Ancestry & Evolution
The desire to understand our origins is primal. By examining our DNA over successive generations through the evolutionary process of inherited characteristics of human and animal populations–as well as from those species from which humans share a common ancestry–we can decipher our individual and collective past and develop medical innovations for the future.
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Viewpoint: Revisiting the debate over genes and IQ
In The Bell Curve, Murray and Herrnstein argue that intelligence, as measured by an IQ score, is a crucial determinant of ...
‘The Arrogant Ape’: A takedown of the human supremacy complex
In the grand story of evolution, the crowning human distinction is our big brain. But our large heads have been ...
What’s the difference between human intelligence and AI? Not very much
The term artificial intelligence renders the sense that what computers do is either inferior to or at least apart from ...
Are there such things as ‘ancestral bloodlines’? Not when you examine the DNA
Human history is rife with contentions about the purity (and superiority) of the bloodlines of one group over another and ...
‘It doubles the time of origin of the human species’: How digital technology is rewriting the origin of humanity
An ancient skull, warped and damaged by the ravages of time and degradation, may have just altered our understanding of ...
The laughing reflex: Giggling, endorphins and evolution
“Is laughter contagious? Well, actually, all emotions are contagious,” Dr Sandi Mann, chartered member of the British Psychological Society .... “We ...
Human carelessness and climate change are killing millions of animals. Gene editing could save them. Should we use it?
It wasn’t our intention that humanity would become the planet’s greatest evolutionary force; yet the fact that we are confronts us ...
New evidence underscores that autism stretches back to our early hominid existence and is likely linked to neurons responsible for high intelligence
[As] debates over modern medicine dominate the headlines, new research suggests the roots of autism’s high prevalence in humans may ...
Genes take a back seat as culture drives human evolution forward
Researchers at the University of Maine are theorizing that human beings may be in the midst of a major evolutionary ...
From soil to DNA: How micronutrients drove genetic adaptations across human populations worldwide
Micronutrients, minerals that are part of the human diet in small amounts, may have influenced human evolution more than previously ...
It’s often said that humans and chimps share 99% of their DNA. That means a lot less than almost everybody believes it means
Early research suggested that human and chimp genomes are more than 98% identical. "What it means is that for each ...
Confronting the elephant in the human biodiversity room — the explosive issue of IQ
Here’s a thought experiment. Imagine two widely separated human groups living for thousands of years in different cultural and ecological ...
Marrying your cousin: Might it provide some evolutionary benefits?
The taboo against cousin marriages may be overblown--and there may even be an evolutionary argument in support of it in ...
Soapy cilantro? Bitter Brussels sprouts? Coffee with a chemical aftertaste? How genes shape our differing processing of food smells
In 2025, a major breakthrough came from Leipzig University, where genetic epidemiologist Markus Scholz led a sweeping genome-wide association meta-analysis ...
GLP spaces on X: ‘Designer baby’ revolution is coming. Are we ready?
The day is rapidly approaching when many people will reproduce in the lab instead of the bedroom. Rather than pairing ...
Viewpoint: The Catholic Church’s new guidelines on AI fail to account for the overlap of evolution and technology
While the Vatican acknowledges stages of technological development, it lacks a model of integrating science and religion that can adequately ...
Why dogs and cats are evolving to look alike?
Domestication has made cats and dogs more diverse, but also curiously alike – with serious implications for their health and ...
How humans (and apes) evolved to love alcohol
Humans and some other great apes share an unusual adaptation: They can metabolize ethyl alcohol – the intoxicating ingredient in ...
How a devout Muslim creationist missionary became an avowed evolutionist
Guiding us on the epic, mind-expanding journey is paleoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi, who has undergone her own radical evolution. As a ...
Viewpoint: What role can indigenous populations and agroecology play in promoting sustainable food
For millennia, Indigenous peoples have cultivated diverse, adaptive and evolving food systems, rooted in deep relationships with land, water and ...
As recently as 40,000 years ago, as many as 5 ancient human species lived alongside us. Only we survived
We may be the only human species alive today, but just a few hundred thousand years ago there was a ...
Potato, tomato: Today’s French fries linked by evolution to tomatoes 9 million years ago
Ketchup and fries make a tasty pair. But the connection between tomatoes and potatoes may go beyond making a good ...
Directed evolution: We can now speed up evolution inside human cells by decades
Inspired by the generative abilities of AI, directed evolution, a biological system that works much like machine learning, can actually be ...
Some early ancient humans were cannibals and ate children
Archaeologists discovered new evidence of cannibalism among early human ancestors at the Gran Dolina cave site in northern Spain. The ...
Genes and sports: Europeans are far more likely than any other population group–especially Africans–to carry a Neanderthal mutation that limits their ability to become top athletes
Scientists have uncovered a genetic variant, inherited from Neanderthals, that may limit athletic performance. The mutation is thought to affect ...
Human intelligence genes linked to cancer
A study led by Dr. LI Chuanyun from the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology of the Chinese Academy of ...
How farming spread globally in prehistoric times to supplant hunting and gathering
If you’ve ever wondered how farming spread far and wide, our research on past human societies offers one explanation: contact ...
