Showing posts with label humans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label humans. Show all posts

Squirrel Hunter

 
"It's shooting season agaim.  Git me to them pesky humans!"
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Funny Animal Photos
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Man Can Survive a Major Disaster

If there is a major world disaster will Mankind survive? In the past our forebears got through environmental difficulties, so there is no reason to believe that this will not continue to happen. As technology becomes increasingly specialized, things we take for granted will be lost. Humanity will take a few steps back or fall right back into a survival-type culture.

The skill to print could end. Story telling could return as a way to pass on culture. Man has always been inquisitive about what lies over the horizon. Experimentation will still be the key to survival. In a major disaster only those species that can adapt will live through it.

Neanderthals were not smart enough to survive. This is despite their brains being larger than humans. The brains of Man obviously operated differently. This could have been the power of imagination. Neanderthals learned more by direct copying of behavior. Humans can deduce answers from information.

Another important factor is present in humans. We have the ability to live in close proximity to each other. Living in cities is a feature of Man. Neanderthals only existed in small groups. They could not "pool" knowledge and make it available to everyone. We develop and control our environment. Neanderthals did not.
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History
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City Spiders Are Larger

Many animals do better when they live alongside humans. One seldom thinks of spiders though. If you travel overseas you soon discover the huge spiders in rented accommodation. Research has shown that these frightening but usually friendly creatures do grow larger in warm homes.

They don't have to be living inside the houses either. Just staying close to warm building is sufficient. The golden orb spider was placed in particular external environment and data were collected. Those near buildings were larger and fatter than their bush cousins. Living in the middle of a car park with the heat given off by cars made them bigger as well.

Though many people fear them, urban spiders are harmless. They keep pest insects in check. If they weren't there, we would probably be "eaten alive" by flies and gnats. Rather than spraying and crushing them, put them outside and send them on their way.
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Society
TwitThis

Humans Did Not Kill Off Megafauna

During the Middle-Late Pleistocene, one million to 10,000 years ago, more than 50 species of animal disappeared, the last to do so 46.4 thousand years from the present. The reason for the demise of the giant creatures is hotly debated. Some scientists claim that the spread of Man across the globe was the cause. This is suspect, however, because there were so few of them. Killing the odd animal would not have made a significant impact.

Many believe that the end date for megafauna is incorrect. As stated above, the theory that humans killed them off by definition means that people and animals lived side-by-side for a considerable time. Evidence in Australia certainly points to this - 13 species of large animals were here on human arrival. Moreover, the people mainly relied on subsistence strategies for food. Their weapons were not very efficient. A boomerang is highly inaccurate and the range of a spear is limited.

Megafauna died out over a long period of time, not all at a specific date. Species lingered on in many regions. Just assuming that humans killed them is a mistake and diverts from the discovery of why the large animals became extinct. This was a time of extremes in climate. Perhaps a series of wild swings in climate gradually reduced their number to the tipping point where reproduction did not take place.
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Society
TwitThis

Less Atractive Males Make do With Plainer Females

An audience affects the behavior of mating male fish. If a male Atlantic Molly (Poecilia mexicana) is left alone he will try to mate with the healthiest looking female - the best female in his eyes. If there are other males in the vicinity he will not choose this female.

It may be thought that he is giving up. This is not the case. He is thinking strategically. By choosing a less desirable female he leads other males away from the intended target best female. The male hopes to mate with this female later when the other rival males have gone.

Some males are just too ordinary and have to mate with lesser females because other fitter males stop them getting close to "ideal" females. Mating with any female is better than not mating at all.

This behavior could be present in humans. When a group of young men meet with a group of young females the handsomest men can be expected to pair off with the prettiest young ladies. The less attractive have to make do with second best. This means that some of the good genes carried by the plainer individuals can be passed on despite mating between the healthier, fitter thus better looking people being the norm.
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Society

Monkey Overeat Like Humans but the Animals Do Not Get Fat

Monkeys, like humans, overeat. Monkeys gorge themselves on low protein fruit. Extremely large quantities are ingested which could lead to an increase in body fat. Food intake for monkeys is tied to the level of protein in food. If food has a high protein level they will eat less of it before feeling full.

Shoots and leaves have a high protein level. So they eat less of these to obtain their daily intake of 12 grams of protein. The reason that eating fruit does not make them fat is that it takes a lot of energy to obtain the fruit.

In Western countries we seek high carbohydrate food because we are trying to satisfy our craving for protein. The conclusion has been reached by scientists that human obesity began 40,000 years ago when people substituted meat with crude bread made out of wild grain. Humans have become fatter as easier ways of harvesting grains have developed.
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Evolution

We Would not Be Here if Dinosaurs had not Existed

If an asteroid hadn't collided with the Earth 65 million years ago we would not be here today. Reptiles would still probably rule the world and apes would never have evolved. There was so much devastation after the impact that only small animals survived - very small mammals. These small creatures only came out into the open to take over the world when it was safe after the dinosaurs had gone.

Mankind's development actually depended on the dinosaurs existence. Small animals evolved to give birth to live young so dinosaurs could not eat their eggs. Even giving milk to their young was to avoid the danger from dinosaurs. Becoming warm blooded allowed them to hunt at night which dinosaurs could not do.

After the dust had settle it was a virtual paradise for mammals. The sun came out and they basked in it. A niche for large animals was vacant so mammals grew large and were successful. The climate changed and trees disappeared. Large mammals grazed happily until an intelligent ape began hunting them. Then large mammals died out and these apes, men, bred and spread all round the globe. Unfortunately, this "intelligent" animal is now threatening small mammal with extinction.
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Paleontology

Baboons Can Recognize words

It was thought that monkeys and chimpanzees were unable to use language as humans do because they do not have the required language centers in their brains.  Tests on baboons turned this theory on its head.  Monkeys learned the rules of words, for example consonants and vowels, so they could recognize real words in a bundle of made up nonsense.

Humans must first build up words from letters before they get meaning.  We need to construct words as if they were tables and chairs, from the legs up.

Baboons were tested by encouraging them to "play" with computers.  When they selected a real word they got wheat as a reward.  Each computer had a cross and a circle so the baboons could show words and non-words by pressing either symbol.  The words were only four uppercase letters long, but each baboon did up to 60,000 tests and they were 75 per cent correct.  The best baboon learned 308 words
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Science

Dogs Taking Life Easy

"I reckon we should take life real easy."
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Elephants and Mammoths Have Much the Same DNA

Elephants aren't so different from woolly mammoths. DNA samples taken from mammoth hair shows they are much alike. Furthermore, there are indications that the mammoth population was so low toward the end that inbreeding took place.

If the unique mammoth genome can be isolated it can be inserted into elephant DNA to produce a woolly mammoth. It has also been found that differentiation between mammoth was only minor, so that a disease could have easily wiped them out.

Mammoth are more closely related to elephants than chimpanzees are to humans, which is about 99 percent. Evidence shows that there were two groups of mammoth. One group died out 45,000 years ago, the other 10,000 years ago.
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Science

Scout Bees Have "Curious" Brains Like Humans

It was thought that bees were like robots who went about their work on instinct alone, but some bees have "curious" genes. The scouts who find sources of food are actually mischievous seekers. Their genes give them a brain structure similar to humans.

Scout bees are independent creatures who don't go along with the mob. They find new food sources by intuition and pure skill. Being female, they go back to the hive do a wiggle dance to pass on directions, then go out again to find a new source.

Tests were done on a hive of bees. The hive was put into an enclosure and food was put out in different colored jars. Bees that located the jars were collected and marked with a dot of paint. Later the brains of these scout bees were removed and compared with the brains of normal hive bees. Brain activity in the genes of the two types of bees differed by 16 per cent. The brains of scouts could change the levels of neurotransmitters dopamine and glutamate. Another test was done with the scouts being fed sugar water laced with a neurotransmitter "booster", The scouts became more active in their search.

This proves that dopamine and glutamate are responsible for curiosity in humans. The common ancestor of bees and Man was a marine flatworm. These basic animals would not have had scouts, so the "curious" genes developed in both lines, bees and Man, separately. It is also probable that the gene variant can become active in any animal: it is latent in the gene toolkit.
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Biology

Hendra Virus Similar to Nipah Disease in Asia

The Hendra virus was first identified in 1994. It killed horses and several veterinary scientists. Oddly, this deadly disease has only appeared in Australia. This is very unusual. Diseases tend to spread across national borders.

Outbreaks are spasmodic. Horses in Queensland and New South Wales have died recently in the latest outbreak. Scientists are intensively examining all aspects of the Hendra virus. A dog was found to be a carrier. Though unaffected and quite healthy the dog had to be put down.

Promising results have been obtained by using human antibody m102.4 on monkeys who were intentionally infected. The animals remained well for three days before needing treatment. All of the subjects survived. A control group of monkeys who were not given the antibody died.

Though unproven, the ailment is believed to be carried and spread by bats. A similar bat borne disease is widespread in India, Bangladesh and Malaysia. The Asian Nipah ailment identified in 1998 is of interest to scientists because aspects of it are much the same as the Hendra virus.
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Medicine

How Do We Select What to Pay Attention to?

How do we select which sounds to pay attention to? When we walk down a street we ignore the sounds of cars passing by, the gossip of people, and on, but we pay attention to a short, sharp whistle. Even little children know the sound of the ice cream truck.

Psychologists have been trying to find out how we select some things over others. Our brains record everything. Hypnosis has shown this to be true. We could not possibly take note of everything around us. Attention allocation operates by combining two functions: the predictive principle and the uncertainty principle.

The predictive principle is logical in that the brain searches for the more meaningful from the background "noise".

With the uncertainty principle the brain looks for the unusual, the odd thing out.

Animal research has shown that they do use both principles. However, tests on humans had clearly shown the predictive principle at work but not uncertainly. New tests show humans use a variant of the uncertainty principle called negative transfer. This involves ignoring new associations (outcomes) to a cue once a particular association has been learned. In other words new associations take longer to register in humans. The more "severe" the new association the quicker the uncertainty principle kicks in.
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Society