Season 4 Episode 6: Your Inner Sea Squirt

Mark, Sarah, and James discuss Chapter 6 of Charles Darwin's Descent of Man. In this chapter Darwin unequivocally declares humans evolved from ancestral primate stock and that event occurred in Africa. We discussed how prescient Darwin was in interpreting the biology and scant fossil record in determining human relationship in the evolutionary tree. 

(Image credit: Nick Hobgood/Wikimedia Commons)

We discussed at length this problematic paragraph:

The great break in the organic chain between man and his nearest allies, which cannot be bridged over by any extinct or living species, has often been advanced as a grave objection to the belief that man is descended from some lower form; but this objection will not appear of much weight to those who, convinced by general reasons, believe in the general principle of evolution. Breaks incessantly occur in all parts of the series, some being wide, sharp and defined, others less so in various degrees; as between the orang and its nearest allies—between the Tarsius and the other Lemuridæ—between the elephant and in a more striking manner between the Ornithorhynchus or Echidna, and other mammals. But all these breaks depend merely on the number of related forms which have become extinct. At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked, will no doubt be exterminated. The break will then be rendered wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as at present between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.

After that awkward discussion we finished with the notion that our ancestor probably looked like a sea squirt. 

Here is the episode that Sarah referenced on the economics of Darwin's voyage - it was called to Drawn a Bill

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

1st interlude music was Mr. Smith - Happy Dance.

https://freemusicarchive.org/music/mr-smith

2nd Interlude music

It's a long way to Amphioxus by Sam Hinton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0egWbwErRQ

Season 4 Episode 5: I am Jack's morality

In this episode we enlist a different Furlong, Dr. Jack Furlong, to help us untangle morality and determine if there really is such a thing as big M morality, as Sarah calls it. <spoiler alert>  Jack, after a very in depth explanation, says "No". 

Jack invokes the classic Trolley thought experiment to illustrate why various historical positions on morality stumble when confronted with the scenario and asks which big M morality system should be employed when resolving the trolley dilemma. Jack also challenges the view that morality in humans is either unique or exceptional. 

We also discussed how morality may show up in non-human animals and Jack cleared up for James the proper term to use when referring to more than a single octopus.  We also discussed if an octopus would have morality. 

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/12/octopus-farming-unethical-and-threat-to-food-chain

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

Interlude music 

ENCOMIUM by Evan Schaeffer Music Studios | https://soundcloud.com/evanschaeffer
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US

The Cure - Close to You

Season 4 Episode 4: Big M morality &c

In Chapter 4 Darwin begins to sketch out his views on how complicated human behaviors, like sacrifice, empathy for others, and group defense would evolve when selection would favor us to act otherwise.

Chapter 4 is entitled Comparison of the Mental Powers of Man and the Lower Animals - continued, but the short title at the top of the page is Moral Sense, which suggests what Darwin really thinks he is discussing. although he never clearly defines morality

Mark shares with us a couple of definitions of morality and notes that Darwin hints at the idea that morality is actions that we feel we ought to do, not necessarily what we want to do. Later in the chapter Darwin entangles into the concept of morality ideas of choice, doing things that are not innate, and having a sense of what others expect of us, and us wanting to avoid disapprobation from our social group.

We discussed altruistic and defensive behaviors exhibited in social animals and asked if those actions were actually moral. Here is an image of a baboon facing off a leopard to protect the baboon troop, is that action moral?

James proposed of the idea that there is a set of morals that are independent of religion or culture but are based upon equality and fairness that all rationale people would agree upon. Sarah referred to this as capital M morality and rejected the notion. Mark stayed silent of the idea....

Chapter 5 is where Darwin outlines his view that groups selection could explain the shift for moral behaviors, those behaviors that benefit the group at the cost to the individual. Darwin noted that-

 

When two tribes of primeval man, living in the same country, came into competition, if (other circumstances being equal) the one tribe included a great number of courageous, sympathetic and faithful members, who were always ready to warn each other of danger, to aid and defend each other, this tribe would succeed better and conquer the other. Let it be borne in mind how all-important in the never-ceasing wars of savages, fidelity and courage must be. The advantage which disciplined soldiers have over undisciplined hordes follows chiefly from the confidence which each man feels in his comrades. Obedience, as Mr. Bagehot has well shewn, is of the highest value, for any form of government is better than none. Selfish and contentious people will not cohere, and without coherence nothing can be effected. A tribe rich in the above qualities would spread and be victorious over other tribes: but in the course of time it would, judging from all past history, be in its turn overcome by some other tribe still more highly endowed. Thus the social and moral qualities would tend slowly to advance and be diffused throughout the world.

We discussed the strengths and weaknesses of group selection argument and also explored the conflicted tone Darwin used in these two Chapter. In these two chapters alone, Darwin used the term "savages" thirty-two times. In the entire text, Darwin used the term "savages" 187 times! We discussed what he meant by that term and considered modern alternative.

In this episode Sarah, Mark, and James discuss Chapter 4 & 5 of Darwin's The Descent of Man.  Before we got started, James noted that Mark is the campus champion of Crokinole which he plays in his campus office on this board. 

Mark Jackson's office Crokinole championship arena

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

Interlude music is Overthrow by Shaolin Dub

Season 4 Episode 3: Civilised as much as a dog

 

In this episode we discuss Chapter 3: The Mind from Darwin's Descent of Man. We are joined by a very special guest - Dr. Ellen Furlong from Illinois Wesleyan University who studies cognition in dogs. In this chapter Darwin spends some time going through a litany of traits that he associates with intelligence. His goal is to get the reader to recognize that humans, although very intelligent, are only different in degree and not in kind when compared to other animals. The list of traits Darwin thought indicated intelligence were:

Curiosity

Imitation

Attention

Memory

Imagination

Reason

Progressive Improvement

Tools and weapon use

Abstraction

Self-consciousness

Language

Sense of Beauty

Complex emotions 

Belief in God, superstition, etc.

Darwin started off the discussion clarifying the difference between instinct and intelligence and noted some researchers proposed that instinct and intelligence are an inverse ratio to each other, the more your behaviors are dictated by instinct the less intelligence, as defined by the traits above, you exhibited. 

Mark discussed instinct in humans when he was a special guest of the Podcast nearly 6 years ago from when we recorded this podcast. He was a special guest in October 2015 and we recorded this episode October 2021. You can find Mark's inaugural appearance here.

Ellen explained how nest building behavior is different from other behaviors we may do without thinking and why nest building is an instinct and bike riding is not.

Ellen made it clear that intelligence can only be compared within a species and in comparison to other individuals within a species. It is incorrect to make cross species comparisons when it comes to intelligence, since each species is a genius for its own domain. Ellen notes people love to make claims about how smart their dogs are, but they often ignore the failings of their dogs in those comparisons. Ellen noted a short essay she wrote about how dogs do love us has been very popular as people are very interested in knowing what is going on in the minds of their pets. 

We ended the conversation about the classic marshmallow test which purported to measure patience and delayed gratification in young children. Children were offered a single marshmallow and told if they waited and not eat it, they would be given a second one later. It is the idea that can we resist our desire for instant gratification now for some possible bigger gratification in the future. 

Ellen discussed her own efforts to replicate that experiment using dogs and a variety of treats.  Unfortunately COVID has disrupted her research.

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

Interlude music is "Who let the dogs out?" by the Baha Men

 

Season 4 Episode 2: Absolutely useless faculty

 

In this episode we discuss Chapter 1 of Descent of Man and are joined by a special guest - Evolutionary developmental (EvoDevo) biologist Dr. Belinda Sly. Darwin spends the chapter documenting how human bodies show the scars from evolution past. Darwin takes two approaches in convincing the reader that humans are modified from "lower forms". In one approach he discusses how humans share ailments, diseases, and parasites with other animals. The argument of homology. The second argument Darwin uses is cataloging the various rudimentary, vestigial, and nascent structures humans have and how they are present and useful in other animals.

Sarah highlighted the homology argument that Darwin used - the fact that humans share diseases and parasites with other animals, showing the similarity of our bodies with other animals - by discussing the diversity of human lice - head, body, and pubic lice. After explaining the differences between each, Sarah helped us understand how they are used to identify important points in our evolutionary past, when we became hairless and when we adopted clothes. 

The strongest homology argument that Darwin presented was the similarity in form of vertebrate embryos and how the new technology of the time - microscopes - was increasing that dataset.  Dr. Belinda Sly discussed the different scientists of the time that were documenting embryo development - Karl Ernst von Baer and Ernst Haeckel. There is great similarity in embryo forms for various vertebrate animals, although Haeckel seems to have exaggerated those similarities in his illustrations. Belinda discussed the power of the comparison of embryos, and how they do give the best evidence of evolution via descent with modification but fall short of the old adage "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny".

The second line of argument Darwin discussed was the various rudimentary or vestigial structures we have that are of "absolutely useless faculty".  In particular he spent some time highlighting our restricted ability to use our panniculus carnosus muscles to move our skin as illustrated in this GIF of a horse twitching its skin to dislodge flies. In humans the ability is mostly restricted to our ability to move our eyebrows, but Darwin discussed some families ability to move their scalp and Sarah shared her "lamest super power ever" ability to slightly move her ears. 

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

1st interlude music is Head Lice song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7us3ucQmrIE

2nd interlude music is Black Bear Combo - Black Bear Kolo http://blackbearcombo.com/

  

Season 4 - Episode 1: The most interesting problem for the naturalist

 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/

This is the first episode of Season 4 where we begin our exploration of Charles Darwin's Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex which was published in 1871. In this episode we explore how Darwin finally got around to discussing the evolution of humans, a topic he avoided in Origin of Species even though he told Alfred Wallace it was "...the highest & most interesting problem for the naturalist." In creating the book he relied on a wide array of scientists, citizen scientists, and bureaucrats in collecting the wide array of facts he uses to support his claim that humans are just another animal and we have evolved like any other organism. 

We discussed what the social, political, and scientific climate was like when Darwin was publishing this book and how it was received by his friends and enemies alike. 

https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/henrietta-emma-darwin

Sarah introduced us to Henrietta Darwin, Charles's daughter who was influential in editing Descent of Man. We discussed the amazing University of Cambridge correspondence project where you can easily search the immense database of correspondences between Charles Darwin and other family members, scientists, friends, his publisher, and others, Follow this link if you wish to explore the site. 

Sarah reminded us of the tragic tale of the children who were on the Beagle when young Charles Darwin traveled the world. You can find that story told in detail in our first episode of Season 2 entitled Hot Coffee 

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

Interlude music is "Saulsalita Soul" by Mr. ruiZ

Season 3 Episode 11: a loathsome, distended, tumefied, bloated, dropsical mass

 

By Photographer unidentified - MS Am 1092 (1185), Houghton Library, Harvard University, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=34246605

In this final episode of Season 3 we actually do not talk about Darwin, but instead focus our attention to William James, a medical doctor, early psychologist, and philosopher who wrote about emotions about 20 years after Charles Darwin published The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals. Mark suggested we read James' views on emotion which he published first in his 1890 two volume set of his Principles of Psychology and then distilled in his single volume Psychology:Briefer Course. You can find reading editions of both books at the wonderful resource Project Gutenberg.

The opening and closing theme to Discovering Darwin is "May" by Jared C. Balogh.

Interlude music Laid by James