Evolution of the Brain

Dear Limpid, I believe the melanesian elliptocytosis Dr. Adequate mentioned is seen in Papua New Guinea (Hadley et al, 1983). Another recently discovered mutation found in Papua New Guinea also confers resistance to severe malaria (Cockburn et al, 2004).TTFN,WKEdited by Wounded King, : No reason given.Edited by Wounded King, : Rectified typographical error

Thank you

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Lucy

There are various degrees of thalassaemia, depending on how many genes aren't functioning. If all of them are broken, the affected person will be stillborn; if only a few are broken ... you get Pete Sampras, amongst other people. If both are transmitted to the child, the outloock is poor, if I remember correctly. Also one sickle-cell allele and one haemoglobin C allele can be nastier than two sickle-cell alleles. Tay-Sachs carriers are protected against tuberculosis. As with sickle-cell, it's only with two copies of the allele that you get negative symptoms.In European genes, the most common lethal recessive is cystic fibrosis. No-one really seems to know what it protects against ... cholera, typhoid, tuberculosis? ... 'cos whatever it is, Euopeans aren't dying of it any more. But given the compatively high rate of the condition, the disease, whatever it was, must have hit Europe good and hard. I have ... that sounds like postpartum psychosis, and if all you had were visual disturbances you can count yourself fortunate.NB: I'm not a medical doctor, I just have a retentive memory and an interest in various topics in medicine. And I can spell "metacarpophalangeal". Nothing that I say should be taken as definitive medical advice.

Thank you Dr Adequate, All very interesting stuff. When you have a moment to spare, would you very kindly suggest an online site or basic texts for evolution of the brain.It is very interesting about Tay Sachs, I wouldn't have thought that Jewish people would have any greater problem with TB than other groups. Of course, geographical origins may have predisposed them to more severe problems ... another guess.Cystic-fibrosis? ... not a consequence of the Black Death? I think it wiped out over a 1/3rd of the population in Europe just during one cycle alone. Even now, the pneumatic variety is considered pretty dire - and very fast working. When I was doing research in the British Museum studying original 16/17th texts, I recoiled instantly from a diary which stated that members of the diarist's family had the Black Death. But, luckily my mandatory white gloves saved me (grin).Regarding the visual nature of my condition, and the fact that it was triggered off by looking a one of van Gogh's work ( being painted during one of his worst mental periods) I just wondered if I picked up on something he was transmitting of his condition. (Most of his paintings reflect some of his mental illness - some more than others. And due to my mental state was vulnerable to it.) Just a thought ...but, as you say, just coincidental to my state at the time. My psychiatrist, subsequent to this event, obviously thought flowers were the key to diagnosis of mental disease. I have a newspaper photo where he is holding an enormously long stemmed lily and explaining some theory about it. Someone said he lost his license, but his diagnostic "flower" theory was unrelated.

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Lucy

Recommend a book on the evolution of the brain? I could probably write down everything anyone knows for certain on the back of a postcard.The problem is that when you look at the fossilized skull of, say, a Homo erectus, you can see that he had a brain of a certain size, but not what he did with it. You can see that whatever it was, it required more brainpower than Australopithecus.There just isn't the data. If you wanted to know about the evolution of tetrapod forelimbs, say, then paeleontologists could show you the intermediate forms and tell you what function each one served. Looking at hominid skulls ... we know they were for thinking with, but that's about it.You can also see an increasing sophistication in the use of stone tools, so larger brains do seem correlated to higher intelligence ... which we'd have guessed anyway.Does the hyoid bone tell us about the evolution of language? At best, it allows us to put a date on it; it wouldn't reveal the process.In genetics, now that we have the human and chimp genomes to compare, there may be some answers forthcoming.And of course, we don't really know how the brain works yet, so explaining its evolution would be kind of tricky.Does anyone have anything to add to that that's more than conjecture?---Cystic fibrosis as a protection against the plague? Possibly, but unless the Black Death ravages Old London Town again, how will we tell? The main suspect has long been cholera, but here's a chap arguing for tuberculosis.A look at the literature on CF and genetic immunity reveals papers littered with words such as "may", "might", "possibly" ... nothing's cut and dried yet.

There are books on brain evolution, not sure exactly what it is your hoping to find though.The 'principles of brain evolution' will have a good summary of what we knew up to 2004ish. I've found the precis of the book that was published in the journal 'behavioral and brain sciences', it also has commentary and peer reviews from many in the field. Here's a linky to the article, I uploaded it to sendspace for you (you should hopefully be able to download it from there). It does have a couple of chapters on the human brain but it is not it's only focus and it will be pretty high level stuff.Free large file hosting. Send big files the easy way!There is another book recently published that is more psychology based, 'origin of the mind' I think it's called.ABE: almost right, it's called 'The Origin of Mind: Evolution of Brain, Cognition, and General Intelligence', it's an APA book by David C. Geary. Should be a better read.Edited by melatonin, : correction

Hold the patterns and the jumpers, Lucy. As a wetsuit-wearin` water worker, I know the value of a good neoprene.:-p

Dr Adequate, Thank you yet again for the information. As for the Black Death, Europe (and I think the east) had waves of it. It was at its deadliest in Europe in the early 14th century (1348) when it first broke out, and also at its most virulent and infectious form (pneumonic). It must have been pretty devastating. Bubonic plague kept recurring for more than three centuries after, but even in its non-pneumonic (or a "lesser" form) manged to wipe out up to a third of an area's population. Either the plague mutated, or either some resistance was built up in the general populations. Certainly, better hygiene wouldn't have been a factor and the ratus ratus species never died out. Nowdays, cases of the pneumonic form can, I believe, in its early stages be confused with appendicitis - which I find quite extraordinary. But it remains vicious. I can remember my grandmother referring to Bubonic fever occurring in the population in her youth - her elder sister died of it. Whether it was in some way a distant relative of the plague, I do not know.It must have been a wonderful time in Europe in the past, what with recurring famine, then the outbreak of smallpox as well.So there is no common gene shared between man and his nearest relative that is related to a major mental disorder? That is interesting .. It would seem than evolution of the brain in man coincides with the development of genetic major mental disorders.

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Lucy

Dear Melatonin,Thank you very much for the references. I look forward to reading them. Incidentally, how do you regard Lewontin's theory that the removal of a "damaging" gene, might be counter-productive?

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Lucy

Well Nightrain, The offer still stands if you need it ...!

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Lucy

By the way, does skull size necessarily relate to mental ability? The grey parrot of Africa is said to have the intelligence of a four-year old human. And the big apes and orang utans have larger skulls than man.Now I read that there is a hypothesis (yet another ...) that Alzheimers is more likely to hit a person with a small skull size. Of all the conditions one can develop, I have a greater fear of mental senility, in whatever form, than cancer. But my daughter tells me not to worry, that I wouldn't know anyway (actually, I don't know quite how to take this!!) I had hoped that Alzheimers was a ploy to avoid speaking to those one didn't chose too - like certain family members, or avoiding loathed activites expected of one. But regrettably not.I thought that there was a method whereby taking a mold of the inside of the early human skull could indicate which parts of the brain were functioning - at least at some level.I very much look forward to reading the references Melatonin supplied.

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Lucy

Said by whom? Gorillas have brains averaging about 500 cc, chimps about 400 cc, humans 1500 cc. To an extent, yes. See here for example. But as with the hyoid bone, this can only help us to put dates on the process --- but not to know what it was.

While Limpid's statement may be slightly inaccurate, Dr. Irene Pepperberg has published some very interesting papers on the intelligence of African Grey Parrots (Psittacus erithacus). Here is one paper where she finds that the parrot "demonstrated numerical comprehension competence comparable to that of chimpanzees and very young children."

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Page not found - Alex Foundation

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It's an interesting browse...

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Kakariki

Yeah, Greys are quite intelligent (I have one), along with mammals, some birds show tool use.This is from the article I uploaded before... Streidter, G.F. (2006)I guess the brain size idea holds well within mammalia.Edited by melatonin, : bad html codeEdited by melatonin, : No reason given.

I am very interested in the brain of birds, more so than in other animals - except humans. I think that only now we are beginning to even comprehend the extraordorinary
nature that birds have. I know that Crows particularly are also bright. In Japan there was a problem with them placing stones on the railway track just to hear the noise of them going off as the train ran over them. I found this absolutely fascinating!! Also, they used vehicles to break open walnuts for them. At intersections, these birds would, during the red light, place a walnut under a car's wheel. After the cars had passed, they would rush over and collect these nuts. I have references regarding these events, but have to look them up.
I had a teal duck and a goose, Abelard and Eloise, who developed fascinating traits. We have wild ducks where I live also. A pair of wild ducks came onto our block, the female and Abelard developed a friendship. As my birds were free to roam - except at night, due to foxes, Abelard was apparently making acquaintances with other houses in the street. The householders knew him (unbeknownst to me) and gave him food. When he developed an attachment for the little female, he used to take her round with him to the houses for food. The wild male duck stayed behind. The next door neighbour told us that when they had open day for a sale, Abelard walked straight in, and vetted all the visitors. Both he and Eloise, would come into our home on occasion, especially if we had guests. Their curiosity was insatiable. A number of wild birds, such as pigeons and magpies developed attachments with my children. One pigeon, would dive into the house as I was opening the front door. He nested in a wicker basket on top of the bookcase and would ride on the roof of the bus when the children went to school, only returning when the bus came to the end of the street. My son came home with a wild galah that the vet had given him. It had been hit by a car and the vet diagonsed that he would never fly again. We assumed he had been someone's pet, but they never enquired. My husband would take him round the garden on his shoulder and place him in different trees. I would collect wild grasses, from which he selected those he wanted. I soon learnt to only pick these. This went on for a month. However, on seeing a goat he took fright and "flew" away. The thing about this event, is that not only could he fly, but he had only been in the vet's care for a day, and before that he had been a wild bird - not in human contact at all. So in this case, who was the "bird brain"?

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Lucy