Intro to Human Biologocial Diversity

Chapter 1 Summary
Tuesday, September 09, 2014
1:26 PM

This sections tells us what exactly anthropology is-- study of physical and learned characteristics of human beings and primates. Interesting fact human behavior is learned and humans are merely "the result of long time interactions between biology and culture AKA BIOCULTURE." It also Contains five subfields: 1. Cultural Anthropology
i. Studies of patterns and beliefs in modern/ historical behavior
2. Linguistic Anthropology
i. Study of human speech and language
3. Archaeology
i. Study of earlier cultures excavation
4. Physical Anthropology
i. Study of human biology in regards to evolution and bioculture
5. Applied Anthropology
i. Use of anthropological theories
All methods are conducted via scientific method utilizing only quantitative data and hypothesis which mean it is supported by factual data.

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Introduction to Anthropology
Thursday, September 11, 2014
1:32 PM

Evolution is…
The cumulative changes in the average genetic characteristic of a population usually occurring over multiple generations IN MY WORDS: changes in DNA over time within a specific group
What is Biological Anthropology….
Science concerned with biological and behavioral characteristics of human beings, primates, and everything in between. "Anthropology is a discipline"
It is the study of humans
- Holistic/ Whole
Eat sleep perspective beliefs
- Comparative
Comparing/ contrasting societies or difference in the learned behavior
CULTURE:
- How we act and what we do that has been learned from previous generations rather than genetics
Study all ranges and aspects of humans

Things the Teacher Says:
- Homo erectus before Neanderthals
- Emily Resmo
○ Female tennis player French
○ Study shows the thickness of her tennis arm is notably thicker than the other
○ MORE MUSCLE = MORE BONE DENSITY
- Thinner pelvis more efficient runners
- Culture has diverged and caused major tension in genetically similar people - Jane Goodall : Chimp studier
- Josef Mengele "Angel of Death" murderer if 400,000
- Monogamous : "mate for life"
*Usage of Tools - widdling stick to a point to get bugs mini linuers
- Homologs - bone relations between animals
○ 260 bones in cranium
- ONE BONE IS THE SACTIC NOTCH LARGE FOR WOMAN FOR CHILD BIRTH

SUBDISCIPLINE OF ANTH
- Cultural Anthropologist
- Linguistics
○ Observation of people behaviors
○ Documenting languages studying modern behavior studying evolutions of
 Utilize todays behavior to language evaluate the past
- Archaeology
- Physcial Anthropology
○ Excavate and analyze
○ Epidemiology: study of diseases

Osteology
- Study of the skeleton and understanding it's mechanics
- Interpreting the fossils

Physical Anthropology Branches

Primatology
- Study of non human primates
○ Relatedness
○ Behavioral studies of NHP's
○ Cultural behaviors of chimpanzee's and NHP*
 Grooming in order o keep each other calm
 Using tools to eat and gather termites

Paleopathology
- Study of skeletal
Disease and Trauma
( day to day of violent things signature on bones Intro to Huuman Biological Diversity (1) Page 2

Molecular Genetics
- DNA comparisons of populations - Allow to understand the peopling of the world
- Genetic difference's

Paleoanthropology
- Study of earliest ancestors (prepeople)

Anthropomoetry
- Study ofhuman body measurements documentation of phsyical variation

Forensic Anthropology
- Applied anthropology "dead men do tell tales" for legal poloitcal and special interest issues use remains to identify things like race gender stature time of death

Chapter 2 Summary
Monday, October 06, 2014
2:01 PM

Talks about the history of Natural Selection as developed by Darwin. However, a man named Wallace also had the same idea but we didn't make It to the punch. For a while schools didn't teach the theory of evolution in school because of the separation of church and state similar to previous churches that didn't accept the theory as well ( believed to be heresy).

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Scientific Method
Monday, October 06, 2014
2:02 PM

Alfred Packer - accused of cannialbilism 1880
--> when he and a few others traveled up to a pass. When a storm came and passed Alfred was the only one who came out. He had indeed tasted human.

Science - a process of understanding things through observation gneralization and verification
- Empirical (observable)
- Relies on experimentation
" For scientist the world around us is real and knowable"
□ Perception based on testing theories
□ Test w/ controlled observation
 Theory:
□ An explanatory framework set of assumptions derived from observation
□ Has been tested and accepted as more accurate than competing explanation
"Theory is not a hypothesis, A theory is extremely close to a law"
 Hypothesis: tentative assumption that accounts for relationships between observations
Scientific Model
- Representation of reality devised for the purpose of testing hypotheses
○ Conceptual framework for explaining things
○ Physical model
The Human Experience
We need to understand and appreciate DIVERSITY
Because it help avoid being ethnocentric
- Judging other cultures or peoples based on their own culture. Assumes superiority
 Evaluate them on their own terms

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Theories: Supported by testing hypothesizes
Deductive reasoning vs. inductive reasoning
- hypothesis made by theoretical knowledge then tested with new observation

History o)1796)f Evolutionary Thought
Monday, October 06, 2014
2:13 PM

Archbishop Ussher
- Believed that earth was created on Oct. 23rd 4004 B.C by analyzing the first chapter of the Bible Genesis and the generations in it
I. Three Mains Ideas of the Pre 17th Century
1. Catastrophism:
i. World was created by successive catastrophes i.e. Noah's Flood
2. Fixity of Species
i. All creatures created separately
1) Not related
3. The Great Chain of Being
i. All creatures are hierarchically ranked - Aristotle 350 B.S.
1) Share 70% of genes with a slug
II. The Age of Enlightenment
i. Colonization period ii. Questioning creationist
1. John Ray
i. Plants and animals reproduce isolated
1) No Cross Species ii. Coined the term "species" based on Reproduction
2. Carolus Linnaeus
i. Binomial Nomenclature ii. Wrote the book Systame Natuae 1735 iii. Taxonomy: classification of organisms according to their relationships
1) Order groups into hierarchies
3. Comte de Buffon (1700s)
i. Environment is stimulus for change ii. Species changed based on conditions locally
ADAPTATION
4. Erasmus Darwin
i. Grandfather of Charles Darwin ii. " Life originated in the seas" AD1794" iii. All species descended from a common ancestor iv. Considerable time depth needed
v. Competition for resources among and between species vi. Environmental influence
5. George Cuvier (1796)
i. Vertebrate paleontologist ii. He wanted to preserve the fixity of species iii. "Fossils were the results of extinctions"
1) Elaborated on Catastrophism
a) Regional catastrophes where all life died
b) Repopulated by migrants from nearby regions
6. Charles Lyell
i. 1833: Principles of Geology
1) uniformitarianism: process acting in the present also occurred in the past
2) Gradualism: changes occurred slowly and cumulatively not rapidly. ii. His Ideas:
1) Earth's History is Long!
2) Use the present to understand the past
7. Thomas Malthus (1798)
i. Human Populations
- Tried to understand why there was so much suffering
- Increase fast population
 At some point not enough food which causes a natural check to slow population growth
 famine, disease ii. Important Ideas:
1) Population size is limited
2) Reproduction is Unlimited
3) Hence endless competition for food
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Genus / Species
Homo

Sapien

CLASSIFICATION

3) Hence endless competition for food
8. Jean Baptiste Lamarck (1809)
i. Lamarckism
1) Explanation for the evolutionary process
a) During one's lifetime, an organism could acquire new traits
i) Principle of Inherentice of Acquired Characteristics
One. Use it you keep it, don't use it, lose it. Then Pass it On. ii) Example: giraffes neck growth iii) Fluids and forces bring new traits

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The Darwinian legacy
Monday, October 06, 2014
3:18 PM

HMS Beagle--> ship Darwin set off his journey in 1831
Alfred Wallace
Independently derived same ideas as Darwin
Darwin Noticed:
Domesticated animals are bred for certain traits
Domestication via ARTICIAL SELCTION
"dogs - species can look very different but have very similar genetic make-up"
Galapagos Islands
Finches
Each island had the same range of animals "similar but not the same"
Local modifications of the same species ex: beaks
Darwin's Observations:
1. All population can produce lots of offspring
a. Reproduction potential unlimited
b. There is Potential exceeds no offspring that survive
2. Population size remains generally stable
3. Plants animals limited by resources
a. Competition always occur between specific
4. Individual in population vary
5. Much variation is heritable
a. Get it from parents at birth
Darwin's Inferences
a) Some organism are more fit than others
b) Leads to different survival and reporductive success
Differentiated from lamarck because he blieves the developed during lifetime
c) Over time, favoruable characteristics accumulate in populations
a. DESCENT WITH MODIFICATIONS
Over Time:
Get a new species distinct from ancestral ones
Ex: armadillo vs. glyptodont
BUT WAIT THERE"S MORE
Survival ≠ success
Reproduction = success
Natural Selection in Action
1. Peppered Moths:
a. Pre industrial Revolution - Local dust
b. Dark vs. peppered moths
2. Mice In Missouri
a. Cats vs. mice Farmer McCroskey Granary
b. Dark vs. Pale
c. In dec there was 72% dark fur and 28% Pale Fur mice when the cats were removed and allow for repopulation there was 53% dark and 47% pale. However, in Janurary when cats were brought back in the numbers went back to normal. 3. Darwin's Finches (by college kids and birds not Darwin)
a. Study in 1970 after El Nino Strom
b. Big Beak vs. Little Beak
Individual = unit of selction
- The population is what evolves
- Adaptation = res

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Humans were selective agents thus did nature select in a similar way?
- Death of Unfit
- Propagation of the Fittest

Indentify the Selctive Pressure
1. Birds
2. Cats
3. Weather/ Habitat