Adoptive Parenting Is More Complex Than Evolutionary Theory Would Predict

2021 ◽  
pp. 374-410
Author(s):  
Jessica A. K. Matthews ◽  
Ellen E. Pinderhughes ◽  
Martha L. Pott
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Evolutionary Perspective ◽  
Human History ◽  
Relative Difficulty ◽  
Adoption Theory ◽  
History Of

This chapter focuses on adoptive parenting. At face value, adoption does not fulfill one of the primary goals of evolution: survival and eventual reproduction of one’s genes. Why, then, given our evolutionary history, and the relative difficulty of adoption, is adoption so widespread and usually successful? The chapter is devoted to examining adoption from an evolutionary perspective. It traces the history of adoption and reviews many reasons why adoption has been, and still is, widespread. The human history of adoption reflects many of our evolutionary goals and biological drives. However, one of the unique capacities of humanity is the ability to rise above our baser biology to use logic and reason to overcome gut reactions rooted in animal biology. Modern adoption theory and practice seek to recognize patterns rooted in biology, history, and culture, while encouraging more equitable practices that respect each individual involved in adoption.

scholarly journals A Natural History of Hygiene

2007 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valerie A Curtis
Keyword(s):  
Infectious Disease ◽  
Natural History ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Animal Behaviour ◽  
Human History ◽  
Hygiene Behaviour ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Times

In unpacking the Pandora’s box of hygiene, the author looks into its ancient evolutionary history and its more recent human history. Within the box, she finds animal behaviour, dirt, disgust and many diseases, as well as illumination concerning how hygiene can be improved. It is suggested that hygiene is the set of behaviours that animals, including humans, use to avoid harmful agents. The author argues that hygiene has an ancient evolutionary history, and that most animals exhibit such behaviours because they are adaptive. In humans, responses to most infectious threats are accompanied by sensations of disgust. In historical times, religions, social codes and the sciences have all provided rationales for hygiene behaviour. However, the author argues that disgust and hygiene behaviour came first, and that the rationales came later. The implications for the modern-day practice of hygiene are profound. The natural history of hygiene needs to be better understood if we are to promote safe hygiene and, hence, win our evolutionary war against the agents of infectious disease.

scholarly journals The Hippo pathway origin and its oncogenic alteration in evolution

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuxuan Chen ◽  
Han Han ◽  
Gayoung Seo ◽  
Rebecca Vargas ◽  
Bing Yang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cell Proliferation ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Somatic Mutations ◽  
Hippo Pathway ◽  
Evolutionary Perspective ◽  
Paralogous Gene ◽  
Evolutionarily Conserved ◽  
History Of ◽  
Unicellular Origin ◽  
The Hippo Pathway

AbstractThe Hippo pathway is a central regulator of organ size and a key tumor suppressor via coordinating cell proliferation and death. Initially discovered in Drosophila, the Hippo pathway has been implicated as an evolutionarily conserved pathway in mammals; however, how this pathway was evolved to be functional from its origin is still largely unknown. In this study, we traced the Hippo pathway in premetazoan species, characterized the intrinsic functions of its ancestor components, and unveiled the evolutionary history of this key signaling pathway from its unicellular origin. In addition, we elucidated the paralogous gene history for the mammalian Hippo pathway components and characterized their cancer-derived somatic mutations from an evolutionary perspective. Taken together, our findings not only traced the conserved function of the Hippo pathway to its unicellular ancestor components, but also provided novel evolutionary insights into the Hippo pathway organization and oncogenic alteration.

scholarly journals The evolutionary history of Neanderthal and Denisovan Y chromosomes

Science ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 369 (6511) ◽  
pp. 1653-1656 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Petr ◽  
Mateja Hajdinjak ◽  
Qiaomei Fu ◽  
Elena Essel ◽  
Hélène Rougier ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mitochondrial Dna ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Genetic Load ◽  
Modern Human ◽  
Gene Pools ◽  
Chromosomal Gene ◽  
Human History ◽  
Effective Population ◽  
Y Chromosomes ◽  
History Of

Ancient DNA has provided new insights into many aspects of human history. However, we lack comprehensive studies of the Y chromosomes of Denisovans and Neanderthals because the majority of specimens that have been sequenced to sufficient coverage are female. Sequencing Y chromosomes from two Denisovans and three Neanderthals shows that the Y chromosomes of Denisovans split around 700 thousand years ago from a lineage shared by Neanderthals and modern human Y chromosomes, which diverged from each other around 370 thousand years ago. The phylogenetic relationships of archaic and modern human Y chromosomes differ from the population relationships inferred from the autosomal genomes and mirror mitochondrial DNA phylogenies, indicating replacement of both the mitochondrial and Y chromosomal gene pools in late Neanderthals. This replacement is plausible if the low effective population size of Neanderthals resulted in an increased genetic load in Neanderthals relative to modern humans.

scholarly journals The eIF4F and eIFiso4F Complexes of Plants: An Evolutionary Perspective

2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan M. Patrick ◽  
Karen S. Browning
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Sequence Data ◽  
Flowering Plants ◽  
Plant Genome ◽  
Target Point ◽  
Evolutionary Perspective ◽  
Initiation Factors ◽  
Eif4f Complex ◽  
History Of ◽  
Common Target

Translation initiation in eukaryotes requires a number of initiation factors to recruit the assembled ribosome to mRNA. The eIF4F complex plays a key role in initiation and is a common target point for regulation of protein synthesis. Most work on the translation machinery of plants to date has focused on flowering plants, which have both the eIF4F complex (eIF4E and eIF4G) as well as the plant-specific eIFiso4F complex (eIFiso4E and eIFiso4G). The increasing availability of plant genome sequence data has made it possible to trace the evolutionary history of these two complexes in plants, leading to several interesting discoveries. eIFiso4G is conserved throughout plants, while eIFiso4E only appears with the evolution of flowering plants. The eIF4G N-terminus, which has been difficult to annotate, appears to be well conserved throughout the plant lineage and contains two motifs of unknown function. Comparison of eIFiso4G and eIF4G sequence data suggests conserved features unique to eIFiso4G and eIF4G proteins. These findings have answered some questions about the evolutionary history of the two eIF4F complexes of plants, while raising new ones.

scholarly journals The evolutionary history of Neandertal and Denisovan Y chromosomes

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Petr ◽  
Mateja Hajdinjak ◽  
Qiaomei Fu ◽  
Elena Essel ◽  
Hélène Rougier ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mitochondrial Dna ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Genetic Load ◽  
Modern Human ◽  
Gene Pools ◽  
Human History ◽  
Effective Population ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Y Chromosomes ◽  
History Of

AbstractAncient DNA has allowed the study of various aspects of human history in unprecedented detail. However, because the majority of archaic human specimens preserved well enough for genome sequencing have been female, comprehensive studies of Y chromosomes of Denisovans and Neandertals have not yet been possible. Here we present sequences of the first Denisovan Y chromosomes (Denisova 4 and Denisova 8), as well as the Y chromosomes of three late Neandertals (Spy 94a, Mezmaiskaya 2 and El Sidrón 1253). We find that the Denisovan Y chromosomes split around 700 thousand years ago (kya) from a lineage shared by Neandertal and modern human Y chromosomes, which diverged from each other around 370 kya. The phylogenetic relationships of archaic and modern human Y chromosomes therefore differ from population relationships inferred from their autosomal genomes, and mirror the relationships observed on the level of mitochondrial DNA. This provides strong evidence that gene flow from an early lineage related to modern humans resulted in the replacement of both the mitochondrial and Y chromosomal gene pools in late Neandertals. Although unlikely under neutrality, we show that this replacement is plausible if the low effective population size of Neandertals resulted in an increased genetic load in their Y chromosomes and mitochondrial DNA relative to modern humans.

Elaborating the role of reflection and individual differences in the study of folk-economic beliefs

2018 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Arceneaux
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Individual Differences ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Behavioral Responses ◽  
History Of ◽  
Economic Beliefs

AbstractIntuitions guide decision-making, and looking to the evolutionary history of humans illuminates why some behavioral responses are more intuitive than others. Yet a place remains for cognitive processes to second-guess intuitive responses – that is, to be reflective – and individual differences abound in automatic, intuitive processing as well.

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