Origins of humans according to Daily Mail....

Apparently humans are hybrids of pig and chimpanzee.

This calls for an experiment!

edited 2nd Dec '13 4:17:41 AM by IraTheSquire

...the heck?

First!

^ You have a very appropriate title.

Well... We do have the whole subcutaneous fat and tendency to sunburn thing in common with our porcine brethren, which chimpanzees don't have (and makes them shit at swimming).

USA is a country where they teach in some states bullshit like Young Earth Creationism. Nothing will shock me about their pseudoscientists.

Also, The Daily Mail is evil.

And as an science teacher in the USA, I personally take offense to that.

edited 2nd Dec '13 4:29:45 AM by unnoun

Well, everyone in the Western world was at one point taught the young earth creationism stuff. Or they tended to get burned, drowned or hanged as heretics if they disbelieved. plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Trouble is, by that logic the platypus will have to be a hybrid of a duck, otter and beaver.

It's still the fact your system of education let fruitcakes in.

Waiting for Manbearpig.

edited 2nd Dec '13 4:37:51 AM by CaptainKatsura

Wait, wait! It isn't? I was lied to! Damnit.

As one of those fruitcakes, I take even more offense to that.

...Anyway. I mean, yeah, Pigs are stupidly similar to humans in many ways. Pig dissections are pretty much the best next to an actual human cadaver. The cells, tissues and organs are all really close, and so is a lot of the DNA. We can get a lot of porcine diseases. And parasites. And vice versa.

So. I haven't seen the actual study, but parts of the premise of it make some actual sense. The trouble is that we have way more primate features, and the idea of interbreeding after speciation is basically impossible by definition. So I can sorta squint and see where the idea comes from I guess. Still stupid.

EDIT: Also, why the fuck does the article have a naked lady?

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:10:53 AM by unnoun

Please tell me this is satirical.

I really hope it is. Knowing The Daily Mail though...

Goddammit. Why. Why do people not understand how evolution works? Why?

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:05:18 AM by unnoun

Don't tell me you deny Darwinism and/or vote Republican. D:

Is that a polite way of saying "Laughed out of court wherever he talks about it"?

...I do neither of those things. Well. Depending on what you mean by "Darwinism". I do understand and accept as true the concept of evolution of species and Natural Selection.

I suppose my nature as a fruitcake doesn't have much to do with my scientific practices but. I mean, jobs shouldn't discriminate against fruitcakes. We're basically nice people.

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:04:08 AM by unnoun

I sure hope Katsura did not meant Social Darwinism.

Exactly. Social Darwinism is bullshit.

EDIT: I mean, I guess I might vote for a member of the Republican Party into public office if I agreed with most of his policies or at least more of his policies than his opponent's. That hasn't happened but I'd be a fool to deny that it could. I see no reason to owe any particular inherent loyalty to one party over another.

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:13:05 AM by unnoun

My definition of fruitcake is either a person who deny certain empirical facts about the world, including scientific theories (NOTE: do not mistake with hypothesis since theory is a hypothesis confirmed by well-grounded evidence) or far right person, not always but often religious, who oppresses minorities who just lead different life style than 'fruitcake' in question.

So I don't have problem with Christians who do not deny what science is certain about and don't bash people for different religious and/or cultural practice.

PS. Fruitcakes in my definition are also Atheists who believe gods were aliens who visited Earth in ancient times and see alien intervention everywhere, in spite of archeological evidence. I'd say these guys worry me more than some YE Cs.

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:13:59 AM by CaptainKatsura

I'm a Postmodernist, and I dabble in voodoo, ritualism, kabbalah, and Native American spiritualities. I am told that there is supposed to be a conflict between these aspects of my personal life and my career in the hard sciences, specifically biology. Screw that.

Science is great and I love it, but it can't create meaning or purpose.

EDIT: I mean, I guess I might vote for a member of the Republican Party into public office if I agreed with most of his policies or at least more of his policies than his opponent's. That hasn't happened but I'd be a fool to deny that it could. I see no reason to owe any particular inherent loyalty to one party over another.

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:18:57 AM by unnoun

@Unnon. I do not think belief in magic does conflict science by definition, unless somebody wants to replace proved theorem (proved for emphasis) with her/his understanding of magic.

While I'm at it, I could explain why ancient aliens guys worry me so much. There is certain kind of condescending racism in their claims, in that ancient civilizations are unable to do anything without intervention of aliens. It says a lot about those people that they usually place alien interventions outside Europe.

PS. If we confirm things like ESP or other kinds of 'magic' do exist , they won't be 'magic' anymore, but 'science'. Things explained don't feel that unusual, usually.

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:24:15 AM by CaptainKatsura

It's the Daily Mail. They could well have misread exactly what was said - I'd guess the person in question said 'It could be said this happened, where...', but they're printing it as 'This happened, where...'.

The first one is an analogy, the second is silly.

Again, The Daily Mail is evil. Evil.

   EVIL   

I know that some anti-genetic engineering Luddites scare people with prospect of man(bear)pig happening.

I'd prefer catgirls (but not too furry). I'm sure some will be enough crazy (awesome) to pull it off.

edited 2nd Dec '13 5:28:53 AM by CaptainKatsura