Evolution, You’re Drunk - Issue 9 : Time

#Evolution, You’re Drunk
►http://nautil.us/issue/9/time/evolution-youre-drunk

Amoebas are puny, stupid blobs, so scientists were surprised to learn that they contain 200 times more DNA than Einstein did. Because amoebas are made of just one cell, researchers assumed they would be simpler than humans genetically. Plus, amoebas date back farther in time than humans, and simplicity is considered an attribute of primitive beings. It just didn’t make sense.

The idea of directionality in nature, a gradient from simple to complex, began with the Greeks, who called nature physis, meaning growth. (...)

(...)

Mother Nature, with her 4 billion years of experience, does not work like Steve Jobs, continuously designing sleeker versions. When asked whether de-evolution, a reversal from the complex to the simple, happens frequently, [Casey] Dunn [an evolutionary biologist at Brown University in Providence, R.I.] replies, sure. “But,” he adds, “I wouldn’t call that de-evolution, I’d call it evolution.”

Evolution, You’re Drunk - Issue 9 : Time
►http://nautil.us/issue/9/time/evolution-youre-drunk

http://static.nautil.us/2412_186fb23a33995d91ce3c2212189178c8.jpg

Amoebas are puny, stupid blobs, so scientists were surprised to learn that they contain 200 times more DNA than Einstein did. Because amoebas are made of just one cell, researchers assumed they would be simpler than humans genetically. Plus, amoebas date back farther in time than humans, and simplicity is considered an attribute of primitive beings. It just didn’t make sense. The idea of directionality in nature, a gradient from simple to complex, began with the Greeks, who called nature physis, meaning growth. That idea subtly extended from changes over an organism’s lifetime, to changes over evolutionary time after Charles Darwin argued that all animals descend from a single common ancestor. When his contemporaries drew evolutionary trees of life, they assumed increasing complexity. (...)