Are Humans Fundamentally Different From Other Animals
Top x things that brand humans special
Humans are unusual animals by any stretch of the imagination. Our special beefcake and abilities, such equally big brains and opposable thumbs, have enabled us to alter our world dramatically and even launch off the planet. There are also odd things about united states that are, well, just special compared with the residue of the brute kingdom. So what exactly makes us and then special? Some things we take for granted might surprise you lot.
i. Speech
No ane enjoys a proficient gab session like humans. But why can't apes, our closest living relatives, talk like us? After all, the shape and role of the larynx and song tract are fairly similar across primates, comparative studies take institute.
To answer this question, wait no farther than the encephalon.
Primates tend to have a wider vocal repertoire when two features of the brain — the cortical association areas that control voluntary control over behavior, and the brainstem nuclei involved in control of muscles governing vocal product — are larger, a 2018 study in the journal Frontiers in Neuroscience establish. In humans, these features are larger than in other primates.
"In simple terms, primates with bigger cortical clan areas tended to brand more than sounds," written report co-researcher Jacob Dunn, an associate professor of evolutionary biological science at Anglia Ruskin University in the United kingdom, wrote in The Conversation. Other factors, such as genetics and the anatomy of the song tract, likely besides take an effect, and research into their relation to speech is ongoing.
2. Upright posture
Humans are unique amidst primates because our chief way of locomotion is walking fully upright. This way of moving frees our hands up for using tools. Unfortunately, the changes fabricated in our pelvis to assist usa move on ii legs, in combination with babies with large brains, makes man childbirth unusually unsafe compared with the residue of the creature kingdom.
Unlike other primates, humans have a lumbar curve in the lower back, which helps usa maintain our balance as we stand up and walk, but it also leaves the states vulnerable to lower back pain and strain, Alive Science previously reported.
3. Nakedness
We look naked compared with our hairier ape cousins. Surprisingly, yet, a foursquare inch of human skin, on average, possesses equally many pilus-producing follicles as a chimpanzee's (Pan troglodytes) skin, a 2018 written report in the Periodical of Human Development found. It's just that humans often have thinner, shorter, lighter hairs on well-nigh of our bodies than well-nigh primates practise, so it'southward easy to think of us as "naked."
And then, why are humans covered with brusk, nearly invisible hair? About 2 million years agone, an adaptation acquired members of the genus Homo to miniaturize body hair, while another adaptation increased the number of eccrine sweat glands, which most mammals have only on their palms and the soles of their feet, Live Science previously reported. These adaptations made it easier for Human being to cool off while running long distances because of the exceptional power to sweat a lot.
If humans were covered with thick hair, like apes are, sweat would coat the hair, which would brand it harder for the sweat to evaporate, which is how sweat cools u.s. off. It'south a proficient thing we have miniaturized hair; it makes cooling off a breeze.
Fun fact nearly hair: Fifty-fifty though we don't seem to have much, information technology evidently helps us find parasites, co-ordinate to a 2011 study in the journal Biology Messages.
four. Clothing
Humans may be called "naked apes," merely virtually of us article of clothing clothing, a characteristic that makes us unique in the animate being kingdom. Chimpanzees have been documented adorning themselves with items — ane wild chimp wore a knotted pare "necklace" fabricated from the leftovers of a slain cerise colobus monkey, a 1998 report found, while a captive chimp in Zambia started wearing grass "earrings" that she had draped over her ears, a fashion trend that spread to her fellow chimps — only these adornments didn't protect or insulate the chimps from the elements like human clothes do.
The development of human vesture has even influenced the evolution of other species — torso lice (Pediculus humanus humanus), unlike all other kinds, cling to clothing, not hair.
We've also invented clothing for animals, who, truth be told, don't always savour getting dressed upwardly.
5. Extraordinary brains
Without a dubiousness, the human trait that sets u.s.a. farthest apart from the brute kingdom is our extraordinary brain. One of the human encephalon's most prized regions is the overdeveloped cognitive cortex; it represents over eighty% of our brain mass and is thought to incorporate 100 billion neurons, according to a 2009 study in the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. The cerebral cortex is associated with complex, higher thinking, such every bit controlling, executive command, emotional regulation and language. Even though the human encephalon makes up about 2% of body weight, it consumes more than 25% of our body's overall energy, a 2018 report in the Journal of Human Evolution reported.
Humans don't have the largest brains in the world — those vest to sperm whales. Yet the human being brain, weighing but nearly iii pounds (i.3 kilograms) in adults, gives usa the power to reason and think on our feet beyond the capabilities of the rest of the animal kingdom.
half-dozen. Hands
Contrary to common misconceptions, humans are not the only animals to possess opposable thumbs — most primates practise. (And unlike humans, the rest of the bang-up apes even have opposable large toes on their feet.) What makes humans unique is how we tin can bring our thumbs all the way across the manus to our ring and piddling fingers. In other words, our opposable thumbs are much longer than other primate thumbs, according to the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York.
Our long thumbs and their power to easily bear on other fingers helps us firmly grasp and manipulate objects. Nosotros likewise have fine muscle control, meaning we can do wildly different activities with our hands, such every bit throw a curveball or agree a pen to sign our names, according to the AMNH.
7. Fire
Humans' ability to control fire brought a semblance of twenty-four hour period to night, helping our ancestors to run across in an otherwise night world and keep nocturnal predators at bay. The warmth of the flames also helped people stay warm in cold conditions, enabling u.s. to live in cooler areas. And of course it gave united states of america cooking, which some researchers suggest influenced human development — cooked foods are easier to chew and assimilate, possibly contributing to reductions in human molar and gut size.
There is testify that humans used burn as far dorsum as one 1000000 years ago, but archaeological bear witness shows it became more widespread in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Center Eastward about 400,000 years ago, Live Science previously reported.
viii. Blushing
Humans are the only species known to blush, a behavior Charles Darwin called "the nearly peculiar and the about human of all expressions." It remains uncertain why people chroma, involuntarily revealing our innermost emotions (though we practice know how it works).
From an evolutionary perspective, peradventure blushing signals that someone has messed up merely is acknowledging their error to avoid a confrontation. It could also be an indicator of emotional intelligence, Ray Crozier, an honorary professor at Cardiff Academy'due south School of Social Sciences in the Uk, told the BBC.
"A prerequisite for embarrassment is to be able to feel how others feel — you take to be empathetic, intelligent to the social situation," Crozier said.
ix. Long childhoods
Humans must remain in the care of their parents for much longer than other living primates. For instance, humans have nearly twice equally long as chimpanzees to mature, and it looks like our ancient human relatives, such as the three.ii million-year-former australopithecine Lucy and a i.six million-year-old Human erectus boy, reached machismo faster than modern humans do, Science magazine reported.
The question then is why do mod humans have so long to mature, when it might make more evolutionary sense to grow as fast as possible to have more offspring? The explanation may be our large brains, especially its loftier number of cortical neurons; other animals with large numbers of neurons in the cerebral cortex, such as some birds and mammals, also have long childhoods and extensive longevity, a 2018 study in the Journal of Comparative Neurology found.
"Information technology makes sense that the more than neurons you accept in the cortex, the longer it should take a species to attain that point where information technology's not merely physiologically mature, but also mentally capable of beingness independent," Suzana Herculano-Houzel, writer of the 2018 study and an associate professor of psychology at Vanderbilt Academy, said in a statement. "The delay also gives those species with more cortical neurons more time to learn from feel, equally they interact with the surroundings."
x. Life after children
Most animals reproduce until they die, including the frisky marsupials known as dusky antechinuses (Antechinus vandycki), whose males mate in a marathon frenzy until they drop dead, equally well equally many species of octopus, whose males die shortly later mating and whose females die later on tending to their eggs.
Only in humans, females can survive long after ceasing reproduction. This might exist due to the social bonds seen in humans — in extended families, grandparents can help ensure the success of their families long afterward they have passed the historic period when they themselves can accept children. The so-called "grandmother effect" is existent; an analysis of births and deaths between 1731 and 1890 in Finland showed that babies had an increased hazard of survival if their maternal grandmothers were between 50 and 75 years sometime, probable because the grandmas helped with kid rearing, a 2009 study in the journal Current Biology found.
Editor'southward Note: Originally published in 2011. Updated in March 2016 and February 2022.
Additional resources
- Learn more about homo evolution at The Smithsonian's Human Origins Program
- Peruse the latest findings at the Max Planck Constitute for Evolutionary Anthropology
- Read the latest anthropology news written by scientists effectually the world at The Chat.
Bibliography
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Fitch, W.T. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2000
Dunn, J.C., "Why apes tin't talk: our written report suggests they've got the voice merely non the brains" The Conversation, Aug. x, 2018
Kamberov, Y.M. et al. Journal of Human Development, 2018.
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McGrew, W.C., Marchant, L.F., Pan Africa News, 1998
Dye, L., "Did a Chimp Invent Jewelry?" ABC News, 2014
Herculano-Houzel, S. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 2009
Jawabri 1000.H., Sharma S. Physiology, Cerebral Cortex Functions, NIH Books, 2022
Boyer, D.M. Journal of Human Development, 2018
"The Grasping Mitt," American Museum of Natural History, accessed Jan 2022
Coughlan, S., "Too hot to handle," BBC, 2007
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Chapman, S.N. et al. Current Biology, 2019
Source: https://www.livescience.com/15689-evolution-human-special-species.html
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