Browsing by Subject "evolution"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
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    Ancestor Worship and the Longevity of Chinese Civilization
    (Brill, 2016) Coe, Kathryn; Begley, Ryan O.; Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health
    Although an impressive body of literature is devoted to the practice of venerating ancestors in China and other places, there is little agreement on what ancestor worship is, where it is practiced, and whether it is an ancient and persistent trait. Ancestor worship, we argue, is an ancient trait that has persisted in China, as in other parts of the world, since prehistoric times. We also discuss its universal aspects, including those associated with teaching it and with encouraging its persistence across generations. We end by discussing the function of ancestor worship in China. Has it been an impediment to progress, as Christian missionaries and communists insisted, or, as Ping-Ti Ho claimed, has it promoted the “longevity of Chinese civilization”? We argue that both claims may be correct, depending on the definition of progress and the characteristics associated with China’s two forms of ancestor worship.
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    Bacterial regulatory networks are extremely flexible in evolution
    (2006-05) Lozada-Chávez, Irma; Janga, Sarath Chandra; Collado-Vides, Julio
    Over millions of years the structure and complexity of the transcriptional regulatory network (TRN) in bacteria has changed, reorganized and enabled them to adapt to almost every environmental niche on earth. In order to understand the plasticity of TRNs in bacteria, we studied the conservation of currently known TRNs of the two model organisms Escherichia coli K12 and Bacillus subtilis across complete genomes including Bacteria, Archaea and Eukarya at three different levels: individual components of the TRN, pairs of interactions and regulons. We found that transcription factors (TFs) evolve much faster than the target genes (TGs) across phyla. We show that global regulators are poorly conserved across the phylogenetic spectrum and hence TFs could be the major players responsible for the plasticity and evolvability of the TRNs. We also found that there is only a small fraction of significantly conserved transcriptional regulatory interactions among different phyla of bacteria and that there is no constraint on the elements of the interaction to co-evolve. Finally our results suggest that majority of the regulons in bacteria are rapidly lost implying a high-order flexibility in the TRNs. We hypothesize that during the divergence of bacteria certain essential cellular processes like the synthesis of arginine, biotine and ribose, transport of amino acids and iron, availability of phosphate, replication process and the SOS response are well conserved in evolution. From our comparative analysis, it is possible to infer that transcriptional regulation is more flexible than the genetic component of the organisms and its complexity and structure plays an important role in the phenotypic adaptation.
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    The Evolution of Modern Sexuality
    (2011-09-09) Gunderman, Richard B.
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    What Makes Us Human?
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2016-04-08) Goss, Sarah; King, Justin; Smith, Rebekah; Walker, Whitney; Whitman, Priya
    What makes us human? Is it something innate within us, perhaps in our souls, if we even have them? Or are we determined by biology and genetics? It is increasingly clear that we cannot simply reduce humanity to the false dichotomies illustrated in antiquated arguments such as nature vs. nurture. Throughout history, the Cartesian mind-body divide has fueled a schism between understandings of what makes us human. Our infographic dispels these false dichotomies, indicating that humans are shaped myriad elements including genetics, socio-cultural constructs, the environment, and consciousness. This infographic shows the audience some of the greatest thinkers’ philosophies and ideas regarding areas such as human biology, consciousness, and evolution. We explain three prominent thought pathways, their roots, connotations, and interdependencies on a web of human thought, mapping out genetic foundations, theories of consciousness and human nature, and socio-cultural constructs. This web of humanity shows how the many theories of what makes us human coexist and interconnect; further indicating that humanity cannot be reduced to either the biological or the intellectual. What was once viewed as a dichotomy has become an open space for examination of human nature through the many lenses that are required for our complex nature. Perhaps the historic division of science and the humanities has provided the arena for deep thought on all sides. But now, there is a space to bridge the divide, and this bridge shows us that we are niche creators founded in biology and genetics and extant in our socio-cultural constructs. We exist in intentional space unintentionally. We are human, and perpetually evolving to be.