Human Evolution

[Darwinsbulldog]

Final Version is out:-

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal...ture11128.html

[STILL FREE]

[Darwinsbulldog]

Wu, X., C. Zhang, et al. (2012). "Early Pottery at 20,000 Years Ago in Xianrendong Cave, China." Science 336(6089): 1696-1700.

The invention of pottery introduced fundamental shifts in human subsistence practices and sociosymbolic behaviors. Here, we describe the dating of the early pottery from Xianrendong Cave, Jiangxi Province, China, and the micromorphology of the stratigraphic contexts of the pottery sherds and radiocarbon samples. The radiocarbon ages of the archaeological contexts of the earliest sherds are 20,000 to 19,000 calendar years before the present, 2000 to 3000 years older than other pottery found in East Asia and elsewhere. The occupations in the cave demonstrate that pottery was produced by mobile foragers who hunted and gathered during the Late Glacial Maximum. These vessels may have served as cooking devices. The early date shows that pottery was first made and used 10 millennia or more before the emergence of agriculture.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/336/6089/1696

[Mjt]

Puppy, methinks you know us too well
On the up side, I have learned a new thing, in spite of myself













Come on, fess up, who else had to look cos of the thread title?

Oh, just me then. Awkward

[Logic please]

@Mjt: another sneaky hand half-raises over here.

[Darwinsbulldog]

Journalistic licence! Just tryin' ta keep my readership numbers up.

[Darwinsbulldog]

Kinoshita, M., R. Matsui, et al. (2012). "Genetic dissection of the circuit for hand dexterity in primates." Nature 487(7406): 235-238.

It is generally accepted that the direct connection from the motor cortex to spinal motor neurons is responsible for dexterous hand movements in primates1, 2, 3. However, the role of the ‘phylogenetically older’ indirect pathways from the motor cortex to motor neurons, mediated by spinal interneurons, remains elusive. Here we used a novel double-infection technique to interrupt the transmission through the propriospinal neurons (PNs)4, 5, 6, which act as a relay of the indirect pathway in macaque monkeys (Macaca fuscata and Macaca mulatta). The PNs were double infected by injection of a highly efficient retrograde gene-transfer vector into their target area and subsequent injection of adeno-associated viral vector at the location of cell somata. This method enabled reversible expression of green fluorescent protein (GFP)-tagged tetanus neurotoxin, thereby permitting the selective and temporal blockade of the motor cortex–PN–motor neuron pathway. This treatment impaired reach and grasp movements, revealing a critical role for the PN-mediated pathway in the control of hand dexterity. Anti-GFP immunohistochemistry visualized the cell bodies and axonal trajectories of the blocked PNs, which confirmed their anatomical connection to motor neurons. This pathway-selective and reversible technique for blocking neural transmission does not depend on cell-specific promoters or transgenic techniques, and is a new and powerful tool for functional dissection in system-level neuroscience studies.

<ABSRACT ONLY>

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature11206

[gruber]

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0712162744.htm

Professor Lee Berger, a Reader in Palaeoanthropology and the Public Understanding of Science at the Wits Institute for Human Evolution, will make the announcement at the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum in Shanghai, China on 13 July 2012.
"We have discovered parts of a jaw and critical aspects of the body including what appear to be a complete femur (thigh bone), ribs, vertebrae and other important limb elements, some never before seen in such completeness in the human fossil record," says Berger. "This discovery will almost certainly make Karabo the most complete early human ancestor skeleton ever discovered. We are obviously quite excited as it appears that we now have some of the most critical and complete remains of the skeleton, albeit encased in solid rock. It's a big day for us as a team and for our field as a whole."

[Darwinsbulldog]

Gervais, S. J., T. K. Vescio, et al. (2012). "Seeing women as objects: The sexual body part recognition bias." European Journal of Social Psychology: n/a-n/a.

Objectification theory suggests that the bodies of women are sometimes reduced to their sexual body parts. As well, an extensive literature in cognitive psychology suggests that global processing underlies person recognition, whereas local processing underlies object recognition. Integrating these literatures, we introduced and tested the sexual body part recognition bias hypothesis that women's (versus men's) bodies would be reduced to their sexual body parts in the minds of perceivers. Specifically, we adopted the parts versus whole body recognition paradigm, which is a robust indicator of local versus global processing. The findings across two experiments showed that women's bodies were reduced to their sexual body parts in perceivers' minds. We also found that local processing contributed to the sexual body part recognition bias, whereas global processing tempered it. Implications for sexual objectification and its underlying processes and motives are discussed. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...2BF4F73.d03t01

Paywall, so we are left with a write-up from SD:-

ScienceDaily (July 25, 2012) — When casting our eyes upon an object, our brains either perceive it in its entirety or as a collection of its parts. Consider, for instance, photo mosaics consisting of hundreds of tiny pictures that when arranged a certain way form a larger overall image: In fact, it takes two separate mental functions to see the mosaic from both perspectives.
A new study suggests that these two distinct cognitive processes also are in play with our basic physical perceptions of men and women -- and, importantly, provides clues as to why women are often the targets of sexual objectification.
The research, published in the European Journal of Social Psychology, found in a series of experiments that participants processed images of men and women in very different ways. When presented with images of men, perceivers tended to rely more on "global" cognitive processing, the mental method in which a person is perceived as a whole. Meanwhile, images of women were more often the subject of "local" cognitive processing, or the objectifying perception of something as an assemblage of its various parts.
The study is the first to link such cognitive processes to objectification theory, said Sarah Gervais, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the study's lead author.
"Local processing underlies the way we think about objects: houses, cars and so on. But global processing should prevent us from that when it comes to people," Gervais said. "We don't break people down to their parts -- except when it comes to women, which is really striking. Women were perceived in the same ways that objects are viewed."
In the study, participants were randomly presented with dozens of images of fully clothed, average-looking men and women. Each person was shown from head to knee, standing, with eyes focused on the camera.
After a brief pause, participants then saw two new images on their screen: One was unmodified and contained the original image, while the other was a slightly modified version of the original image that comprised a sexual body part. Participants then quickly indicated which of the two images they had previously seen.
The results were consistent: Women's sexual body parts were more easily recognized when presented in isolation than when they were presented in the context of their entire bodies. But men's sexual body parts were recognized better when presented in the context of their entire bodies than they were in isolation.
"We always hear that women are reduced to their sexual body parts; you hear about examples in the media all the time. This research takes it a step further and finds that this perception spills over to everyday women, too," Gervais said. "The subjects in the study's images were everyday, ordinary men and women … the fact that people are looking at ordinary men and women and remembering women's body parts better than their entire bodies was very interesting."
Also notable is that the gender of participants doing the observing had no effect on the outcome. The participant pool was evenly divided between men and women, who processed each gender's bodies similarly: Regardless of their gender, perceivers saw men more "globally" and women more "locally."
"We can't just pin this on the men. Women are perceiving women this way, too," Gervais said. "It could be related to different motives. Men might be doing it because they're interested in potential mates, while women may do it as more of a comparison with themselves. But what we do know is that they're both doing it."
Would there be an antidote to a perceiver's basic cognitive processes that lead women to be reduced and objectified? Researchers said some of the study's results suggested so. When the experiment was adjusted to create a condition where it was easier for participants to employ "global" processing, the sexual body part recognition bias appeared to be alleviated. Women were more easily recognizable in the context of their whole bodies instead of their various sexual body parts.
Because the research presents the first direct evidence of the basic "global" vs. "local" framework, the authors said it could provide a theoretical path forward for more specific objectification work.
"Our findings suggest people fundamentally process women and men differently, but we are also showing that a very simple manipulation counteracts this effect, and perceivers can be prompted to see women globally, just as they do men," Gervais said. "Based on these findings, there are several new avenues to explore."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0725150215.htm

[EvilDRMike]

@DarwinsBulldog if you are going to give away the secret man club stuff you will be kicked out of man club. Man's only hope is that women never find out what men are really like. Sure they think they know but they cannot be sure. As for me it's a good job no one can read my mind as I'm sure I'd be in jail, and that's if they go easy on me.

EDM

[Darwinsbulldog]

Ha ha, got u 2 read it though!