THE EVOLUTION OF COOKING

edge.org: "According to Harvard biological anthropologist Richard Wrangham, almost two million years ago humans emerged from a stock of pre-human apes. Remarkably, our species is still evolving today, faster than ever. 'Why we evolved then, and why we are still changing, are problems that shape our souls,' he says.

Wrangham believes that humanity was launched by an ape learning to cook. In a burst of evolution around two million years ago, our species developed the family relations that make us such a peculiar kind of animal. Cooking made us women, men and lovers.
'We behave like our two closest relatives,' Wrangham says. 'Chimpanzees and bonobos, because in spite of first appearances, we face somewhat similar kinds of problems to each of those species. Cooking makes our behavior partly chimpanzee-like because it intensifies a chimpanzee-like division of labor. Self-domestication, on the other hand, makes us bonobo-like by selecting for a youthful psyche. In both cases human behavior echoes the biology of our cousins, though never exactly copying it.'"

Comments

Digital Cam media safe to fly with

Technocrat.net : "Recent tests found no evidence of X-ray scanner damage to digital camera media cards or to the images they hold. The tests of scanner models currently in use in the U.S. transportation industry were jointly conducted by the International Imaging Industry Association (I3A), the leading global association for the imaging industry; SanDisk Corporation, a manufacturer of digital media cards; and the U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA). These findings mean that digital cameras and their image storage media can travel safely in either checked or carry-on bags, which will be reassuring to holiday travelers. And though they were not explicitly tested, it is likely that images on camera-phones will be safe in either situation as well. More care is needed for cameras with film, however, as the X-ray scanners for both checked and carry-on luggage can fog both developed and undeveloped film."

Artist turns animals into everyday objects

Ananova - A Chilean artist is making a name for herself with an exhibition in which stuffed animals are transformed into household objects. Artworks on display include a chick turned into a lamp, and 'sheep bag' - a lamb carcass fitted with handles. Artist Caterina Purdy says her exhibition at the Experimental Arts Centre in Santiago is intended to be humorous but also makes a serious point. She told Las Ultimas Noticias online: 'It is possible to see my work as something scary, but I find it beautiful. 'There is also irony and humour in my objects as well as a criticism of the way animals are treated by society.'"

BW Online | March 1, 2004 | Software : "As Stephen and Deepa emerge this summer from graduate school -- one in Pittsburgh, the other in Bombay -- they'll find that their decisions of a half-decade ago placed their dreams on a collision course. The Internet links that were being pieced together at the turn of the century now provide broadband connections between multinational companies and brainy programmers the world over. For Deepa and tens of thousands of other Indian students, the globalization of technology offers the promise of power and riches in a blossoming local tech industry. But for Stephen and his classmates in the U.S., the sudden need to compete with workers across the world ushers in an era of uncertainty. Will good jobs be waiting for them when they graduate? 'I might have been better served getting an MBA,' Stephen says."

Sophont

Search This Blog