Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:00 GMT
... to welcome our new genetically modified tea-drinking speaking mouse overlords!
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:00 GMT
Slightly misreading the headline, I suddenly thought that this explains Party Conferences...
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:00 GMT
"proving that our evolutionary cousins could speak is pretty much impossible, given the absence of contemporary sound recording equipment"
Indeed. It is exactly as difficult as proving that our *ancestors* could speak at that time.
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:03 GMT
"Dr Paabo has grown a batch of lab mice whose FOXP2 genes have been replaced with the human version, and says that although their behaviour is unchanged "there seems to be a change in vocalisation. They squeak in a different way". The mice also have extra connections in their brains."
This is terrific news ! Once this bloke has sorted out the exact genes sequence, surely, he'll be able to work out a treatment for "her" being too talkative !
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:03 GMT
"...their being capable of speech doesn't prove that we would have been able to sit down with the "cavemen" and have a natter over a cup of tea (proving that our evolutionary cousins could speak is pretty much impossible, given the absence of contemporary sound recording equipment)"
Not so impossible. If anyone would care to send me a stamped addressed envelope plus £10, I can send them sample recordings of conversations held in presumably some sort of meeting, furthermore proving that Neanderthals have not died out and a small group disguised as computer programmers is still alive and well, thriving in an old building in Staffordshire.
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:03 GMT
How else would they have signed us up for the new EU constitution without a referendum?
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:03 GMT
"Critics of the work have suggested it could have been contaminated by human DNA"
Maybe those critics would also like to challenge every guilty verdict based on DNA.
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:03 GMT
Probably an early embedded dDutch Netherland thing, Senor.
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 14:03 GMT
For definitive evidence of this, please see any of the many videos showing one S. Ballmer at any M$ gathering...
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 17:44 GMT
Could the Dr. make some talking mice with tiny little five fingered hands please?
Posted Friday 19th October 2007 17:53 GMT
Is incorrect, and rests on (a) anthropcentric prejudice, (b) nostalgia for Victorian prurity, (c) 'The Inheritors' by Wm Golding. Would you rather have a hippy or a neanderthal for a son-in-law?
Posted Saturday 20th October 2007 02:35 GMT
Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?
Posted Saturday 20th October 2007 03:19 GMT
Yes, but me and Pippi Longstockings? It'll never work.
Posted Saturday 20th October 2007 13:25 GMT
<quote>The human version of this gene is different from the chimp version in two places, leading scientists to speculate that these changes are responsible for our ability to speak</quote>
It could alternatively be responsible for our inability to peel bananas with our feet, couldn't it? Has anyone checked those modified mice for opposable digits?
Posted Saturday 20th October 2007 18:08 GMT
Nope, I just checked that one now. Not only did I peel a banana with my feet I managed to get a good amount into my mouth.
Chimps 0 : Humans 1
Posted Sunday 21st October 2007 04:19 GMT
Same thing we do every night, Pinky.
Try to take over the world!
Posted Sunday 21st October 2007 17:58 GMT
@ Ken Hagan
There is some debate as to whether Neanderthals are really our ancestors - or are actually more like cousins, sharing some more distant forebears. Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis and Homo Sapiens Sapiens....
Posted Monday 22nd October 2007 03:28 GMT
The line is
"I think so Brain, but me and pippy longstockings? I mean think what the children would look like!"
Other favourites
"I think so Brain but isnt that what they invented tube socks for?"
"I think so Brain but if we didnt have ears we'd look like Weasels!"
"I think so Brain but if they called them sad meals kids wouldn't buy them."
Posted Tuesday 23rd October 2007 00:53 GMT
< proving that our evolutionary cousins could speak is pretty much impossible, given the absence of contemporary sound recording equipment
Well: a load of jokes, but no serious comments.
Consider the findings that the tool-making skills of the Neanderthals were not too inferior to those of homo sapiens of the same period and that Neanderthals buried their dead, with tributes of flowers thrown into the graves (totally unlike the behaviour of the present-day great apes, who leave their dead to rot where they fall, and move on).
The findings indicate a culture, and this is not possible without language. In particular, the burial of the dead indicates that the Neanderthals were capable of comprehending death, and thinking beyond it: a facility not possessed by any animal other than modern homo sapiens (i.e., us).
The more I hear about Neanderthals, the more I admire them.
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