my point of view, there is a misconception between devolution, and degeneration. Degeneration is caused by anomalous gene replication, because of chemicals and radiation, for example, while devolution is a mere biological process. So we are not interested here with assumptions such as Adam and Eve were white Caucasians, which is an evolutionlike statement irrelevant to evolution. We are also not interested in statements produced by misconceptions about the laws of physics. Entropy, for example, is not just loss of information; it is rather number of ways of information recombination. But devolution should be considered that can occur, otherwise we would make the same mistake as those who see an arrow of time. The probability that apes evolved to humans and not the opposite is greater (due to the fact that human fossils are much older than those of the extant great apes), although the whole syllogism is wrong: Neither apes nor humans evolved one from the other. We are talking about two different species, such as cats and dogs. But the standard of what consists a human being and what an ape must exist, otherwise we have no opportunity to make the distinction. So devolution could measure a degree of deviation from this standard or average. For example, if the Third World War occurred and brought humanity to the ground, the next stage would be an ape- man living in caves under completely primitive conditions. If man could start all over again, this is another question, which is by the way related to the notion of non- reducible complexity, or essential skill. However, as we have already pointed out earlier, information does not discriminate which will be the next chosen species, or what will it look like, by default. It is us who have anthropized the whole picture.

Evolutionary acceleration event

The genome of a living species is the product of a long series of changes, including neutral, beneficial, and detrimental alterations to the sequence. Sequence changes that affect the organisms fitness are subject to evolutionary pressures, such as the pressure to survive, to outcompete other species, and to defend the organism against external attack. In order to uncover these changes, we need to know what the ancestral genome looked like, which we can infer by comparing multiple genomes to one another. As we accumulate genomes from species related to human, and especially from within the primate lineages, we should be able to learn more about what makes humans special. At the same time, we can learn what makes each primate different

from the others. Until recently, methods for detecting the effects of evolution had been designed for relatively distant species such as humans and mice. With the publication of the chimpanzee genome, we had our first look at a very close relative of human. The genomes of chimpanzees and humans are so close, in fact, that sequence similarity cannot be used to infer functional significance: in most cases, similarity simply reflects the recent divergence between the species. With more species, sequence comparison even among close relatives can be used to tease apart regions that are constrained by evolutionary forces and that, consequently, are likely to have functional importance to the biology of humans. [55]

Researchers analyzing variation in the human genome have concluded that human evolution accelerated enormously in the last 40,000 years under the force of natural selection. The finding contradicts a widely held assumption that human evolution came to a halt 10,000 years ago or even 50,000 years ago.

The new survey- led by Robert K. Moyzis of the University of California, Irvine, and Henry C. Harpending of the University of Utah- developed a method of spotting human genes that have become more common through being favored by natural selection. They say that some 7 percent of human genes bear the signature of natural selection. By dating the time that each of the genes came under selection, they have found that the rate of human evolution was fairly steady until

about 50,000 years ago and then accelerated up until 10,000 years ago. The high rate of selection has probably continued to the present day, Dr. Moyzis said, but current data are not adequate to pick up recent selection. The brisk rate of human selection occurred for two reasons, Dr. Moyzis team says. One was that the population started to grow, first in Africa and then in the rest of the world after the first modern humans left Africa. The larger size of the population meant that there were more mutations for natural selection to work on. The second reason for the accelerated evolution was that the expanding human populations in Africa and Eurasia were encountering climates and diseases to which they had to adapt genetically. The extra mutations in their growing populations allowed them to do so. Dr. Moyzis said it was widely assumed that once people developed culture, they protected themselves from the environment and from the forces of natural selection. But people also had to adapt to the environments that their culture created, and the new analysis shows that evolution continued even faster than before. David Reich, a population geneticist at the Harvard Medical School, said the new report was a very interesting and exciting hypothesis but that the authors had not ruled out other explanations of the data. The power of their test for selected genes falls off in looking both at more ancient and more recent events, he said, so the overall picture might not be correct. Similar reservations were expressed by Jonathan Pritchard, a population geneticist at the University of Chicago. My feeling is that they havent been cautious enough, he said. This paper will probably stimulate others to study this question. [56]

It seems that what drives evolution is natural selection, which is a mechanism of biological adaptation, through favorable mutations, to environmental, natural or artificial, conditions. However, natural selection is just a mechanism, not the driving force. For example, under the same environmental pressures only humans evolved bipedalism and larger brains from all the animals existing at the same places and at the same time. So why natural selection apllied only to humans and not to the other species? The answer is because natural selection is mostly a notionrelative to a natural mechanism that indeed exists- that relies on logical assumptions connecting biological processes to natural forces. In other words, it is these forces that carve the

environment and impose adaptation stresses on living organisms. But these natural forces also apply to the biological level. For example, mutations occur even before any external event takes place, even if their distribution collapses at the moment when the organism establishes contact with the environment. So, natural selection describes this particular moment of adaptive behavior, not what caused the changes in the first place.

It is found that brain growth was preceded by bipealism and this may have also been the case for tool making. So an evolutionary acceleration event, that led to the humanization of an ape- like species was triggered by a couple of incidental events that have neither to do with biology nor with the environment. Lets consider for example the events which more significantly led to this acceleration. Bipedalism is believed to have evolved before the drying of the environment, at a stage where the first humans were still living on trees. Brain growth could be related to a change in diet, meat eating, for example. But other creatures that were carnivorous didnt evolve a larger brain. So it is logical to assume that brain growth could have preceded meet eating, or that these two events are unrelated to each other. In any case, if we consider meet eating as necessary for the sustainability of a larger brain, brain growth occurred incidentally at some evolutionary stage driven by some more fundamental conditions that were expressed. Stone technology is perhaps the most important event that took place. Humans became predators instead of the hunted ones, and stone technology must have given them a lot of leisure time to occupy themeselves with other, more advanced personal and social behaviours. The ability to speak is of course another major event. Can we explain this ability by natural selection? Again, the need for communication is so fundamental in nature that we cannot consider it as a coincidental attribute of mutations and natural selection.

When we talk about specific incidents in the process of evolution we mean conditions ready to be met. Such a condition may be a mutation matched with environmental necessities. But these incidents would take place one way or another. The ultimate form of the most intelligent organism doesnt matter so much. But this unfoldment of information takes place not with mutations but with some extraordinary events. Technology, for example, with its primitive form of stone tool making, cannot be attributed to mutations. Even monkeys may hold tools, while their limbs cannot be regarded as products of mutations. In the same sense making and using

tools is not just an aspect of adaptive behavior. We may use tools in all sorts of environments, so that it must have been not an outcome of environmental stress. It is more like a property already found in the most primitive organisms in the form of an artificial use of the environment: Mud and broken branches, for example, that birds use to build their nests is a form of technology, since they use external sources of raw materials in a diversified way.

Conqlusively, evolutionary acceleration events are triggered by major innovations at certain stages of the lifetime of a species, such as the increase in brain size, the use of technology, speech, etc. Since these events take place not only at a biological but also, and mainly, at a natural and even social level, they should be attributed to incidental, as far as space and time is concerned, but deterministic, in the context of evolution, events which comprise the main factors of speciation. Under different initial conditions, a different species may have evolved such behaviors. But as far as humans are concerned, the main stages of their accelarated evolution can be definitively described: Standing upright freed their hands; tool technology was made possible; brain growth formed new areas in the brain, such as the area of speech; and the artificial environment humans created made them think about nature from an out-standing point of view. These basic steps in the process of evolution may be seen at the level of mutations and described in the context of natural selection; still their deepest origin lies in the same conditions and laws that made life and existence in the universe possible.

Non- local interactions in evolution

A (rather oversimplifying) graph showing human origins according to the multiregional hypothesis

The previous graph, according to a parallel approach to evolution, suggests that different human clades evolved separately. However, the same graph shows that all parallel lineages converge to a common ancestor (the unique line at the bottom of the graph). So this representation ends up with a common ancestor, which annihilates the initial argument of the multiregional hypothesis. I am not really sure how deep back in time we need to go to find a common ancestor, but as I previously suggested such a journey would most probably lead us to a dead end. We will always find a previous common ancestor till we end up at the stage of the first organic forms, or even earlier at the first atoms and the fundamental laws of nature. In other words, even if we could identify, for example, a multicellular organism as the possible MRCA for all extant mammals, this would be a scheme of comparison rather than a biological reality.

As we have repeatedly said, humans did not evolve from apes, since, if we wish to make such a comparison, it seems more likely the opposite- human fossils date from 2- 2.5Mya, while great apes fossils are only 500ky old. Humans and great apes stem from parallel clades, and there has never been a previous humanoid (a monkey) that split into humans and apes. Both clades evolved from different lineages of monkeys, which in turn evolved from more primitive forms of

mammals. This should be the meaning of a multiregional approach, or, in other words, of parallel evolution. This doesnt necessarily exclude replacement events. However, these events are not concerned with different species but with different groups of the same species. Moreover, if we take a closer look, we will realize that replacement is always accompanied, more or less, by hybridization. Otherwise we just have extinction events. So when we say, according to the out of Africa hypothesis, that all modern humans may have descended from just a small group of people living about 100kya in East Africa, me must be careful because we should also consider the degree of hybridization with other human groups or lineages, as well as where did these first people stem from. Thus, if this group was an offshoot of H. heidelbergensis or even of H. erectus, then, by simple inference, we all stem from the first H. heidelbergensis or H. erectus, respectively.

So both the multiregional and the out of Africa hypotheses mean nothing. Evolution, while being full of gaps of an inherent discontinuity, is coherent enough in order to have a rebirth of species after major extinction events. All these minor or major evolutionary gaps suggest evolutionary jumps and acceleration events, that could be bridged by biological means but essentially are to be interpreted by correlation processes. For example, not all dinosaurs became extinct, so that we may find a mammal- like serpent of that period that gave offspring to survive after the extinction event. But we can never be sure if these offspring descend genetically from a previous lineage, or if it represents a new or another species that look alike.

I have been long wondering about the probability of two different species or two groups within the range of a species sharing common genetic features without any direct genetic interaction between them. From a genetics point of view, in order a group to descend from another it should have a new as well as the previous mutations of this species. I guess, the probability for two groups to share the same series of mutations by chance is almost zero. But the point is that we never know if these mutations were genetically inherited or if they were expressed by genetic drift at a local level of a small group.

I would like to make here a comparison. The pyramids of America and Egypt were built independently, as we all know. But when the pyramids of America were first discovered, everyone supposed that they should have been built by the same civilization that had also built the pyramids in Egypt. This is because the probability of being separately built by chance was supposed to be practically zero. However, it was proved after dating them that the pyramids of America were thousands of years younger. The formal explanation of archeologists was that they were the product of parallel evolution. They said that all civilizations share the same features at the same evolutionary stage. In other words, stone technology is such that if someone uses stone to build monuments he should make them conical. But as you can see there is a problem here. Because not all stone age civilizations built pyramids. And the probability that this event occurred separately at the two edges of the world by chance is also zero.

If we now bring the former analogy to the level of genes, there really could exist the same mutation series in two distant groups of people without any kind of direct contact between them. This is what we could call non- local genetic flow. As with the pyramids, it must have happened in the past between separate groups of people and it may be still taking place. There is term in biology gene flow with isolation by distance, which however has a different meaning from what the phrase would suggest. But this term expresses exactly what non- local gene flow would mean. You dont always need to bring to distinct populations together in order to find the same pattern in their genes. You may equivalently correlate them even if they live apart.

I am not aware how such non- local correlations could be incorporated into the body of modern biology. However, this sort of correlations, or non- local interactions by distance, are common in modern physics. You just dont need to assume physical communication between two parts of a system in order to explain their interaction. You dont need to bring them together, at least no more than once, and you dont even need to suppose a messenger- particle to establish an interaction. This is what Einstein called spooky action at a distance, and what is now called quantum entanglement. Someone could argue that this is a process of the microcosm, which may not be transferred to the macroscopic world. But this is just a matter of convenience, because there isnt any distinct boundary between the smallest and the largest.

So something real may be going on in nature, a form of correlation, or connection, with physical isolation by distance, which we may have been wrongly assuming as biological interaction of distant populations. (Take native Australians or South Americans, for example, and imagine ancient Africans going coast to coast, and then building boats large enough to cross the Indian ocean, or the Pacific. Then imagine ancient Egyptians making boats to travel to the New World, building the American pyramids, and then staying there to evolve into the Aztecs. These two logical assumptions are in fact identical.)

In population genetics, gene flow (also known as gene migration) is the transfer of alleles or genes from one population to another. Migration into or out of a population may be responsible for a marked change in allele frequencies. Immigration may also result in the addition of new genetic variants to the established gene pool of a particular species or population. There are a number of factors that affect the rate of gene flow between different populations. One of the most significant factors is mobility, as greater mobility of an individual tends to give it greater migratory potential. Maintained gene flow between two populations can also lead to a combination of the two gene pools, reducing the genetic variation between the two groups. It is for this reason that gene flow strongly acts against speciation, by recombining the gene pools of the groups, and thus, repairing the developing differences in genetic variation that would have led to full speciation and creation of daughter species. [57] This is the strict and narrow definition of the local process of gene flow. It doesnt take into account the non- local aspect of gene flow between distant populations, that is without migration events. The probability of non- local correlations between isolated populations is of course nonzero, from the moment it is defined. The aspect of a biological and genetic form of entanglement is very intriguing and also very important in order to establish the correct relationships between modern and extinct (if there is any) groups of people. I am not aware at the moment what methods could be used to test such a hypothesis, but there must be a lot of gene patterns (if not all of them) evolving in parallel and not in a linear way. These patterns should also include many lineages in order to explain speciation in a sense broader than simple local gene recombination. If we dont take into account such considerations, we will be always doomed with a monolithic way of thought to explain natures ubiquitous appearances.

Intelligent information

Information theory in evolution

During the last sixty years, the concept of information has acquired a strikingly prominent role in many parts of biology. This enthusiasm extends far beyond domains where the concept might seem to have an obvious application, such as the biological study of perception, cognition, and language, and now reaches into the most basic parts of biological theory. Descriptions of how genes play their causal role in metabolic processes and development are routinely given in terms of transcription, translation, and editing. The most general term used for the processes by which genes exert their effects is gene expression. Many biologists think of the developmental processes by which organisms progress from egg to adult in terms of the execution of a developmental program. Other biologists have argued for a pivotal role for information in evolution rather than development: John Maynard Smith and Eors Szathmary (for example) suggest that major transitions in evolution depend on expansions in the amount and accuracy with which information is transmitted across the generations. And some have argued that we can only understand the evolutionary role of genes by recognizing an informational domain that exists alongside the domain of matter and energy.

One common way to start organizing the problem is to make a distinction between two senses of information, or two kinds of application of informational concepts. One of these is a weak or minimal sense, and the other is stronger and more controversial. In the weaker sense, informational connections between events or variables involve no more than ordinary correlations (or perhaps correlations that are non-accidental in some physical sense involving causation or natural laws). A signal carries information about a source, in this sense, if we can predict the state of the source from the signal. This sense of information is associated with Claude Shannon (1948), who showed how the concept of information could be used to quantify facts about contingency and correlation in a useful way, initially for use in communication technology. For Shannon, anything is a source of information if it has a number of alternative states that might be realized on a particular occasion. And any other variable carries information

about the source if its state is correlated with the state of the source. This is a matter of degree; a signal carries more information about a source if its state is a better predictor of the source, less information if it is a worse predictor.

This way of thinking about contingency and correlation has turned out to be useful in many areas outside of the original applications that Shannon had in mind, and genetics is one example. This framework has turned out to be very useful also in biology. Both Godfrey-Smith (2000) and Griffiths (2001) have argued that there is one highly restricted use of a fairly rich semantic language within genetics that is justified. This is the idea that genes code for the amino acid sequence of protein molecules, in virtue of the peculiar features of the transcription and translation mechanisms found within cells. Genes specify amino acid sequence via a templating process that involves a regular mapping rule between two quite different kinds of molecules (nucleic acid bases and amino acids). This mapping rule is combinatorial, and apparently arbitrary (in a sense that is hard to make precise).

This very narrow understanding of the informational properties of genes is basically in accordance with the influential early proposal of Francis Crick (1958). The argument is that these low-level mechanistic features make gene expression into a causal process that has significant analogies to paradigmatic symbolic phenomena. Some have argued that this analogy becomes questionable once we move from the genetics of simple prokaryotic organisms (bacteria), to those in eukaryotic cells. Mainstream biology tends to regard the complications that arise in the case of eukaryotes as mere details that do not compromise the basic picture we have of how gene expression works. An example is the editing and splicing of mRNA transcripts. The initial stage in gene expression is the use of DNA in a template process to construct an intermediate molecule, mRNA or messenger RNA, that is then used as a template in the manufacture of a protein. The protein is made by stringing a number of amino acid molecules together. In organisms other than bacteria, the mRNA is often extensively modified (edited) prior to its use. This process makes eukaryotic DNA a much less straightforward predictor of the proteins amino acid sequence than it is in bacteria, but it can be argued that this does not much affect the crucial features of gene expression mechanisms that motivate the introduction of a symbolic or semantic mode of description.

So the argument in Godfrey-Smith (2000) and Griffiths (2001) is that there is one kind of informational or semantic property that genes and only genes have: coding for the amino acid sequences of protein molecules. But this relation reaches only as far as the amino acid sequence. It does not vindicate the idea that genes code for whole-organism phenotypes, let alone provide a basis for the wholesale use of informational or semantic language in biology.

Information has also become a focus of general discussion of evolutionary processes, especially as they relate to the mechanisms of inheritance. As John Maynard Smith, Eors Szathmary, and Richard Dawkins have emphasized in different ways, inheritance mechanisms that give rise to significant evolutionary outcomes must satisfy some rather special conditions. Maynard Smith and Szathmary claim, for example, that the inheritance system must be unlimited or indefinite in its capacity to produce new combinations, but must also maintain high fidelity of transmission. They argue that many of the crucial steps in the last four billion years of evolution involve the creation of new ways of transmitting information across generations- more reliable, more finegrained, and more powerful ways of making possible the reliable re-creation of form across events of biological reproduction. The transition to a DNA-based inheritance system (probably from a system based on RNA) is one central example (Maynard Smith & Szathmary 1995). The evolutionarily crucial features of inheritance mechanisms are often now discussed in informational terms, and the combinatorial structure seen in both language and DNA provides a powerful basis for analogical reasoning.

In some writers, however, the idea that evolution is an informational process can be taken too far. For example, Williams (1992) argues that, via reflection on the role of genes in evolution, we can infer that there is an informational domain that exists alongside the physical domain of matter and energy. This is an extreme version of a more common idea, that there exist such things as informational genes that should be understood as distinct from the material genes that are made of DNA and localized in space and time. We think that the reification of the informational gene is problematic; it is a mistake to suppose that there is both a physical entitya string of bases- and an informational entity, a message. We rightly ignore some properties of DNA and focus on others. But it is a mistake of reification to treat this abstraction as an extra

entity, with mysterious relations to the physical domain. The result is to obscure the ontological side of evolutionary theory, which can and should remain straightforwardly materialistic. [58]

Intelligent design in information

In a recent volume of the Vienna Series in a Theoretical Biology (2003), Gerd B. Muller and Stuart Newman argue that what they call the origination of organismal form remains an unsolved problem. In making this claim, Muller and Newman distinguish two distinct issues, namely, (a) the causes of form generation in the individual organism during embryological development and (b) the causes responsible for the production of novel organismal forms in the first place during the history of life. To distinguish the latter case (phylogeny) from the former (ontogeny), Muller and Newman use the term origination to designate the causal processes by which biological form first arose during the evolution of life. They insist that the molecular mechanisms that bring about biological form in modern day embryos should not be confused with the causes responsible for the origin (or origination) of novel biological forms during the history of life. They further argue that we know more about the causes of ontogenesis, due to advances in molecular biology, molecular genetics and developmental biology, than we do about the causes of phylogenesis- the ultimate origination of new biological forms during the remote past.

In making this claim, Muller and Newman are careful to affirm that evolutionary biology has succeeded in explaining how pre- existing forms diversify under the twin influences of natural selection and variation of genetic traits. Sophisticated mathematically- based models of population genetics have proven adequate for mapping and understanding quantitative variability and populational changes in organisms. Yet Muller and Newman insist that population genetics, and thus evolutionary biology, has not identified a specifically causal explanation for the origin of true morphological novelty during the history of life. Central to their concern is what they see as the inadequacy of the variation of genetic traits as a source of new form and structure. They note, following Darwin himself, that the sources of new form and structure must precede the action of natural selection- that selection must act on what already exists. Yet, in their view, the genocentricity and incrementalism of the neo-Darwinian mechanism has meant that an

adequate source of new form and structure has yet to be identified by theoretical biologists. Instead, Muller and Newman see the need to identify epigenetic sources of morphological innovation during the evolution of life. In the meantime, however, they insist neo-Darwinism lacks any theory of the generative.

Form, like life itself, is easy to recognize but often hard to define precisely. Yet, a reasonable working definition of form will suffice for our present purposes. Form can be defined as the four- dimensional topological relations of anatomical parts. This means that one can understand form as a unified arrangement of body parts or material components in a distinct shape or pattern (topology)- one that exists in three spatial dimensions and which arises in time during ontogeny. Insofar as any particular biological form constitutes something like a distinct arrangement of constituent body parts, form can be seen as arising from constraints that limit the possible arrangements of matter. Specifically, organismal form arises (both in phylogeny and ontogeny) as possible arrangements of material parts are constrained to establish a specific or particular arrangement with an identifiable three dimensional topography- one that we would recognize as a particular protein, cell type, organ, body plan or organism. A particular form, therefore, represents a highly specific and constrained arrangement of material components (among a much larger set of possible arrangements).

Understanding form in this way suggests a connection to the notion of information in its most theoretically general sense. When Shannon (1948) first developed a mathematical theory of information he equated the amount of information transmitted with the amount of uncertainty reduced or eliminated in a series of symbols or characters. Information, in Shannons theory, is thus imparted as some options are excluded and others are actualized. The greater the number of options excluded, the greater the amount of information conveyed. Further, constraining a set of possible material arrangements by whatever process or means involves excluding some options and actualizing others. Thus, to constrain a set of possible material states is to generate information in Shannons sense. It follows that the constraints that produce biological form also imparted information. Or conversely, one might say that producing organismal form by definition requires the generation of information. In classical Shannon information theory, the amount of information in a system is also inversely related to the probability of the arrangement

of constituents in a system or the characters along a communication channel (Shannon 1948). The more improbable (or complex) the arrangement, the more Shannon information, or information-carrying capacity, a string or system possesses.

Since the 1960s, mathematical biologists have realized that Shannons theory could be applied to the analysis of DNA and proteins to measure the information-carrying capacity of these macromolecules. Since DNA contains the assembly instructions for building proteins, the information-processing system in the cell represents a kind of communication channel (Yockey 1992). Further, DNA conveys information via specifically arranged sequences of nucleotide bases. Since each of the four bases has a roughly equal chance of occurring at each site along the spine of the DNA molecule, biologists can calculate the probability, and thus the informationcarrying capacity, of any particular sequence n- bases long. The ease with which information theory applies to molecular biology has created confusion about the type of information that DNA and proteins possess. Sequences of nucleotide bases in DNA, or amino acids in a protein, are highly improbable and thus have large information-carrying capacities. But, like meaningful sentences or lines of computer code, genes and proteins are also specified with respect to function. Just as the meaning of a sentence depends upon the specific arrangement of the letters in a sentence, so too does the function of a gene sequence depend upon the specific arrangement of the nucleotide bases in a gene. Thus, molecular biologists beginning with Crick equated information not only with complexity but also with specificity, where specificity or specified has meant necessary to function (Crick 1958; Sarkar, 1996). Molecular biologists such as Monod and Crick understood biological information- the information stored in DNA and proteins- as something more than mere complexity (or improbability). Their notion of information associated both biochemical contingency and combinatorial complexity with DNA sequences (allowing DNAs carrying capacity to be calculated), but it also affirmed that sequences of nucleotides and amino acids in functioning macromolecules possessed a high degree of specificity relative to the maintenance of cellular function.

The ease with which information theory applies to molecular biology has also created confusion about the location of information in organisms. Perhaps because the information carrying capacity of the gene could be so easily measured, it has been easy to treat DNA, RNA and

proteins as the sole repositories of biological information. Neo- Darwinists in particular have assumed that the origination of biological form could be explained by recourse to processes of genetic variation and mutation alone (Levinton 1988). Yet if one understands organismal form as resulting from constraints on the possible arrangements of matter at many levels in the biological hierarchy- from genes and proteins to cell types and tissues to organs and body plans- then clearly biological organisms exhibit many levels of information-rich structure. Thus, we can pose a question, not only about the origin of genetic information, but also about the origin of the information necessary to generate form and structure at levels higher than that present in individual proteins. We must also ask about the origin of the specified complexity, as opposed to mere complexity, that characterizes the new genes, proteins, cell types and body plans that arose in the Cambrian explosion. Dembski (2002) has used the term complex specified information (CSI) as a synonym for specified complexity to help distinguish functional biological information from mere Shannon information- that is, specified complexity from mere complexity.

Many scientists and mathematicians have questioned the ability of mutation and selection to generate information in the form of novel genes and proteins. Such skepticism often derives from consideration of the extreme improbability (and specificity) of functional genes and proteins. Recently, experiments in molecular biology have shed light on these questions. A variety of mutagenesis techniques have shown that proteins (and thus the genes that produce them) are indeed highly specified relative to biological function (Bowie & Sauer 1989; Reidhaar-Olson & Sauer 1990; Taylor et al. 2001). Mutagenesis research tests the sensitivity of proteins (and, by implication, DNA) to functional loss as a result of alterations in sequencing. Studies of proteins have long shown that amino acid residues at many active positions cannot vary without functional loss (Perutz & Lehmann 1968). More recent protein studies (often using mutagenesis experiments) have shown that functional requirements place significant constraints on sequencing even at non-active site positions (Bowie & Sauer 1989; Reidhaar-Olson & Sauer 1990; Chothia et al. 1998; Axe 2000; Taylor et al. 2001). In particular, Axe (2000) has shown that multiple as opposed to single position amino acid substitutions inevitably result in loss of protein function, even when these changes occur at sites that allow variation when altered in isolation. Cumulatively, these constraints imply that proteins are highly sensitive to functional

loss as a result of alterations in sequencing, and that functional proteins represent highly isolated and improbable arrangements of amino acids -arrangements that are far more improbable, in fact, than would be likely to arise by chance alone in the time available (Reidhaar-Olson & Sauer 1990; Behe 1992; Kauffman 1995; Dembski 1998; Axe 2000, 2004). Dawkins (1986) has noted that scientific theories can rely on only so much luck before they cease to be credible. The neutral theory of evolution, which, by its own logic, prevents natural selection from playing a role in generating genetic information until after the fact, relies on entirely too much luck. The sensitivity of proteins to functional loss, the need for long proteins to build new cell types and animals, the need for whole new systems of proteins to service new cell types, the probable brevity of the Cambrian explosion relative to mutation rates- all suggest the immense improbability (and implausibility) of any scenario for the origination of Cambrian genetic information that relies upon random variation alone unassisted by natural selection. Yet the neutral theory requires novel genes and proteins to arise- essentially- by random mutation alone. Adaptive advantage accrues after the generation of new functional genes and proteins. Thus, natural selection cannot play a role until new information- bearing molecules have independently arisen.

The problems with the neo-Darwinian mechanism run deeper still. In order to explain the origin of the Cambrian animals, one must account not only for new proteins and cell types, but also for the origin of new body plans. Within the past decade, developmental biology has dramatically advanced our understanding of how body plans are built during ontogeny. In the process, it has also uncovered a profound difficulty for neo- Darwinism. Significant morphological change in organisms requires attention to timing. Mutations in genes that are expressed late in the development of an organism will not affect the body plan. Mutations expressed early in development, however, could conceivably produce significant morphological change (Arthur 1997). Thus, events expressed early in the development of organisms have the only realistic chance of producing large- scale macroevolutionary change (Thomson 1992). As John and Miklos (1988) explain, macroevolutionary change requires alterations in the very early stages of ontogenesis.

Yet recent studies in developmental biology make clear that mutations expressed early in development typically have deleterious effects (Arthur 1997). For example, when early- acting body plan molecules, or morphogens such as bicoid (which helps to set up the anterior-posterior head-to-tail axis in Drosophila), are perturbed, development shuts down (Nusslein-Volhard & Wieschaus 1980; Lawrence & Struhl 1996; Muller & Newman 2003). The resulting embryos die. Moreover, there is a good reason for this. If an engineer modifies the length of the piston rods in an internal combustion engine without modifying the crankshaft accordingly, the engine won't start. Similarly, processes of development are tightly integrated spatially and temporally such that changes early in development will require a host of other coordinated changes in separate but functionally interrelated developmental processes downstream. For this reason, mutations will be much more likely to be deadly if they disrupt a functionally deeply-embedded structure such as a spinal column than if they affect more isolated anatomical features such as fingers (Kauffman 1995). This problem has led to what McDonald (1983) has called a great Darwinian paradox. McDonald notes that genes that are observed to vary within natural populations do not lead to major adaptive changes, while genes that could cause major changes- the very stuff of macroevolution- apparently do not vary. In other words, mutations of the kind that macroevolution doesn't need (namely, viable genetic mutations in DNA expressed late in development) do occur, but those that it does need (namely, beneficial body plan mutations expressed early in development) apparently dont occur. According to Darwin (1859) natural selection cannot act until favorable variations arise in a population. Yet there is no evidence from developmental genetics that the kind of variations required by neo- Darwinism- namely, favorable body plan mutations- ever occur.

Developmental biology has raised another formidable problem for the mutation/selection mechanism. Embryological evidence has long shown that DNA does not wholly determine morphological form (Goodwin 1985; Nijhout 1990; Sapp 1987; Muller & Newman 2003), suggesting that mutations in DNA alone cannot account for the morphological changes required to build a new body plan. DNA helps direct protein synthesis. It also helps to regulate the timing and expression of the synthesis of various proteins within cells. Yet, DNA alone does not

determine how individual proteins assemble themselves into larger systems of proteins; still less does it solely determine how cell types, tissue types, and organs arrange themselves into body plans (Harold 1995; Moss 2004). Instead, other factors- such as the three- dimensional structure and organization of the cell membrane and cytoskeleton and the spatial architecture of the fertilized egg- play important roles in determining body plan formation during embryogenesis. For example, the structure and location of the cytoskeleton influence the patterning of embryos. Arrays of microtubules help to distribute the essential proteins used during development to their correct locations in the cell. Of course, microtubules themselves are made of many protein subunits. Nevertheless, like bricks that can be used to assemble many different structures, the tubulin subunits in the cell's microtubules are identical to one another. Thus, neither the tubulin subunits nor the genes that produce them account for the different shape of microtubule arrays that distinguish different kinds of embryos and developmental pathways. Instead, the structure of the microtubule array itself is determined by the location and arrangement of its subunits, not the properties of the subunits themselves. For this reason, it is not possible to predict the structure of the cytoskeleton of the cell from the characteristics of the protein constituents that form that structure (Harold 2001).

More recently, Conway Morris (2000, 2003) has suggested another possible explanation based on the tendency for evolution to converge on the same structural forms during the history of life. Conway Morris cites numerous examples of organisms that possess very similar forms and structures, even though such structures are often built from different material substrates and arise (in ontogeny) by the expression of very different genes. Given the extreme improbability of the same structures arising by random mutation and selection in disparate phylogenies, Conway Morris argues that the pervasiveness of convergent structures suggests that evolution may be in some way channeled toward similar functional and/or structural endpoints. Such an enddirected understanding of evolution, he admits, raises the controversial prospect of a teleological or purposive element in the history of life. For this reason, he argues that the phenomenon of convergence has received less attention than it might have otherwise. Nevertheless, he argues that just as physicists have reopened the question of design in their discussions of anthropic finetuning, the ubiquity of convergent structures in the history of life has led some biologists (Denton 1998) to consider extending teleological thinking to biology. And, indeed, Conway

Morris (2000, 2003) himself intimates that the evolutionary process might be underpinned by a purpose.

Conway Morris, of course, considers this possibility in relation to a very specific aspect of the problem of organismal form, namely, the problem of explaining why the same forms arise repeatedly in so many disparate lines of decent. But this raises a question. Could a similar approach shed explanatory light on the more general causal question that has been addressed in this review? Could the notion of purposive design help provide a more adequate explanation for the origin of organismal form generally? Are there reasons to consider design as an explanation for the origin of the biological information necessary to produce the higher taxa and their corresponding morphological novelty? The remainder of this review will suggest that there are such reasons. In so doing, it may also help explain why the issue of teleology or design has reemerged within the scientific discussion of biological origins and why some scientists and philosophers of science have considered teleological explanations for the origin of form and information despite strong methodological prohibitions against design as a scientific hypothesis (Gillespie 1979; Lenior 1982).

First, the possibility of design as an explanation follows logically from a consideration of the deficiencies of neo- Darwinism and other current theories as explanations for some of the more striking appearances of design in biological systems. Neo- Darwinists such as Ayala (1994), Dawkins (1986), Mayr (1982) and Lewontin (1978) have long acknowledged that organisms appear to have been designed. Arguably, biological forms- such as the structure of a chambered nautilus, the organization of a trilobite, the functional integration of parts in an eye or molecular machine- attract our attention in part because the organized complexity of such systems seems reminiscent of our own designs. Yet, this review has argued that neo-Darwinism does not adequately account for the origin of all appearances of design, especially if one considers animal body plans, and the information necessary to construct them, as especially striking examples of the appearance of design in living systems. Indeed, Dawkins (1995) and Gates (1996) have noted that genetic information bears an uncanny resemblance to computer software or machine code. For this reason, the presence of CSI in living organisms, and the discontinuous increases of CSI that occurred during events such as the Cambrian explosion, appears at least suggestive of

design. Does neo-Darwinism or any other purely materialistic model of morphogenesis account for the origin of the genetic and other forms of CSI necessary to produce novel organismal form? If not, as this review has argued, could the emergence of novel information-rich genes, proteins, cell types and body plans have resulted from actual design, rather than a purposeless process that merely mimics the powers of a designing intelligence?

A second reason for considering design as an explanation for these phenomena follows from the importance of explanatory power to scientific theory evaluation and from a consideration of the potential explanatory power of the design hypothesis. Intelligent human agents- in virtue of their rationality and consciousness- have demonstrated the power to produce information in the form of linear sequence-specific arrangements of characters. Indeed, experience affirms that information of this type routinely arises from the activity of intelligent agents. A computer user who traces the information on a screen back to its source invariably comes to a mind- that of a software engineer or programmer. The information in a book or inscriptions ultimately derives from a writer or scribe- from a mental, rather than a strictly material, cause. Our experiencebased knowledge of information-flow confirms that systems with large amounts of specified complexity (especially codes and languages) invariably originate from an intelligent source from a mind or personal agent. As Quastler (1964) put it, the creation of new information is habitually associated with conscious activity. Conscious and rational agents have, as part of their powers of purposive intelligence, the capacity to design information-rich parts and to organize those parts into functional information-rich systems and hierarchies. Further, we know of no other causal entity or process that has this capacity.

There is a third reason to consider purpose or design as an explanation for the origin of biological form and information: purposive agents have just those necessary powers that natural selection lacks as a condition of its causal adequacy. Natural selection can favor new proteins, and genes, but only after they perform some function. The job of generating new functional genes, proteins and systems of proteins therefore falls entirely to random mutations. Yet without functional criteria to guide a search through the space of possible sequences, random variation is probabilistically doomed. What is needed is not just a source of variation (i.e., the freedom to search a space of possibilities) or a mode of selection that can operate after the fact of a

successful search, but instead a means of selection that (a) operates during a search- before success--and that (b) is guided by information about, or knowledge of, a functional target.

Demonstration of this requirement has come from an unlikely quarter: genetic algorithms. Genetic algorithms are programs that allegedly simulate the creative power of mutation and selection. Dawkins and Kuppers, for example, have developed computer programs that putatively simulate the production of genetic information by mutation and natural selection (Dawkins 1986, Kuppers 1987). Nevertheless, as shown elsewhere (Meyer 1998, 2003), these programs only succeed by the illicit expedient of providing the computer with a target sequence and then treating relatively greater proximity to future function (i.e., the target sequence), not actual present function, as a selection criterion. As Berlinski (2000) has argued, genetic algorithms need something akin to a forward looking memory in order to succeed. Yet such foresighted selection has no analogue in nature. In biology, where differential survival depends upon maintaining function, selection cannot occur before new functional sequences arise. Natural selection lacks foresight.

What natural selection lacks, intelligent selection- purposive or goal-directed design- provides. Rational agents can arrange both matter and symbols with distant goals in mind. In using language, the human mind routinely finds or generates highly improbable linguistic sequences to convey an intended or preconceived idea. In the process of thought, functional objectives precede and constrain the selection of words, sounds and symbols to generate functional (and indeed meaningful) sequences from among a vast ensemble of meaningless alternative combinations of sound or symbol (Denton 1986). Similarly, the construction of complex technological objects and products, such as bridges, circuit boards, engines and software, result from the application of goal- directed constraints (Polanyi 1967, 1968). Indeed, in all functionally integrated complex systems where the cause is known by experience or observation, design engineers or other intelligent agents applied boundary constraints to limit possibilities in order to produce improbable forms, sequences or structures. Rational agents have repeatedly demonstrated the capacity to constrain the possible to actualize improbable but initially unrealized future functions. Repeated experience affirms that intelligent agents (minds) uniquely possess such causal powers.

Analysis of the problem of the origin of biological information, therefore, exposes a deficiency in the causal powers of natural selection that corresponds precisely to powers that agents are uniquely known to possess. Intelligent agents have foresight. Such agents can select functional goals before they exist. They can devise or select material means to accomplish those ends from among an array of possibilities and then actualize those goals in accord with a preconceived design plan or set of functional requirements. Rational agents can constrain combinatorial space with distant outcomes in mind. The causal powers that natural selection lacks almost by definition are associated with the attributes of consciousness and rationality with purposive intelligence. Thus, by invoking design to explain the origin of new biological information, contemporary design theorists are not positing an arbitrary explanatory element unmotivated by a consideration of the evidence. Instead, they are positing an entity possessing precisely the attributes and causal powers that the phenomenon in question requires as a condition of its production and explanation. [59]

Information and intelligent life

Information according to Shannon is related to entropy. The entropy of a message is the number of different ways we can organize the information contained. The less the information contained in a message, the higher its entropy. But this doesnt mean a level of irreducible complexity in information. Entropy may be zero or tend to zero in a message of high degree of hierarchy (a letter for example), but the message itself could be re- organized to complete randomness.

It has been suggested that in order to identify a life form on another planet it would be sufficient to measure negative entropy, as a basic characteristic of life. Life tends to re- organize things in such a way as to reduce randomness towards a level of higher order. Still, there exists a misconception, because entropy always increases, even if a local decrease of entropy occurs. So entropy can measure complexity of life forms, while this complexity may not necessarily lead to higher forms of organization.

The carrier of information, in this case a message, is like an electron in an E/M field. It doesnt really reveal the properties of the source, nor information about the whole environment. A message is a unit, or bit of information, in the same sense that an electron or a photon comprises a quantum of the corresponding field. However, the source can be any kind of accelerated charge, while an electron has charge itself, while the field has its own properties, such as intensity, etc. In other words, information comprises a broader message than the message which is carried by.

I have already noted before that local expression of information, gene expression or a mutation for example, is not enough to explain radical changes in an organisms subsequent form. We need something more than this: a non- local, or holistic, pattern to unravel itself at the level of the whole organism- including in reality the environment, other interacting organisms, as well as the observer/experimenter. So we have a totality of messages concerning an information process at a higher- dimensional level. The dimensions are just the parameters that we must take into account. So an information process is not only the message but also includes the source, forces, consciousness of the observer, the environment in general. Now lets say something more about randomness. According to the laws of probability, randomness doesnt necessarily mean chance. Nevertheless it doesnt mean something like meaningful coincidence. In fact statistics arent even interested in the causes, or forces, that bring about a statistical assembly against another one. When randomness evolves, it is just a matter of time for the distribution to collapse, or crystallize. There is a common misunderstanding that random processes are chanceful. However randomness is neither indifferent nor deliberate. Nature is full of spontaneous mechanisms that give birth to biological phenomena and set the paths for these biological entities to follow, so that even if we attribute a primal cause to these mechanisms, then the primal cause will be the mechanism itself.

Without randomness there is no space or time for diversification. What should be understood is that true intelligence uses randomness to diversify itself and become even more intelligent, while a monolithic and absolutely determinist behavior of physical systems would make them converge

into a unitary nothingness. Some people may think this way about nature but, thankfully, nature doesnt work this way. Nature, for example, accepts both evolutionists and creationists, as two out of an infinite number of possible configurations of random information.

Another difference between a totally random system and a highly organized one, apart from its entropy, is the degree of correlations between its separate parts. The stronger the correlations, the more determinist the system is, and vice versa. Logical systems are in fact the most complex, the most evolved ones. Still, in the process of logical inference, or of constructing an algorithm, there is a compromise we have to make. This refers to the axioms of a system, truths that cannot be proved by the premises of the same system (see Gdels incompleteness theorem for reference). It may seem paradoxical but it is a necessary condition. For example, in physics we accept a singularity that predated the Big Bang. What is more, this singularity cannot be explained by the physical laws. In biology, it has been proposed the Cambrian Explosion, a Big Bang in the field of biology, to explain the sudden appearance of species. So before we go on with any kind of theory to explain intelligence and life, we should first make sure that the initial conditions are already and definitely set.

Abiogenesis, for example, is a proposed mechanism that set the proper conditions for life to appear- a bombardment of inorganic life with high frequency radiation and with the possible mediation of some catalysts. This would seem like the creation of spontaneous biochemical loops, within the cosmic soup, that triggered the first sparkles of life. However, as we have already suggested, the passage from inorganic to organic life cannot meet any sort of initial conditions, because, at least, we are talking about two different systems. It is as if imagining a road that leads from life to death, and then perhaps back in life. Why should we expect inorganic life to precede organic life? At an evolutionary level this is correct, because carbon atoms were made after the first stars had died and exploded to space. But from an information point of view, the difference between hydrogen and carbon atoms is just the number of electrons (together with the corresponding protons). In other words, the probability of a carbon atom distribution existed at the same time with the distribution of a hydrogen atom. So, information had already existed at a fundamental level, before it began to evolve.

We said that the passage from randomness to determinism has to do with the degree of correlation between the separate parts of a system. This scale of causal relationships between parts of a system or between separate systems also expresses the degree of order, a hierarchical level of abstraction within information. So how may we define intelligence in this context? What is the difference between, lets say, empty and full of meaning information? Presumably, it is a question of organization, or hierarchy. The more organized a message is, the more intelligent it must be. We should not confuse life with intelligence. Not all living beings are clever, as well as not all inanimate things are stupid. But at a fundamental level, life and intelligence converge to the same notion of mobility. Life moves on, while information propagates. So it is mainly a question of identification.

This is where information meets its own self. If genes can duplicate themselves, then we may identify a more fundamental process of information duplication. This is directly analogous to the notion of speciation. Great changes in the evolution of intelligent life involve the totality of the system and not parts of it. They involve processes that spread throughout the system and help the system to move at a higher level of order. This is the way consciousness arises, not as an alien life form outside natural space but as a ubiquitous process of information within the system. This also explains the participators paradox: We, observers, are entangled with the world we live in, not because of some strange sort of power, but because we are all part of the same information process.

The anthropic principle

Some proponents of creation theory argue that if evolution theory was correct, then how come humans is the only species to have evolved? The answer to this question according to evolution is that all species evolve but it takes time for new traits to appear. Furthermore, once humans reached a threshold, or an evolutionary singularity as we might call it, the evolution process was accelerated. Finally, we may also keep in mind that once a species establishes itself on the top of the animal kingdom, it deprives all other species from the opportunity to take its place. However, there may be a less sophisticated, simpler and more straightforward explanation: We

humans are the only species to have evolved, because we are the only species which considers the question.

The anthropic principle was introduced by Brandon Carter (1973) in reaction to the Copernican principle, which states that humans do not occupy a privileged position in the Universe. As Carter said, Although our situation is not necessarily central, it is inevitably privileged to some extent. Specifically, Carter disagreed with using the Copernican principle to justify the Perfect Cosmological Principle, which states that all large regions and times in the universe must be statistically identical. Carter defined two forms of the anthropic principle, a weak one which referred only to anthropic selection of privileged spacetime locations in the universe, and a more controversial strong form which addressed the values of the fundamental constants of physics. In their 1986 book, The anthropic cosmological principle, John Barrow and Frank Tipler depart from Carter and define the WAP and SAP as follows: Weak anthropic principle (WAP) (Barrow and Tipler): The observed values of all physical and cosmological quantities are not equally probable but they take on values restricted by the requirement that there exist sites where carbon-based life can evolve and by the requirements that the Universe be old enough for it to have already done so. Strong anthropic principle (SAP) (Barrow and Tipler): The Universe must have those properties which allow life to develop within it at some stage in its history.

The philosophers John Leslie and Nick Bostrom reject the Barrow and Tipler SAP as a fundamental misreading of Carter. For Bostrom, Carters anthropic principle just warns us to make allowance for anthropic bias, that is, the bias created by anthropic selection effects (which Bostrom calls observation selection effects)- the necessity for observers to exist in order to get a result. He writes: Many anthropic principles are simply confused. Some, especially those drawing inspiration from Brandon Carters seminal papers, are sound, but... they are too weak to do any real scientific work. In particular, I argue that existing methodology does not permit any observational consequences to be derived from contemporary cosmological theories, though these theories quite plainly can be and are being tested empirically by astronomers. What is

needed to bridge this methodological gap is a more adequate formulation of how observation selection effects are to be taken into account. [60]

What Bostrom wants us to consider is the fact that, in the context of the anthropic principle, we are those who observe and measure the universe, so that the results we take are just answers to specific questions that we imposed on nature. In other words, we always get what we asked for. At the level of physics, this could mean, for example, that the constants of nature, which we use to prove the existence of the anthropic principle, or of intelligent design in nature, are just values that we assume to be constant as forms of simple analogy. Newtons gravitational constant G, for example, shows that the gravitational force is analogous to mass, which in turn is a constant of analogy with respect to all forces compared with acceleration. In more simple words, the constants of nature, which have been regarded as proof of intelligent design, are products of the way we calculate physical relationships. Under different interpretations, the constants of nature could easily become variables. The previous assumption fits into what is called fine- tuned universe. The fine- tuned universe is the proposition that the conditions that allow life in the universe can only occur when certain universal fundamental physical constants lie within a very narrow range, so that if any of several fundamental constants were only slightly different, the universe would be unlikely to be conducive to the establishment and development of matter, astronomical structures, elemental diversity, or life as it is presently understood. The proposition is also discussed among philosophers, theologians, creationists and intelligent design proponents. Physicist Paul Davies has asserted that There is now broad agreement among physicists and cosmologists that the Universe is in several respects fine-tuned for life. However, he continues, the conclusion is not so much that the universe is fine-tuned for life; rather it is fine- tuned for the building blocks and environments that life requires. Among scientists who find the evidence persuasive, a variety of natural explanations have been proposed, such as the anthropic principle along with multiple universes.

Intelligent design proponents have also occasionally appealed to broader teleological arguments outside of biology, most notably an argument based on the fine- tuning of universal constants

that make matter and life possible and which are argued not to be solely attributable to chance. These include the values of fundamental physical constants, the relative strength of nuclear forces, electromagnetism, and gravity between fundamental particles, as well as the ratios of masses of such particles. Intelligent design proponent Guillermo Gonzalez argues that if any of these values were even slightly different, the universe would be dramatically different, making it impossible for many chemical elements and features of the universe, such as galaxies, to form. Thus, proponents argue, an intelligent designer of life was needed to ensure that the requisite features were present to achieve that particular outcome.

Scientists have generally responded that these arguments are poorly supported by existing evidence. Victor J. Stenger and other critics say both intelligent design and the weak form of the anthropic principle are essentially a tautology; in his view, these arguments amount to the claim that life is able to exist because the universe is able to support life. The claim of the improbability of a life-supporting universe has also been criticized as an argument by lack of imagination for assuming no other forms of life are possible. Life as we know it might not exist if things were different, but a different sort of life might exist in its place. A number of critics also suggest that many of the stated variables appear to be interconnected and that calculations made by mathematicians and physicists suggest that the emergence of a universe similar to ours is quite probable. [61]

What we should keep in mind is the fact that the anthropic principle is basically a tautology: If the universe hadnt been able to support life, we wouldnt be here to discuss about it. But this is not proof of the opposite. Furthermore, if we suppose that other universes may exist, not all of them may support life in any form. But again this is a hypothesis, included in the multiverse theory, which aims to support, not to reject, the anthropic principle. A multitude of parallel universes is used just to make our own universe capable to support life.

However, as we have previously discussed, life- and more specifically intelligent life- is neither an attribute of a divine entity living outside the universe, nor a fact imposed on the universe by our own presence. Intelligent life is inherent in the physical processes as a fundamental form of information. Information is capable to propagate, to be stored, and to recombine, in order to

produce all sorts of living forms. How information came into existence in the first place, is an eternally unanswered question. But again this paradox of the initial condition, necessary for everything else to begin to evolve, is a logical paradox, not a physical one. There is a term in physics called spontaneous symmetry breaking. It has to do with the spontaneous appearance of microscopic entities out of the vacuum. So there seem to exist basic symmetry patterns which collapse to give birth to highly asymmetrical, lets say polarized towards existence, entities which then form the properties and building blocks of matter. This entities or patterns obey simple rules of self- organization and of distribution through space. Still, when we pass to the level of life and of intelligent beings, the whole process seems like a miracle. But the point is that if we consider intelligent life as a miracle in itself, we will never have the opportunity to familiarize ourselves with this miracle. On the contrary, the more we try to understand it, the more miraculous our own understanding of the world will become. So, it is not just a matter of anthropic coincidence or divine intervention; it has more to do with the ultimate realization of our fundamental connection to the world.

Tangled hierarchy evolution

In a formal text, tangled hierarchy is found in a system which contains a strange loop. A strange loop is a term coined by Douglas Hofstadter to illustrate a process during which someone moves in successive steps or levels of hierarchy (upwards or downwards), only to find himself back at the point where he started. This process is defined with logic itself and what is called a self-referring argument- a fact that is proved by its own existence. Still, the impossibility of an argument is not an argument against impossibility. On the contrary, it brings an impossible thing into existence. Even if common or formal logic regards some things or objects as impossible, we still know by common experience that these things should really exist.

Strange loops are spontaneous objects or processes, not obeying the fundamental rules of causality. They dont have to do with events that can be aligned with a cause- and- effect chain of events. Each point on a strange loop can be both an end and a beginning. In other words, a

strange loop is an infinite causal loop. Even better, it is an infinite non- local loop, because of its property of spontaneity.

Spontaneous phenomena in nature are rather common, although we usually attribute causal properties to them. For example, in the field of biology parthenogenesis is a phenomenon of spontaneity. In physics, spontaneity rules at the microscopic level, where particles seem to pop up out of nowhere as virtual pairs. What is strange is that these loops of virtual pairs, through processes of what is called spontaneous symmetry breaking, divide into a real part, which comes into existence, and another part which sinks back into the vacuum.

Furthermore, these spontaneous loops exhibit the property of simultaneity. Entangled pairs of particles, for example, in quantum mechanics, seem to transfer their properties one to the other instantaneously, regardless of the distance separating them. This is a well attested fact that is constantly repeated under experimental conditions. It seems as if the loop itself, the so- called wavefunction of the system of entangled particles (or of any particle or system indeed) collapses simultaneously everywhere, while the information about any sort of causal interaction is mediated afterwards. The term tangled hierarchy originally goes with consciousness. Consciousness seems, if not to produce the tangled system, to make it collapse, so that the experimenter or observer plays a fundamental and intrinsic role in the whole process. The observer is really a part of the system. This realization is what makes consciousness and intelligence in general an indispensable factor of natural processes, but also a formative cause as it is able to determine the fate of a system by making it express and realize itself at a chosen time (and not by chance). If we now get rid of the illusions that an infinite loop produces- thinking, for example, that we ascend or descend while we just move along a circular path- we are left with the aspect of simultaneity itself. What is necessary at this point to keep in mind is that a set of things or events that originally take place, lets say, at the same time and at different places, may be interpreted as happening retrospectively separate in space and time. This is because the original situation or phenomenon is triggered in the form of conditions that will only be met or discarded at a later

stage as real things or events. At the initial stage the whole wavefunction which describes any kind of system is fluctuating, or exists in a state of superposition, as it is called. At the moment of realization, when the wavefunction collapses, the set of events is found distributed in space and time. It is then that the world of cause and effect becomes real.

So tangled hierarchy is a state or condition which expresses itself in the real world as a set of events temporally and spatially equivalent at a fundamental level, but hierarchically set according to a space-time order at the second stage of conscious realization and causal attribution of characteristics. This ordering not only comes retrospectively but it is also highly subjective as it is based not only on physical notions, such as the meaning of space and time, but also on social or personal views related to class, status, interests, discrimination, preoccupations, and so on. Lets take for example the first appearance of a human being. According to the scientific interpretation of the fossil record, this event happened 2Mya in Africa. But according to the religious interpretation of the Bible this may have happened just 10kya in Eden. What I would like to note here is how different a causal interpretation of the same conditional hypothesis may be. Because if I asked when was the first time that the condition of a human being was set in the natural record of the universe, nobody would be ready to answer. The process of evolution is in a sense self- evident. Humans or dinosaurs didnt exist before our planet was formed, or at the beginning of the universe. All creatures evolved from primitive forms, which in turn came into existence from the first organic molecules. This story keeps on going back to inorganic matter, to atoms, to the fundamental particles. It goes further back into the vacuum and its fluctuations. I wont ask here who created the vacuum or the universe in the first place, if God created the universe or if God was created by the universe or the vacuum, because this is a question that nobody can answer. This is exactly the point- truths are not to be proved. But whatever happened at the beginning when the infinite loop of all probabilities came into existence, time started to run and with it space started to expand. Energy cooled down, matter formed, the laws of nature were established, and matter according to these laws started to get organized into more and more complex forms.

But are the laws underlying natural process enough to explain the outcome of intelligent life forms? According to the anthropic principle, the answer is positive. What is more intriguing is the fact that this principle is not against religion: they both offer a pre- determined cause, which in fact relies on intelligent design in order to explain the appearance of intelligent life. It seems that, if we try to put them both on a rational scale, science begins with a doctrine which relies on faith, and faith follows to explain the world on a rational basis. Statistics are good but it doesnt reach the level of a formative cause. On the other hand, faith is useful but only at the edges of logic. In a few words, spontaneous generation or creation, which encompasses some properties of causative formation or a formative cause, revealing the basic structure of an intelligent pattern in nature, based on primitive or primordial patterns of symmetry (breaking and reassembling), is all we have got.

By intelligent design it should be consistently meant information having the essential properties of self- sustainability, of transfer, even of transformation. This information, equivalently energy or mass, was expressed at the biological level of the first DNA molecules, in other words biological, self- replicating information, which organized itself into more and more complex forms, what we now call plants, humans and animals. The rules of organization are rather simple: test and either accept or reject. This is called natural selection. But the randomness of biological processes, even if they have to do with transformation or adaptation, mutations as they are called, is not the same with the formative patterns themselves. This is why mutations do not comprise speciation. In order to have a new species and not just a mutant species, we need the formative conditions that take place very early in, even before, the evolution of causative formation. For example, a group of mutant dogs may evolve into a new species- if they somehow break a probable prohibitive barrier of sterility- but it will still be a new species of dogs (not a new animal). In order to have speciation we certainly need more specification. Recombination of genes is a sufficient condition but what is necessary is the recombination of information at a more fundamental level, including, in a non- local and holistic way, the totality of the genome. The non- local processes that take place in the underworld of the microcosm or the world of the unconscious, are related, as we have already mentioned, to simultaneity in nature. Speciation is

subject to certain conditions, expressed spontaneously and instantaneously throughout the body of an emerging organism or life- form. These conditions correspond to archaic traits of organisms, which under the process of evolution will not be met again. For example, snakes may grow a new tail, but humans may not grow a new limb. Insects exhibit properties of spontaneous generation (parthenogenesis) but more complex animals dont. We shouldnt expect speciation after a certain degree of complexity. This is why the notion of irreducible complexity is unavoidable. We cannot identify a common ancestor of all life not even at the level of protists: bacteria, archaea and eycariotes, thus the aforementioned three- domain system. In this case, theistic irreducible complexity meets at a fundamental level a scientific holly- trinity of basal organisms from which all others evolved. This aspect has its deepest roots in spontaneity in nature. Spontaneity is in fact an irreducible process. As with the fundamental trinity either of Christianity or of the modern biological model, an analogous fundamental or irreducible model is found in particle physics. There are 6 fundamental building particles of matter (fermions) and 6 fundamental carriers of forces (bosons). None of them may be produced by another. Consequently, irreducible complexity is not just a religious rhetoric against modern biology; it is more like a cornerstone of logical inference.

So here comes the notion of what I baptized tangled hierarchy evolution. It is not a linear process of life- forms, living separately from each other and locally interacting in space and time. In fact, they are entangled with each other, forming a complex network of life. This is not just a matter of speaking. Even if time or space scales in some cases are large, sooner or later genetic isolation is lifted. If the first life- forms were isolated, bacteria would have never emerged to form the first complex eukaryotic cells. We live within a complex and interconnecting network of thing, beings, energy and information. And what is more remarkable is the possibility that at a fundamental level of causative formation and reality even the same barriers that we recognize to keep us apart from everything else break down. What we are left with is conditions waiting to be expressed at the natural level of speciation. This is the way the world began to exist, and this is where we end each time we make the journey to the origins of life, nature, and the universe

itself. Conditions are not necessarily pre- established life- forms, but they express and explain the properties of causative formation.

This is why evolution is hierarchical. It obeys physical laws, in space- time, guided towards one direction. We all get older, not younger. But what stays immortal is the process of life formation itself. It changes, it creates new species, even destroys others. But this cosmogonic events of new life formation, or speciation, do not occur every day. They happen at critical times and when conditions are met. In physics, these instances are called singularities and they are accompanied by the highest values of energy density. I guess the aforementioned Cambrian Explosion met the requirements. There were the archaic protozoans able to transform into fundamentally new forms of life. This is why I find it hard to believe that speciation can occur nowadays, at least under natural conditions. So evolution should be considered as a, thermodynamically defined, one-way road. As far as entropy is concerned, it is certainly a measure of complexity, probably the best one. Entropy grows with anarchy and reduces with organization. It may also count the amount of information of a given system. Complexity can be counted in units of entropy, certainly. But we should keep in mind that even if intelligent life reduces entropy by self- organization, the total entropy of the universe always increases. So, mainly, irreducibility and irreversibility are two different things. Either going backwards or forward, entropy will increase. But as far as hierarchy in natural processes is concerned, it is something that has both to do with complexity and time. Complexity refers to certain structures necessary in order to identify a life- form, while time may refer to the arrangement of these structures in space, as well as to certain evolutionary stages that define the process and progress of speciation. Let me not forget to mention here the importance of discontinuity, or quantum nature of the whole process. I guess we would all agree that evolution is by no means a continuous process. No matter how many pieces we gather, there will always be gaps in between. I dont what value the minimum fossil gap could take in biology, but, in any case, these gaps may be so small, that they may give the impression of continuity. This is not what goes on in reality. We may never witness a rosebud flowering, even if we take a million photos during the intermediate stages. In the same sense we may never imagine an Australopithecus transform into a human being, not

because of any lack of fossils or imagination, but because the process itself is discontinuous. From one fossil generation to another an evolutionary acceleration event may have taken place, so that any causal relation between them could break down. Still, both generations should be considered to belong to the same species. The next quantum step of the humanization of Australopithecus is more difficult to grasp. But in any case there must be a primitive, ape- like ancestor of ours. So what fills the gaps is our mind which connects the dots and builds a continuous and coherent story.

Finally, we should mention the notion of the evolution of consciousness. Or could we equivalently say consciousness of evolution? The fact that evolution may be regarded as a probabilistic process doesnt exclude the factor of choice, or natural selection as we call it. But how much this natural choice was a conscious event, or reciprocally an event of consciousness? Information is not lost. It is stored, as far as we are now concerned, in genes. But this kind of information is not passive. It dictates how the genes should behave and how should they be expressed. Genes are not only the natural storage places of information, they are manifestations of information at a biological level. As we have seen, information is by nature intelligent, because it contains all the properties that are necessary for its preservation, transmittance, and transformation. So consciousness falls into the realm of intelligent information, as an evolved form of it. But before the human brain or mind evolved, consciousness, in the form of a generalized and diffused system of information, was running through all levels of life- forms and existence. This web of intermingled, or superposed states of information may well define consciousness either at the initial or at the final evolutionary stages. Consciousness, like information, recognizes and even attributes time, while it is timeless itself. This timeless aspect of consciousness puts it back at the early stages of the universal expansion, even before. Consciousness exhibits the same properties of spontaneity as the primordial events that made the universe explode in the first place. This is why we may say that consciousness is intrinsic to nature, in the same sense that information is indispensable for the organization of matter. So while evolution leads to new forms of information and life, consciousness is the realization of the process itself.

We may now gather the main aspects of the notion of tangled hierarchy evolution that we put forward:

Evolution runs in discrete steps instead of being a continuous process. The gaps between evolutionary periods are overpassed by acceleration (or deceleration) events. The boundaries between different species although being characteristic are not to be considered fixed. Quantum information processes run all the way down the spinal cord of evolution establishing non- local correlations between life forms, which exhibit non distinguishable characteristics at the beginning.

Evolutionary processes are hierarchical in space and time, subject to natural selection, and move irreversibly from simpler to more complex forms. However, at an initial stage the first life- forms were produced spontaneously and instantaneously at many different places.

There is a lower limit of reduction below which life as a biological entity becomes undefinable. The first groups of multi- cellular organisms cannot be reduced into more fundamental forms without losing their identity as distinct species.

Speciation takes place during extra- ordinary evolutionary events, when certain conditions are met, concerning natural fitness against violent natural phenomena, and with the presupposition that all organisms are at this stage primitive enough to be speciated.

Intelligence is intrinsic to life in the same sense that information was able to express itself to all extant forms of animate and living matter. Consciousness represents collectively the web of all kinds of information permeating the universe. In other words consciousness is what evolves.

The archetype of man

European

North African

Asian South African

Different representations of H. (erectus-) heidelbergensis

This is a rather intriguing aspect. Was there the form of man at the beginning somewhere within the collective unconscious of all species that would ever exist? Some would say yes, others would say no; Plato would say well, lets talk about it. An archetype in fact is different from a stereotype. Archetypes are preexisting forms, while stereotypes become what they are. So this is not a question of psychology or biology, but a question of philosophy and, perhaps, faith. I still tend to believe that there must be an initial condition. Lets say a singularity back in space and time. Lets not name it God, black hole, infinite loop, or whatever. But as we all know in order for a system to work we need a fundamental assumption about the system.

This system may be a system of logic or a system of faith but the perquisite stays the same. For example, if we consider information (as an imprint for all matter and energy that exist out there) as a system that evolved randomly, we will never be able to simulate a single event of ontogenesis. If someone tells me that he has managed to do so, I will ask him to think if he used a null hypothesis or if he used at least one assumption. Even the notion of what consists a system is an assumption. This perquisite as a fundamental quantity of everything is what leads us to the description or definition of an archetype. But despite its monogenetic approach, an archetype is not a monogenetic entity. We cannot have an archetype of God to create everything. So we need at least another one, the archetype of Creation, and so on. Archetypes are fundamentally equivalent entities, as well as primordial. We need a bunch of them to begin with. May we define or identify the basic group of them, lets say respectively to the first protozoans that appeared on the face of our planet? May be yes, but lets try to go deeper here. The first living organisms were not even animals, they couldnt walk, so they should have looked like symmetry patterns. Triangular or round forms, wormlike elongations or sacks. From these basic living shapes all later life forms should have evolved. Eyes and noses, legs and arms, heads and tails, are adaptations to these primordial forms.

Symmetry plays a crucial role in this investigation. Were there some basic geometric patterns that life was based on to begin? Well, forms of life are more or less symmetrical. We have two hands, two legs, two eyes, and so on. All animals, at least most of them, exhibit quadrupedal patterns of symmetry. Even trees have similar geometrical properties. Weve talked before about spontaneity and symmetry breaking in nature, so that information may be based on some pattern of symmetry. The yes and no modes of operation of our basic system of logic is another twofold pattern of symmetry. Even our DNA has two symmetrical spirals. So to suppose that there is a fundamental aspect of symmetry lying behind all physical processes, is not an opinion without support.

These basic patterns of symmetry may have expressed themselves at the level of organic life through the physical laws, which also have a high level of symmetry. Gaussian distributions, for example, are very symmetrical functions which express the states of physical systems. These symmetrical patterns may be identified with archetypes. Archetypes in turn could be involved with morphogenesis. There has also been suggested the theory of morphogenetic fields, further evolved by Rupert Sheldrake (see his site for reference), that is archetypal patterns of information guiding morphogenesis. However, these patterns shouldnt be regarded as extraterrestrial but as material processes that help matter to self- organize.

Whatever the morphogenetic procedure may be and if it really exists, self- replicating patterns of information are ubiquitous in nature. They can be found from the leaves of trees to the formation of snow flakes, and from DNA replication to the shape of coast lines. If we consider amoebas, we can imagine how they split and rejoin to form new ones. Could we assume such a process of recombination at the level of archetypes? Well, the fundamental bits of information are considered formless. We may not attribute different shapes to different quanta, as they are all regarded equal. But are they? Could they be equal but representing different images? Yes they could. So they are not really equal, instead they are equivalent. In fact, fundamental particles in modern physics represent probabilities of a field, or of a potential, going to be expressed. So they are potentialities. Potentials normally vary with distance, ceteris paribus, so that the same particles form different orbits on a photographic plate. So they do draw different pictures, forming a complex scenery of interactions. It is their position in this landscape which gives them different roles in the whole process. So, though the same, each of them becomes unique according to the context. And even if we might say that this process is random, it is subject to the physical laws. In other words, they obey the formative causes which correspond to their own properties. Causative formation- while there isnt any acausative one- is necessary so that we can explain and describe the basic processes that bring shape into life (or life into shapes). What is difficult to understand is not how life takes shape, since there are underlying processes of symmetry; but how life-forms broke the barrier of nothingness in the first place. I have already given a hint about the meaning of spontaneity in nature, either this spontaneity is attributed to God or to

itself- in both cases it is a self- referring argument. This is why we always need a primary assumption so that the whole process begins. This assumption finds us with the first spontaneously and in infinitely many places prototypes of life.

There is another thing we could point out here. As primordial forms engage with their environment, there is another sort of symmetry taking place. Some of you may have already heard about meaningful coincidences as defined by Carl Jung (see his book about synchronicity). This is a kind of non- local connection, which this time takes place not just between physical, material systems, but between physical and physic states. Whatever a psychic state may be, an observer is not just a material object. He has emotions and thoughts, which are different from simple properties (or states) of matter. Animals too exhibit such an animate behavior. So living systems should be treated as something more than mechanical systems with nothing more than position and momentum.

Whatever their name, fundamental symmetrical patterns in nature exist from the first moment of mater creation out of the vacuum, to the most advanced and complex forms. Most probably all complex organisms consist of simpler patterns, but if these patterns do exist then they represent the lowest levels of irreducible complexity. Furthermore, as far as the notion of intelligent design is concerned, here we have the case of symmetrical design, or just design if we consider that all designs are based on basic forms of symmetry. So from the beginning, intelligent information, through processes of random reorganization of simple patterns of symmetry, led itself towards the stage of living organisms and of high complexity life forms. I am not really sure if an organism has to be complex to be advanced or successful. Sharks for example are very primitive life forms which have survived for over 400My or so. Just think about it: How humans will look like after 400My if of course they will still exist? Our civilization and technology will be then more or less unrecognizable, and our mind power could be totally incomprehensible compared to

our contemporary minds. Of course, we could have instead devolved into apes or into even more primitive creatures, deep down the evolutionary tree, perhaps substituted by another species. However the point is that the basic symmetry patterns according to which both we and all other species have evolved will stay the same, even if at that supposed evolutionary future the most preferred form may not be the archetype of man.

Conclusions
Throughout this conversation we made a journey in time from the appearance of the first humanoids to the present. As we have seen, evolution is not a linear process, not even a straightforward one, as it is characterized by gaps in the fossil record, as well as by ambiguous interpretations of the record. However, this irregularity of the evolutionary process does not disprove evolution; rather it suggests that some aspects should be reconsidered, as well as that some fundamental assumptions should be changed. Those considerations include the notions of speciation (the improbability of having new species through mutations and genetic variation at an advanced stage of evolution); the last common ancestor (the misunderstanding that humans and apes for example evolved from one and the same species); the degree of causal relation between phenotypes and genotypes (the absolute point of view that all physical appearances may be explained by adaptation and natural selection); the appearance of complex life by completely random processes (ignoring the necessity of non- local processes of morphogenesis at the level of the whole organism); and so on. We have realized that the meaning of intelligent information is a prerequisite in order both to describe and to explain the appearance of intelligent life at a certain stage of life in the universe. We have also discussed, according to this context, the notion and meaning of observation bias and of the anthropic principle. We have finally concluded that life and intelligence correspond to inherent properties of matter, spontaneously generated through symmetrical (in fact breaking the symmetry) processes. Information is by nature intelligent, so that consciousness comes as the physical outcome at the level of processing and understanding information. Consequently, words such as God, Creation, the Universe, the Big Bang, or the Cambrian explosion are all equivalent, expressing the same fundamental, though

through different schools of thought and belief, properties of what we are accustomed to call miracle of life, as we all know it. Here, I would like to make a synopsis of the conclusions that weve come to:

Humans did not evolve from apes, since (according to the fossil record) extant great apes

most likely evolved after the first humans. However, at some evolutionary stage the primitive human species would look much like the other species of apes, so that the former would be practically indistinguishable from the latter. Evolution is not necessarily a constant or continuous process. On the contrary, it is characterized by evolutionary gaps- periods of evolutionary acceleration or deceleration (the so- called punctuated equilibria), even by devolution or by extinction events. (So that the notion of backward evolution should be seriously considered). Evolutionary acceleration events refer to periods of intense diversification (what is often regarded as speciation) and they may explain and describe the existence of evolutionary gaps. They may be attributed to a specific mode of gene expression triggered by biological and environmental convergent conditions, or even by incidents of hybridization between different clades (of the same species), so that the generated hybrids may better adapt to various environmental changes. So, evolution comes when conditions are met. In other words, it occurs when the genetic code becomes entangled with the corresponding environmental events, and it is therefore expressed. The basic morphological variations capable to produce new species existed (at least) once

in the past, during the so- called Cambrian Explosion, so that all extant species descend from the parallel lineages of the respective primordial organisms of that period. The evolutionary process cannot be represented by a tree, but, more likely, by a web,

so that different primitive, or even extant, species may overlap each other in a way that any linear definition of a species may be considered obsolete. The difficulty (or even improbability) of distinguishing separate species from an evolutionary stage backwards enhances the hypothesis of irreducible complexity. On the other hand, this hypothesis is confined into the context of the creation of new species and of the non-

existence of missing links, without being a law of nature, since multicellular organisms can evolve from simpler ones, the simpler ones from single strands of DNA, and so on. The discontinuities in the evolutionary process explain the difficulty in recognizing (or simply the lack of) missing links. They are interpreted at a biological level by the successive appearance of lineages of a species and are rooted in the fundamental quantum properties of matter. The effect of observing the evolutionary stages is more important than any chronological or morphological arrangement of them. The last common ancestor is more likely a descriptive tool than a biological reality, an outcome of infinite regress, as there will always be a former common ancestor who will push the whole process further back into time. The fundamental characteristics of extant groups of people are due to basal differences

between members of the species, a fact which shows that in the past more than one human species existed. However, such differences may result from social discrimination instead of wellestablished scientific facts (for example race vs. skin color). The probability that intelligent life occurred by mere chance is essentially zero. On the other side, the assumption of intelligent design will be certainly subject to the laws of nature (known or unknown). According to the anthropic principle, the information for the production of intelligent life

at some evolutionary stage of the universe did exist, although the final form of this information (humans instead of another species) was a matter of random factors. Consciousness participates in the whole process as a form of intelligent information, and

it also comprises the morphogenetic factor of nature and the universe. The theory of evolution, through the notions of natural selection and adaptability,

explains only partially the origin of life and the natural course of species and of humans through time. Tangled hierarchy evolution accepts the determinist view of nature only at the second

stage of pure natural selection and adaptation. At an initial stage, the various species exist only as conditions, which may be either expressed or postponed. Moreover, at this initial stage there isnt any clear distinction between the first- appearing primordial forms of life. The causal aspect of natural- causal selection begins from this stage onwards. Furthermore, tangled hierarchy evolution takes into account the fact that humans transform things and beings they observe,

attributing to them some form which may have not existed before the observation event. Consciousness plays a dominant role in this process, as, not only it stems from the same context and level of the first entities, but also transforms these entities, thus comprising itself the factor of natural selection.

Appendices
An ancient garden of Eden

The new lower jaw KNM-ER 60000 combined with the KNM-ER 1470 cranium (H. rudolfensis)

Exciting new fossils discovered east of Lake Turkana confirm that there were two additional species of our genus Homo living alongside our direct human ancestral species, Homo erectus, almost two million years ago. The finds include a face, a remarkably complete lower jaw, and part of a second lower jaw. They were uncovered between 2007 and 2009 by the Koobi Fora Research Project (KFRP).

KNM ER 1813 (H. habilis) and KNM-ER 1470 (H. rudolfensis), Koobi Fora, Kenya, 1.9Mya

Four decades ago, the KFRP discovered the enigmatic fossil known as KNM-ER 1470 (or 1470 for short). This skull, readily distinguished by its large brain size and long flat face, ignited a longstanding debate about just how many different species of early Homo lived alongside Homo erectus during the Pleistocene epoch. 1470s unusual morphology was attributed by some scientists to sexual differences and natural degrees of variation within a single species, whereas others interpreted the fossil as evidence of a separate species.

This decades-old dilemma has endured for two reasons. First, comparisons with other fossils have been limited due to the fact that 1470s remains do not include its teeth or lower jaw. Second, no other fossil skull has mirrored 1470s flat and long face, leaving in doubt just how representative these characteristics are. The new fossils address both issues. For the past 40 years we have looked long and hard in the vast expanse of sediments around Lake Turkana for fossils that confirm the unique features of 1470s face and show us what its teeth and lower jaw would have looked like, says Meave Leakey, co-leader of the KFRP and a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence. At last we have some answers.

Combined, the three new fossils give a much clearer picture of what 1470 looked like, says Fred Spoor, leader of the scientific analyses. As a result, it is now clear that two species of early Homo lived alongside Homo erectus. The new fossils will greatly help in unraveling how our branch of human evolution first emerged and flourished almost two million years ago. Found within a radius of just over 10 km from 1470s location, the three new fossils are dated between 1.78 million and 1.95 million years old. The face KNM-ER 62000, discovered by field crew member Elgite Lokorimudang in 2008, is very similar to that of 1470, showing that the latter is not a single odd one out individual. Moreover, the faces well-preserved upper jaw has almost all of its cheek teeth still in place, which for the first time makes it possible to infer the type of lower jaw that would have fitted 1470. A particularly good match can be found in the other two new fossils, the lower jaw KNM-ER 60000, found by Cyprian Nyete in 2009, and part of another lower jaw, KNM-ER 62003, found by Robert Moru in 2007. KNM-ER 60000 stands out as the most complete lower jaw of an early member of the genus Homo yet discovered. [62]

A draft sequence of prime evolution

An infant macaque

Catarrhini (Old world monkeys)/ Platyrrhini (New world monkeys) (35Mya) Aegyptopithecus zeuxis lived some 35-33 million years ago in Egypt, and it is believed to be a basal catarrhine (Old world monkey), a crucial link between Eocene and Miocene fossil hominoids.

 In May 2005, three new primate fossils were discovered in the Bugti Hills of Pakistan. These hills lock away many primate mysteries. One of these mysteries was uncovered in 2001, when the early primate Bugtilemur was discovered and led to the assumption that lemurs came from Asia, not Africa. The three primates called Bugtipithecus inexpectans, Phileosimias kamali, and Phileosimias brahuiorum all date back to the Oligocene some 30 million years ago - when monkeys dominated only Africa. These were small lemur-like catarrhines that prospered in an ancient tropical rainforest. Possibly these Asian catarrhines led nowhere in evolution, a side branch from Eosimias. Other possible new catarrhines fossils have been uncovered in China, Thailand, and Burma. [63]

Old World monkeys/ apes/ the tailless macaques (25Mya)

Japanese macaques

Aside from humans (genus Homo), the macaques are the most widespread primate genus, ranging from Japan to Afghanistan and, in the case of the barbary macaque, to North Africa. Twenty-two macaque species are currently recognised, include some of the monkeys best known to nonzoologists, such as the rhesus

macaque, Macaca mulatta, and the barbary macaque, M. sylvanus, a colony of which lives on the Rock of Gibraltar. Although several species lack tails, and their common names therefore refer to them as apes, these are true monkeys, with no greater relationship to the true apes than any other Old World monkeys.

Nearly all (73-100%) pet and captive macaques are carriers of the herpes B virus. This virus is harmless to macaques, but infections of humans, while rare, are potentially fatal, a risk that makes macaques unsuitable as pets. A 2005 University of Toronto study showed urban performing macaques also carried simian foamy virus, suggesting they could be involved in the species-to-species jump of similar retroviruses to humans. [64]

Proconsul skeleton reconstruction

Proconsul is an extinct genus of primates that existed from 23 to 5 million years ago during the Miocene epoch. Fossil remains are present in Eastern Africa including Kenya and Uganda. They had a mixture of Old World monkey and ape characteristics, so their placement in the ape superfamily Hominoidea is tentative, with some scientists placing Proconsul outside it, before the split of the apes and Old World monkeys. [65] Gibbons (lesser apes)/ great apes/ homo? 15 - 20Mya

Male northern white-cheeked gibbon clasps mate as young baby suckles

Gibbons occur in tropical and subtropical rainforests from northeast India to Indonesia and north to southern China, including the islands of Sumatra, Borneo, and Java. [66]

Apes (lesser and great)/ dryopithecus (including the lineage of modern humans?) ~1510Mya

Type specimens of Dryopithecus from Spain (left) and Hungary (right)

 A diversity of apes ranged across the Old World during the Miocene epoch, between 22 million and 5.5 million years ago. Proconsul lived in East Africa, Oreopithecus in Italy, Sivapithecus in South Asia, and Ouranopithecus and Dryopithecus- members of the lineage thought to have given rise to African apes and humans- in Greece and western and central Europe, respectively. Humans may have evolved from a European species of dryopithecus or perhaps from another similar neighboring species. [67] Today, the only non-human primate native to Europe is the Barbary macaque, which has extended its North African range to a small area including Gibraltar, on the southern coast of Iberia. The geographic ranges of living apes do not extend north of the tropics. Thus, it may be surprising that once Europe was the home to a considerable diversity of apes. With the warmer and wetter climate of the Miocene, Europe was an ideal habitat for early hominoids, and they extended across the continent from Spain to Turkey, as far north as Paris. What may be even more surprising than the great productivity of Europe for paleontologists seeking Miocene apes is that Europe possibly was the principal center of their evolution and home of the common ancestors of humans, chimpanzees, and gorillas. [68]

All apes and monkeys, Australopithecus, Homo (represented by a species similar to Australopithecus?) 10Mya- the present

(Including some intermediate species before Australopithecus between ~10 5Mya)

Lemurs- Macaques- Dryopithecines- Australopithecines- Humans

Complementary archeological and geological evidence

Geological periods

The last 50My, as represented by the geologic temperature record, are characterized by a gradual decline in world temperatures, with the last 5My showing a high degree of fluctuation (right side of the previous image). [69]

Middle Miocene coastline

The Miocene period lasted 23.03 - 5.332Mya. This map shows the Tethys sea 16 million years ago, in the Middle Miocene era, some 2 million years after a series of movements in the Earths crust had connected Africa and Eurasia for the first time. This land- bridge allowed African animals, including apes and monkeys, to cross into Europe and Asia, while some rodents and cats moved in the opposite direction. The collision of the continental plates caused major geological upheavals, transforming formerly flat landscapes by pushing up the worlds youngest mountain chains: the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Himalayas, and the Zagros Mountains. East Africas mountains and rift valleys were also created as the continent began to be torn apart at the point of the rift, which is deepening and widening with time (eventually, this will lead to ocean waters rushing in to form a new gulf as Somalia breaks away from Africa). Geographical transformations were accompanied by gradual climatic and environmental changes. In East Africa drier conditions during the Middle and Late Miocene caused a spread of grassland. Animals adapted in response to these changes, which may even have triggered the emergence of the first hominoids. [70]

The term Middle Miocene disruption, alternatively the Middle Miocene extinction or Middle Miocene extinction peak, refers to a wave of extinctions of terrestrial and aquatic life forms that occurred around the middle of the Miocene Epoch, c. 14.8 to 14.5 million years ago, during the Langhian stage of the Miocene. Madelaine Bohme observed the occurrence of Varanidae, Chamaeleon, Cordylidae, Tomistomidae, Alligatoridae, and giant turtles which indicate survival through the Miocene Climatic Optimum (18 to 16 Ma) in Central Europe. A major and permanent cooling step occurred between 14.8 and 14.1 Ma, associated with increased production of cold Antarctic deep waters and a major growth of the East Antarctic ice sheet. Two crocodiles of the genera Gavialosuchus and Diplocynodon were noted to have been extant in these northern latitudes prior to the permanent cooling step then became extinct 13.5 to 14 Ma. [71]

In the middle Miocene also took place the collision between the Arabian microplate and Eurasia, which led to the separation between the Tethys and the Indian oceans. This process resulted in

profound changes in the oceanic circulation patterns, which shifted global climates towards colder conditions. [72]

The Great Rift Valley, which lies between the Ethiopian Plateau to the north and the Somalian Plateau to the south, developed at this period as the Nubian and Somalian plates began to separate during the Miocene Period along the East African rift system. Deformation began around 18 million years ago at the south end, around 11 million years ago close to the Afar depression and probably around 6-8 million years ago in the central sector. [73]

6Mya

The closing of Gibraltar

Messinian salinity crisis (5.96-5.33Mya)

Zanclean flood

At the end of the Miocene took place the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC), a geological event during which the Mediterranean Sea went into a cycle of partly or nearly complete desiccation throughout the latter part of the Messinian age of the Miocene epoch, from 5.96 to 5.33 Ma (million years ago). It ended with the so-called Zanclean flood, when the Atlantic reclaimed the basin.

The climate of the abyssal plain during the drought is unknown. There is no situation on Earth directly comparable to the dry Mediterranean, and thus it is not possible to know its climate. Nonetheless, in the empty Mediterranean Basin the summertime temperatures would likely have been extremely high. Thus one could predict theoretical temperature maxima of around 80C (176 F) at the lowest depths of the dry abyssal plain permitting little known life to survive there. Today the evaporation from the Mediterranean Sea supplies moisture that falls in frontal storms, but without such moisture, the Mediterranean climate that we associate with Italy, Greece, and the Levant would be limited to the Iberian Peninsula and the western Maghreb. Climates throughout the central and eastern basin of the Mediterranean and surrounding regions to the north and east would have been drier even above modern sea level. However, the Paratethys ocean provided water to the area north of the Mediterranean basin.

The Messinian event provided an opportunity to many African species, including antelopes, elephant and hippopotamus to migrate into the empty basin, obviously close to the descending great rivers, to reach interior wetter cooler highlands such as Malta: as the sea level was dropping, as such species would not have been able to cross the wide hot empty sink at maximum dryness. After the return of the sea water, they remained on the islands, where they underwent insular dwarfism during the Pleistocene as on Crete (Hippopotamus creutzburgi), on Cyprus (H. minor), on Malta (H. melitensis) and Sicily (H. pentlandi). Of these, the Cyprus Dwarf Hippopotamus, survived until the end of the Pleistocene or early Holocene.

The water from the Mediterranean would also have been redistributed in the world ocean, raising global sea level by as much as 10 m (33 ft). The Mediterranean basin also sequestered below its

seabed a significant percentage of the salt from Earth's oceans; this decreased the average salinity of the world ocean and raised its freezing point. [74]

The Zanclean flood was the most spectacular known flood in Earths history when water from the Atlantic Ocean breached the mountain range joining Europe and Africa with the force of a thousand Amazon rivers. The deluge was triggered 5.3m years ago by subsidence in the seabed that caused a land ridge between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean basin to collapse. The ridge linked the Betic and Rif mountain ranges that hug the coasts of modern Spain and Morocco. As water began to pour across the strait, it eroded the ridge until the flow became a catastrophic deluge. At the time, the Mediterranean basin was an almost entirely dry expanse of low lying land, between 1.5 km and 2.7 km beneath todays sea level. Subsidence in the sea floor at the strait allowed water from the Atlantic to pour slowly into the Mediterranean basin for several thousand years, before the flow became a powerful surge that filled 90% of the Mediterranean very rapidly- between a few months and two years. The surge of water created a channel several kilometres wide that would become the Strait of Gibraltar. The floodwater discharged around 100m cubic metres of water every second, creating a 200km-long channel across the strait. [75]

During the Pliocene epoch (5.332- 2.588Mya) the earth climate system response shifted from a period of high frequency-low amplitude oscillation dominated by the 41,000 year period of Earth's obliquity to one of low frequency-high amplitude oscillation dominated by the 100,000 year period of the orbital eccentricity characteristic of the Pleistocene glacial-interglacial cycles. The climate became cooler and drier, and seasonal, similar to modern climate. The global average temperature in the mid-Pliocene (3.3Mya 3Mya) was 2-3C higher than today, global sea level 25 m higher and Northern hemisphere ice sheet ephemeral before the onset of extensive glaciation over Greenland that occurred in the late Pliocene around 3 Ma. The global cooling that occurred during the Pliocene may have spurred on the disappearance of forests and the spread of grasslands and savannas. The first recognizable hominins, the australopithecines, appeared in the Pliocene. [76], [77]

The 40th parallel north

The Pleistocene (2.588Mya- 11,7ky BP) covers the recent period of repeated glaciations where continental glaciers pushed to the 40th parallel in some places. It is estimated that, at maximum glacial extent, 30% of the Earths surface was covered by ice. In addition, a zone of permafrost stretched southward from the edge of the glacial sheet, a few hundred kilometers in North America, and several hundred in Eurasia. The mean annual temperature at the edge of the ice was 6 C (21 F); at the edge of the permafrost, 0 C (32 F). Each glacial advance tied up huge

volumes of water in continental ice sheets 1,500 to 3,000 meters (4,9009,800 ft.) thick, resulting in temporary sea level drops of 100 meters (300 ft.) or more over the entire surface of the Earth. During interglacial times, such as at present, drowned coastlines were common, mitigated by isostatic or other emergent motion of some regions. In Eurasia, large lakes developed as a result of the runoff from the glaciers. Rivers were larger, had a more copious flow, and were braided. African lakes were fuller, apparently from decreased evaporation. Deserts on the other hand were drier and more extensive. Rainfall was lower because of the decrease in oceanic and other evaporation.

According to mitochondrial timing techniques, modern humans migrated from Africa after the Riss glaciation (350 130kya) in the middle Palaeolithic during the Eemian Stage (130 114kya), spreading all over the ice-free world during the late Pleistocene. A 2005 study posits that humans in this migration interbred with archaic human forms already outside of Africa by the late Pleistocene, incorporating archaic human genetic material into the modern human gene pool. [78]

Stone technology Mode I (Oldowan)

Oldowan chopper cores

The Oldowan, often spelled Olduwan or Oldawan, is the archaeological term used to refer to the earliest stone tool industry in prehistory, being used during the Lower Paleolithic period, 2.6 million years ago up until 1.7 million years ago, by Hominines. It was followed by the more sophisticated Acheulean industry. The term Oldowan is taken from the site of Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania, where the first Oldowan tools were discovered by the archaeologist Louis Leakey in the 1930s. However, some contemporary archaeologists and palaeoanthropologists prefer to use the term Mode One tools to designate Oldowan tools, with Mode Two designated Acheulean ones and so forth.

It is not known for sure which hominin species actually created and used Oldowan tools. Its emergence is often associated with the species Australopithecus garhi, and its flourishing with early species of Homo such as H. habilis and H. ergaster. Early Homo erectus appears to inherit Oldowan technology and refines it into the Acheulean industry beginning 1.7 million years ago. Oldowan tools are sometimes called pebble tools, so named because the blanks chosen for their production already resemble, in pebble form, the final product. Oldowan tools are sometimes subdivided into types, such as chopper, scrapers and pounders, as these appear to have been their main uses.

By 1.8Mya early man was present in Europe, as shown by the discovery of skulls and Oldowan tools from that time in Dmanisi, Georgia. Remains of their activities have also been excavated in Spain at sites in the Guadix-Baza basin and near Atapuerca. Most early European sites yield mode 1 or Oldowan assemblages. The earliest Acheulean sites in Europe only appear around 0.5Mya. In addition, the Acheulean tradition does not seem to spread to Eastern Asia. [79]

Mode II (Acheulean)

Acheulean hand-axes

Acheulean, a term based on the name Saint-Acheul, a suburb of Amiens, the capital of the Somme department in Picardy, where hand-axes of this period were found in 1859), is the name given to an archaeological industry of stone tool manufacture associated with early humans during the Lower Palaeolithic era across Africa and much of West Asia, South Asia, and Europe. Acheulean tools are typically found with Homo erectus remains. It is thought that they first developed out of the more primitive Oldowan technology as long ago as 1.76 million years ago, by Homo habilis.

It was the dominant technology for the vast majority of human history starting more than one million years ago. Their distinctive oval and pear-shaped handaxes have been found over a wide area and some examples attained a very high level of sophistication. Although it developed in Africa, the industry is named after the type site of Saint-Acheul, now a suburb of Amiens in northern France, where some of the first examples were identified in the 19th century.

From the Konso Formation of Ethiopia, Acheulean hand-axes are dated to about 1.5 million years ago using radiometric dating of deposits containing volcanic ashes. However, the earliest accepted examples of the Acheulean currently known come from the West Turkana region of Kenya and were first described by a French-led archaeology team. These particular Acheulean

tools were recently dated through the method of magnetostratigraphy to about 1.76 million years ago, making them the oldest not only in Africa but the world.

The very earliest Acheulean assemblages often contain numerous Oldowan-style flakes and core forms and it is almost certain that the Acheulean developed from this older industry. These industries are known as the Developed Oldowan and are almost certainly transitional between the Oldowan and Acheulean. Acheulean tools were not made by fully modern humans - that is, Homo sapiens - although the early or non-modern (transitional) Homo sapiens idaltu did use Late Acheulean tools, as did the proto-Neanderthal species. Most notably, however, it is Homo ergaster (sometimes called early Homo erectus), whose assemblages are almost exclusively Acheulean, who used the technique. Later, the related species Homo heidelbergensis (the common ancestor of both Neanderthals and Homo sapiens) used it extensively. [80]
Mode III (Mousterian)

Mousterian tools

Mousterian is a name given by archaeologists to a style of predominantly flint tools (or industry) associated primarily with Homo neanderthalensis and dating to the Middle Paleolithic, the middle part of the Old Stone Age. The culture was named after the type site of Le Moustier, a rock shelter in the Dordogne region of France. Similar flintwork has been found all over unglaciated Europe and also the Near East and North Africa. Handaxes, racloirs and points

constitute the industry; sometimes a Levallois technique or another prepared-core technique was employed in making the flint flakes.

Mousterian tools that have been found in Europe were made by Neanderthals and date from between 300,000 BP and 30,000 BP. In Northern Africa and the Near East they were also produced by anatomically modern humans. In the Levant for example, assemblages produced by Neanderthals are indistinguishable from those produced by Qafzeh type modern humans. It may be an example of acculturation of modern humans by Neanderthals because the culture after 130,000 years reached the Levant from Europe (the first Mousterian industry appears there 200,000 BP) and the modern Qafzeh type humans appear in the Levant another 100,000 years later. [81]

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12/31/2012, Chris Tselentis, Athens, Greece mailto: christselentis@gmail.com