Content: Preface x Introduction: Myths and Misconceptions 1 1 Ideas about Evolution 7 #1 Evolution is a theory, not a fact 7 #2 Evolution is completely random 12 #3 All evolutionary changes are adaptive 16 #4 In evolution, bigger is always better 22 #5 Natural selection always works 26 #6 Some species are more evolved than are others 29 #7 Humans lived at the same time as the dinosaurs 33 2 Human Origins 39 #8 If apes evolved into humans, then apes should not exist today 39 #9 Ramapithecus was a human ancestor 44 #10 Humans and African apes split from each other over 15 million years ago 51 #11 Gigantopithecus was the ancestor of Bigfoot (assuming Bigfoot exists) 56 #12 Human traits all evolved at the same time 60 #13 Large brains evolved very early in human evolution 66 #14 The common ancestor of African apes and humans walked like a chimpanzee 72 #15 Bipedalism first evolved on the African grasslands 76 #16 Lucy was so small because she was a child 80 #17 Australopithecus was a killer ape 85 #18 Human evolution can be described as a ladder 90 #19 All hominin species have probably been discovered 97 #20 There are no transitional fossils in human evolution 101 3 Evolution of the Genus Homo 109 #21 Only one species of Homo lived 2 million years ago 109 #22 Early Homo had modern human brain size 115 #23 Only humans are toolmakers and have culture 120 #24 We can identify species by the stone tools they made 125 #25 Homo habilis definitely made shelter 132 #26 Our ancestors have always made fire 135 #27 Early humans got all of their meat from hunting 139 #28 Species with larger brow ridges are more ape ]like 143 #29 Neandertals walked bent over and were dumb brutes 148 #30 Neandertals definitely could not speak 153 #31 Modern humans appeared first in Eurasia 158 #32 Mitochondrial Eve is our only common female ancestor 163 #33 Neandertals did not interbreed with modern humans 169 #34 We do not need fossils any more to learn about human evolution 175 #35 All recent human species had large brains 178 4 Recent and Future Human Evolution 187 #36 Each of us has billions of distinct ancestors 187 #37 The first Americans came from Europe or the Middle East 192 #38 The first Polynesians came from South America 198 #39 The origin of agriculture led to an improvement in health 203 #40 Civilization has been influenced by extraterrestrials 206 #41 The recent increase in life expectancy was due initially to antibiotics 211 #42 There are three distinct shades of human skin color 217 #43 Biological race is useful for understanding human variation 223 #44 All African Americans have the same genetic history 227 #45 Genetic ancestry is the same thing as cultural identity 231 #46 Sickle cell Anemia is a black disease 234 #47 There is a strong genetic relationship between brain size and intelligence test scores 239 #48 Humans are no longer evolving 243 #49 Blond hair will eventually disappear 246 #50 We can predict future human evolution 249 References 258 Index 273