Discover magazine responds to a paper co-authored by ISG faculty Jessica Lynch Alfaro, Michael Alfaro and former ISG postdoctoral fellow, Sharlene Santana, in its most recent article on human evolution. The research describes the link between the complexity of a monkey species’ facial color pattern and certain social systems. Species that live in larger groups tend to have plainer faces…
In a recent paper in the journal Current Anthropology former ISG postdoctoral fellow, Jennifer E. Smith, along with Eli M. Swanson, Daphna Reed and Kay E. Holekamp suggest that the spotted hyena is an under-appreciated source of information about human evolution. NPR has the full story here Evolution of Cooperation among Mammalian Carnivores and Its Relevance to Hominin Evolution. Jennifer E. Smith, Eli…
Robert W. Sussman, a professor of anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis, says that science has struggled to understand the mysteries of “less-than-human” beings since the late 1400s when the Spanish Inquisition first formalized state persecution of Jews and Muslims. And while the horrors of Nazi Germany exposed fatal flaws in science’s quest to build the master race, the…
Cancer Voices Australia brought the case as it believed Myriad Genetics Inc, which owns the patent on the genes BRCA1 and BRCA2 linked to breast and ovarian cancer had an unfair monopoly on a naturally occurring gene. It’s the first time the validity of genetic patents has been tested in an Australian court. Cancer Voices sought to void the genetic…
Biology, psychology and political science are rarely spoken of together. But according to a new study co-authored by Rose McDermott, professor of political science, the genetics of fear can exert a powerful influence on people’s political opinions, particularly those regarding out-groups. Published online last month in the American Journal of Political Science, her paper explores the correlation between hereditary and…
In 1855, in the garden of his country estate, Charles Darwin built a dovecote. He filled it with birds he bought in London from pigeon breeders. He favored the fanciest breeds — pouters, carriers, barbs, fantails, short-faced tumblers and many more. Pigeon breeding, Darwin argued, was an analogy for what happened in the wild. Yet to later generations of biologists,…