This weeks lecture allowed me to reflect on everything we have learned these past seven weeks to think about just how far we have come. Humans are constantly evolving due to environmental, biological and behavioral changes.
Although the human biology has changed over time, we have become more reliant on technology than the use of our physical attributions. We utilize technology to tell us how to live our lives what to eat, and even wear. We are able to use our brains in more complex ways that our previous non human ancestors did. We are also able to utilize our bodies in different ways. We have more of a choice to be physically active. We can drive, run, walk, or ride a bike. Just how we have evolved technology and resources around us have allowed us to take shortcuts to make life easier for us.
Environmental changes also have had an influence on how we evolve. Climate change has influenced the diet we choose. We are eating less meat and becoming more plant based due to genetically modified foods. This can have a change on our genetic makeup because we are both elimination and increasing certain minerals, vitamins, proteins and much more from our diet. The food we eat is is really a reflection of our health. For instance, if a child does not receive the proper nourishment of fruits, and vegetables for example, that is going to have an affect on his or her growth. Climate change has made long lasting impacts on the food we eat. We have to be more selective with choosing the kind of food we are eating. The industrial industry (farming) has actually contributed to some of these impacts on our food and animals.
We are only adaptable to a certain extent. Humans rely on vaccinations to protect and build our bodies up to fight off protection. Think about it for a minute or two. We go to the doctor or take medication when we are sick instead of relying on our bodies to fight off infection or heal itself. Throughout history, our ancestors did not have the resources or medication to combat disease, so if we have evolved more than them why do we need so many? Because we have it! As humans if there is something to resolve an issue we utilize it to again make things easier, and quicker.In the article “Evolutions and Origins of Disease,” I thought it was interesting how they touched on natural things like coughing and sneezing being beneficial. We naturally associate symptoms like that with something being wrong instead of our bodies just trying to fight off infection or disease.
Great blog post, Britney! I agree that this was a good way to wrap up the course as it was a nice reflection on all of the information that we learned. I really like your example of technology and how that has evolved as I think it is something that has changed and evolved humans tremendously. We have become very reliant on technology and I am interested in how that will impact human evolution in the long term. I also really enjoy the example of climate change as well as the relation of food and diet as both are very important topics right now and have a great impact on our planet as well as the human race. Your question on the need and use of antibiotics is very interesting, too and is something I had never thought of.
I agree, this past module has really forced me to reflect on everything we have learned in this class so far. I can imagine that with the amount of brain stimulation we are used to increases that there will be a time where anthropologists would see a distinct difference in brain development as compared to the more recent past. I feel that one of the biggest factors in humans continuous evolution is our environment. Humans have impacted every aspect of the environment and now we can include environmental factors such as climate. It will be interesting to see how humans will adapt in the short term to climate change and in the long run. As the world becomes more globalized and international, I wonder how conflicting or combining cultural traits will influence humans constant evolution.
Great job on this week’s blog post Britney. You made some great points and you summarized this week’s topic perfectly! I can agree this week’s post has allowed me to recollect my thoughts on prior lectures about human evolution. My blog post is very similar to yours. I touched on technology and how we as humans are very reliant on it. I feel soon technology will become more of a necessity and everyone will be using it to complete simple day-to-day task. Also, I never thought about it until you mentioned how humans relies on vaccination. I too associate sneezing and coughing with having a fever or head cold, but these are natural functions of the body! I’m glad I read your blog post because you made some insightful comments, that contributed to my overall knowledge of human variability!
Hey Britney! I really like how you discussed in your blog post how human are evolving with technology. Technology has become so complex yet so important in our daily lives. Like you said, we utilize technology to tell us what to eat, what to wear, etc. We can now drive cars, planes, trains, bikes, when our early ancestors only transportation was by foot. We definitely definitely have made a lot of short cuts and easy routes for our lives. And the best part is that technology continues to change and evolve just as we do. You talk also about vaccines and how we now rely on them to protect our bodies. The field of medicine also is continuously evolving and growing. It is crazy how we can prevent and treat sicknesses today that may have not been treatable even a decade ago.
Hello, I like your post as it was a great read. I like how you were able to explain how humans today rely a lot on technology and how we are more prone to vaccines. I think we have a more advantage now than our ancestors as you mentioned. We as humans evolve as technology gets better and more improved. We are able to understand that this world is also evolving around us due to human evolution and how we are able utilize the skills learned by our ancestors. The goal is to keep on repeating and learning from ways anthropologist in the past taught or even paved the way for us. Good job over all.
Britney,
I felt like I was pretty enlightened when I read the article from this week about disease “Evolutions and Origins of Disease.” This topic was not something I thought about much before. Thinking of disease and how they have evolved and changed over time is just not something that crosses the mind. But, it is interesting to learn about. I think a lot of things we have now our ancestors never had to experience. I also think about how some diseases and illnesses and things can’t be transmitted across species, but it is interesting how our species has evolved from more primitive or “animal-like” to now and how we think about that evolution in terms of health and diseases. I like how you mentioned how we think of coughing and sneezing as being sick, when it is our natural way to fight off something worse.
Hey Britney, thank you for sharing your ideas with us, I really enjoyed reading your post for this final week of class! I like how you talked about how this week let you reflect on everything we’ve learned so far. I totally felt the same way. This summer semester has gone by so fast, but we’ve really learned a lot of cool stuff. I think technology is a topic everyone talked about for this week’s post and I think it couldn’t be truer. Tech is definitely doing something to our evolution, whether we like it or not and whether we’re aware of it or not. One thing I talked about in my post was the fact that scientists have developed ways to genetically alter our offspring, which is so crazy to me.
Hi Britney, I agree with how you brought up technology. I think this is a drastic change that we are just learning how to get used to. It has been so incorporated in our daily lives that we must adapt and evolve to be able to use it and live a normal life. I like how you brought up genetically modified organisms and how those relate to our evolving environment. With such a high increase in population and a money driven economy we are forced to look into cheap ways to produce large amounts of food and GMOs are how we have adapted to this problem. I really enjoyed how you mentioned that there is a certain extent to which are adaptable and that we run into things such as diseases and other ailments that can stop us from adapting.
I agree that technology has made it easier for humans to progress in evolution. We use it as an aid and solution to most of our problems, some good some bad. With the diverse and ever changing diets of Americans we are hindering how nutritious our food is, with the common goal being mass production and taking shortcuts where it affects us most. I also agree with your opinions on the article, “Evolution and Origins of Disease” about coughing and sneezing being beneficial. There are many natural functions our body has to fight off threats on their own, and when we constantly treat things with medication before letting it run its course, we weaken our immune system to fight it off again. I believe the article states that running a fever is actually good for your body, as long as it isn’t higher than 100.. It means your body is appropriately responding to the infection and trying to fight it off itself. It mentioned that if you can, try to let your fever run its course to build up immunities, it actually makes our system stronger (in most cases).