EVOLUTION'S CHILD:LOOK FOR THE DESCENDANTS OF HOMO SAP/ENS

IN THIS GALLERY OF FUTURE FORMS

rHE VUIIOLEEITOTUTTON AIIT'IANAC

When the book of evolution iswritten, what will it say aboutthe descendants of man?Wil l the heirs to the humanthrone be t iny green crea-tures that feed off the sun, ex-pansive clouds of cosmicdust, or robots with virtuallyno organic components atall? When challenged by thecreative force of evolution,our far-flung progeny mighttake some innovative forms.

Whatever the outcome, sev-eral of the scientists we con-tacted in search of evolution-ary scenarios said that,thanks to extraordinary ad=vances in genetic engineer-ing and robotic science, wewill have the power to controlour species'fate. Partly be-cause we have begun totake command of our desti-ny, itwould be wise not to dis-count any of therfanciful lifeforms that follow. As the nine-teenth-century British biolo-gist Thomas Henry Huxleyonce said during a debate onevolution, "l am too much ofa skeptic to deny the possibili-ty of anything." So today,meet with an open mindsome of the potential mem-bers of the family of futureman.

HIOHER TOUGH

, Each finger of the robotcreature wi l l have f ingers.These f ingers, in turn, wi l lhave smaller fingers in a re-peating pattern. The metal-and-plastic creature, a futureversion of you, will pull in itsbranches to walk through a

door, then, once in theroom, spread out to its full six-foot diameter.

According to Hans Mo-ravec of Carnegie-Mellon's Flobotics lnstitute and author ofMind Children (Harvard Uni-versity Press), the fingers ofth is t reel ike creature wi l lhave a powerful sense oftouch. Gliding over a photo-graph, these tiny tacti le or-gans wil l sense height varia-tions in the developed silveron the paper. And if the crea-ture needs an eye, i t wi l lform it by crisscrossing its fin-gers tightly enough to diffractl ight l ike a lens.

But the most extraordinaryasoect of this immortal crea-ture wil l be its abil ity to simu-late human thoughts and cap-ture human memories so ore-c ise ly that in many ways i t

could pass for-indeed, re-place-one of us. In the sce-nario putforth by Moravec, hu-mans wi l l create this intel l i -gent robot replacement onesteo at a time. The creature'sdumb great-grandfather, cre-ated between 2000 and2010, will have the brainpow-er of a l izard bui l t for gruntwork-and no personality atall. The second-generation ro-bot wi l l learn from experi-ence. The third-generat ionrobot will run almost instantsimulations of every task youassign it, executing intricateinstructions with ease.

By the turn of the next cen-tury, Moravec adds, thefourth-generation robot-thehigh-touch "f ingerbot"-willbe smart enough to build rep-licas of itself and to fashion aspacecraft to the stars.

These h ighly in te l l igent ro-bots, capable of th ink ingmuch l i ke us , w i l l beg in atrek across the cosmos, leav-ing the Earth as a human pre-serve.

At this juncture, says Mo-ravec, organic, morta l hu-mans wi l l want to t ransfertheir thoughts and feelings-indeed, their very essence-into the vessel of the immor-tal machine. As time goes on,Moravec adds, humans wil lmeld with their lab creationsso that they never die.

Human and machine. ore-dicts Moravec, wil l merge in-to one wi th the help of askilled robot surgeon. The sur-geon's job: t ransferr ingbrain function lqyer by layerinto a machine and then ex-cising the now-useless biolog-ica l t issue f rom your body.These human-robot hybrids,Moravec adds, won' t a l lhave to look like a bush witha t r i l l ion f ingers. Instead,you' l l p ick your own bodystyle, gearing it to the environ-ment and your personal aes-thetic taste.

Moravec has found thathis idea raises fears, and won-ders why. "What is it aboutthis body of yours that's so in-credibly important?" the se-n ior robot ic is t says. " l f i twere killed and an exact robot-ic substitute put in its place,your f r iends wouldn ' t missyou. Your fami ly wouldn ' tmiss you; none of your proj-ects would miss you. So noth-ing would miss you. You'd bedead, so you wouldn't missyou. So who cares?"

wlIOIE EI/OLUTION ATMANAC

HEIRS TO THE HUMANTHRONE MAY ASSUME A VARIEry OFINNOVAIIVE FORMS

COSMrc CIOUD

He will be the size of aplanet, though the human oftoday could walk rightthrough the grain-sized ironparticles that make up hisBrobdingnagian frame. Thisgiant creature, inhabiting theempty reaches of space,would greet friends with ablast of solar energy andblow hydrogen gas to whiskcosmic debris away.

More than a decade ago,physicist Freeman Dyson,building on an idea fromastronomer Fred Hoyle,suggested that the evolution-ary last stand of the humanmight be in the form of agiant, intelligent black cloud."What I envisage as thestructural unit of such acreature is simply dustgrains," Dyson said, "proba-

bly made of iron or someconvenient stuff, chargedand working on each otherwith electric and magneticforces. Such creatures couldbe just as iomplex, if notmore complex, than thecreatures we see aroundUS NOW''

In a recent interview, thephysicist at the Institute forAdvanced Study in Princetonsaid that the creature'ssensory organs would becollections of solid particlestuned to resoond to radiowaves, visible light, and Xrays-a fuller spectrum thanhumans can perceive. ltwould live on sunlight orperhaps interstellar gas andradiate long-wave energy-infrared or radio waves-toaid in the excretion of wastes."lt might get rid of things itconsiders junk," Dyson says,like hydrogen byproducts,

Freeman Dyfin sugg*ts humansmay evolve into giant clouds.

for instance, in an occasionalvolcanic belch.

Will the cosmic cloud havefeelings? Will it suffer pain,laugh and love, or pray?"There's no reason why itshouldn't do all of the above,or norte," Dyson says. "Theymay not share any of ourconcepts, or on the contrarythey may share a great deal."

The cloud could evolvemuch more rapidly than wedid, Dyson speculates, andmight prove even moredamaging to the earth'senvironment than we are. Inits wanton wanderings, thedust cloud might sometimespark between the earth andthe sun, casting a coldshadow over the remnants ofanachrbnistic humans, still insolid organic form.

AilflONAVTYCRUIIT

She will have to be thick-skinned about wisecracksconcerning her weight:almost nothing, because

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she'll live in a zero-g envi-ronment. She'll be thick-skinned about everythingelse as well, because geneticengineers will build herthat way, with several inchesof tough hide surroundingher human bones, an organicspace suit that will enable herto live forever in orbit.

British science writerDougal Dixon, author ol ManAfter Man(SL Martin's Ress),imagines that the antigrav-ity grunt will be launched withgenes from human parentson pollution-plagued Earth in200 years. Then she'll qnterpermanent service to workon a starship under construc-tion in orbit. There will beno smog in her workplace.But Dixon says she will worryabout solar wind-streams of

fourth lung will come inhandy if she loses her grip onthe starship's struts andfloats free in space. Thenshe'll be able to blow offsome waste gas to pushherself back to the safety ofthe spaceship.

Far above the earth. theweightless creature Will alsofind time for play. "She'll

shoot pool in three dimen-sions," Dixon suggests, theballs ricocheting off theinside walls of a sphere. Withrudimentary understandingof human society, she'll beable to laugh at visitors' jokesabout how lighthearted sheis. But sealed inside her skin,she'll never hear the jokeswell or speak with a humanvoice. Instead she'll commu-nicate through a set of

HER GRAY OVOID BODY WIIL BE ABOUTFOUR FEET LONG. HER THICK OUTER HIDE WILL PROTECTHER FROM THE ONSLAUGHT OF LIFEIN ZERO G. THOUGH SI'IE CARRIES HUMAN GENES,SHE WILT NEVER REPRODUCE.

ionized particles hurled pastthe earth from the sun. Whenthe solar wind is high, heralligatorlike skin will closeover two sealed lensescovering her eyes, the mostvulnerable part of heranatomy. Her gray, ovoidbody, about four feet long,will include a balloonlikebase, two arms and two legs,and long fingers and toes.Her tough skin will house acompressed human skeletonand organs, including a fewspare lungs, one containinghigh-pressure breathing gas-es and another for use inventing carbon dioxide. The

quivering antennas, like abee. Starship workers willcarry electronic translators toconvert their speechinto vibrations transmitted bydirect touch from plasticantennas to her artificialsensory organs.

She will learn through thistouch-talk how "unique"

she is, says Dixon, a euphe-mistic way of telling herthat she wasn't built to breed.She'll never reproduce.lf there is a need for morevacuumorphs, as Dixoncalls them' engineers will pullout the blueprints andbuild more.

HO.HUM HOMlr|lD

We have seen the future,and it is us. According tomany evolutionary biologists,it seems humans are nolonger evolving at all."lndeed, whep one looks atthe evolution of brain sizeand longevity," says gerontol-ogist Richard Cutler of theNational Institute on Aging, "it

appears that evolution forhumans stopped fifty to ahundred thousand yearsago." In fact, Cutler says,technology has rewrittensurvival-of{he-f ittest laws.Men with defective eyesight,who would have beendevoured by tigers in theprimeval lungle, wear contactlenses today and pass ontheir biological blueprints formyopic men of the future."Not only are we notimproving," says Cutler,"we're getting worse.r'

One evolutionary biologistwho believes that humanevolution has slowed to a haltis Harvard's Stephen JayGould. "Review the incred-ible things we've done, howall of civilization has beenbuilt in twentyfive thousandyears from Cro-Magnon tothis, with no change inmorphology," he says, "so

why should we predictanything else?"

Gould made his case toOmniwriler Delta Willis, whointerviewed paleontologistRichard Leakey as well.Further evolution, notesLeakey, would require majorlife-style changes-living in aspace colony, for example.But Leakey says thathumanity is not likely to enlistin quests requiring isolationfor extended times.

PLANI PEOP1E

In the future, those who earspinach may not have to eatmuch else. Tomorrow'svegetarian will learn toincorporate plant cells intothe human body withoutdigesting them. So, l ike theplants they eat, humans wil ldraw their energy from thesun through photosynthesis-the process by which plantscombine sunlight, water, andoxygen into carbohydrates,the basic foodstuffs of life.For these photosyntheticpeople of tomorrow, thealteration wil l bring a sidebenefit: They won't have toworry about suntanningbecause they'll be green.

Fatima Linda Jackson, ananthropologist at the Univer-

sity of Maryland, is already atwork researching how wemight make better use of thecomponents of plants forgood health. The ultimategoal: protecting the plantswe eat from digestion so theycan continue to l ive insideour bodies.

One animal has alreadysolved the problem-thelowly sea slug, a green blobless than an inch long thatlives at the base of grass insaltwater marshes. Sidney K.Pierce, Ph.D., professor andassociate chair in thedepartment of zoology at theUniversity of Maryland, hasdiscovered that the slugsucks nutrients out of certainhairl ike kinds of algae andsupports the plant materialinside its body. Under l ight,

the material produces o4r-gen and fats that feed theslug. Pierce says he's kept acolony of slugs alive withnothing more than ordinaryfluorescent light for months.

Even before we learn theslug's secret, we could loadthe cargo bays of spacecraftwith batches of the animals tosupply oxygen. But Piercesays there's a limit to theblob's beneficence. Coloniesdie out after about a year.Keeping them cool-close tof reezing-adds about sixweeks to their lives, roughly12 percent, suggesting thatfuture green men might wantto take a cue from today'sflorist-shop roses and remainrefrigerated when they're notout feeding in the sun.

-Gurney Will iams ll l OCI

wflotE Evotufl oN AIilIANAC

THE DEVOLUTION PROGRAM:PLAN FOR ACHIEVING LOWER

BY KEITH HARARY

A FIVE-DAYCONSCIOUSNESS

Becoming a fully evolvedhuman being is a high-pressure preoccupation. Inaddition to serving suchbasic animal needs as eal-ing, sleeping, and havingsex, we must also serve asguardians of our species andthe earth. Threats to hu-man evolution, in fact, comefrom every quarter: nuclear,chemical, and biologicalweapons, medical waste,AIDS, the depletion of theozone layer, the destructionof the rain forests, and theimpoverishment of the ThirdWorld, to name a few. ln theend, we must control allthese elements if we want tosurvive. The more we evolveas a species, it seems, themore complicated our ev-eryday existence becomes.

Jonas Salk, these days astudent of evolutionary biolo-gy, explains our new place inthe cosmos this way: "The

human mind may be seen asa form of matter that hasbecome conscious of itself,conscious of evolution,and conscious of its capacityto participate in evolution.We are a oroduct of evolu-tion, and the embodiment ofthe orocess as well." Asfor the individual best suitedto carry out evolutionarygoals, he or she must,of course, be cooperative asopposed to competitive,generous as opposed togreedy, constructiveas opposed to destructive,sensitive as opposed tocallous, and insightful asopposed to obtuse. Embrac-ing such evolutionary traits iscrucial because, as Salkpoints out, a lot hangs in thebalance: "lf we destroythe ecosystem," he notes

quite rightly, "then wedestroy ourselves."

With all this pressure to beso evolved, we need to letoff a little steam now andthen, to devolve, as it were,and return to our roots. In anetfort to help you fulfill thisneed in a harmless fashion-without actually contributingto the devolution of theplanet, of course-we Pre-sent our five-day devolutionprogram, below:

DAY OIIE:THE HUMAil ZOO

Danvin theorized thathuman beings evolved fromthe apes. You may havenoticed, however, that somepeople appear to haveevolved much further thanothers. Day one of ourdevolution program offers anopportunity for you to activelyexplore this phenomenon.

Begin by going to yourlocal zoo and spendingsome time observing themonkeys and gorillas. As you

observe these distant rela-tives of the human species,notice how much of theirbehavior reminds you ofpeople you know Notice,also, your own evolutionaryconnection with these hu-manlike creatures. Are thechimpanzees doing anythingyou would like to be doingyourself? Can you imagineyourself swinging through thetrees or sitting on top of thejungle canoPy looking outacross the horizon? Sit in acomfortable spot and ob-serve the apes for half anhour. As you do so, imagineyourself mentally tradingplaces with these nobleprimates, actually experienc-ing reality from their point ofview. How would your life'spriorities be different if youwere an ape? How would youcommunicate with others ofyour species? lf you arevisiting the zoo with a friend,spend some time trying tocommunicate with one anoth-er as the apes do. Then gohome and notice all the

apelike features of yourrelatives and friends. Youmay be surprised to realizehow much we still have incommon with our evolution-ary antecedents.

DAY fWOs IIAKEDTI'ilGH

Human beings are the onlyanimals that use utensils,which tend to distance usfrom the animal side of ournature. On day two, begin byletting go of such evolution-ary pretensions. Order take-out spareribs or other basic"finger foods" such assashimi or Dungeness crabfor lunch. Also assemble anassortment of fruit, from redDelicious apples to succulentnectarines and Plums. Thenget naked and sit on the floorwith the foods you havechosen spread out beforeyou. Eat like an animal, usingno implements or naPkins.

Before beginning thesecond part of today'sexercise, which should becarried out just prior todinner, consider that modernprocessed food is a long waYfrom the kind of diet humanitYenjoyed at an earlier Point inour evolution. Much of thefood we consume, from FrootLoops to Chicken McNug-gets, is no longer remotelyrecognizable as anYthingthat was ever alive.

Day two, therefore, offers achance for you to get back intouch with the original form ofsome of the foods You'vebeen eating. (To avoidsenseless waste, you shouldcarry out this exercise onlYwith foods you eventuallYintend to consume.)

Begin by ordering a giant

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bucket of fried chicken froma local stand or one of thefast-food chains. Spread allthe chicken parts out on atable and try to reassemblethe pieces into a completechicken. Use a needle andthread, a staple gun, ormasking tape to holdeverything together. lf youare a vegetarian, you maycarry out this exercise with alarge order of French fries,which you can reassembleinto potatoes. (You mightalso take a cue from thewriters of Late Night WithDavid Lefterman, as recentlyreported in The New YorkTimes. The team suggestedrummaging through meatplant Dumpsters and pullingout enough different parts toassemble your own cow.)

necessities. On day three ofthe devolution program, payhomage to this tradition foran afternoon. Your goal: togather and enjoy as muchfree stuff as possible.

Begin by dousing yourselfwith five or six differentfragrance samples from thenearest perfume or colognecounter. Ask the salespeopleto give you a pocketful ofadditional samples. Next,stop by your doctor's officeand try to get some freesamples of any prescriptiondrugs you may be using.Then seek out a crowded hotdog stand where you cangraze unnoticed from theopen sauerkraut, relish, andpickle bins for a tasty lunch.Use plenty of ketchup andmustard and take some extra

through other people'sgarbage for anything youcan use.

DAY FOUR:PnlMltryEcoilsGtousltEsg

In an effort to be moreevolved, many people try torelate to others in a purelyrational way. Yet there is stillsomething of the primitivein all of us, an inner sensethat responds to people andevents on an emotional,instinctive level.

On day four of our,devolution program, allowyourself to get moreconsciously in touch with thisaspect of your awareness.Whenever any stressfulcircumstances arise duringthe course of your day,ask yourself, "What woutdAu stral op ithec u s af a re n s i sdo in this situation?" Allowyour responses to emergefrom a deep gut level towhatever extent oossible. lfyou pass a pretty flower onthe street, for example; taxetime to savor its organicaroma. lf you get in an argu-ment with your mate, don'tjust deal with the situationfrom an intellectual distance.Stay in touch with yourdeepest feelings throughoutthe discussion. lf you feelstressed out in the course ofyour day, go off to a placewhere you can be alone andwildly pound your fists intopillows or sofa cushions whileallowing yourself the luxuryof a primal scream. Finally, atsome point today, spendtime in a natural setting like awoodland or park and letgo of the intellectual prioritiesof the civil ized world.

DAY FIVES lHEcoftlPEttTlvE sElF

The more we evolve, themore we must learn to live inharmony with each other.On the final day of our devo-lution program, however,you will loosen some of theshackles of socially evolvedbehavior and allow yourinnermost comoetitive self tocome to the fore. Your focusshould be on allowingyourself to be as competitiveas oossible. without becom-ing reaHy obnoxious or mean.

lf you work as a secretaryfor example, you mightorganize a speed-typingcompetition in your office,along with events in pencilsharpening, envelopestuffing, and stamp licking.Try to shoot a rubber bandacross the office farther thananyone else. Or createminiature Olympic eventsless specific to your occupa-tion, including such feats aswatermelon eating, necktieknotting, and speed shaving.lf you can't find people tocompete with, compete withygurself: Get a book ofbrainteasers and see howmany you can answercorrectly. See how manyBarry Manilow tunes you canlisten to, or how many timesyou can play Paul Ankasinging "Havin' My Baby"without throwing up. lf younormally tell yourself not tobe rankled by the politicalmachinations of that manipu-lative colleague of yours, nowis the time to let feelings ofintense annoyance to creepin-and to act on them.Complete the exercise byplaying Risk or'Monopoly-and playing to win. OO

ORDER A BUCKET OF FRIED CHICKENFROM A LOCAL FAST-FOOD PLACE AND TRY TO REAS.SEMBLE THE PIECES INTO A COMPLETE .ANIMAL. VEGETARIANS MAY ORDER FRENCH FRIES ANDREASSEMBLE THEM BACK INTO POTATOES.

By the way, for the ultimatein primitive eating, you mighttry dining out at some of thefiner vending machines inyour area. Suggested fareincludes canned sodas,candy bars, and onion andsour cream chips. Some ofthe more elaborate, Automat-type machines also offerpetrified hamburgers, prehis-toric egg salad, and ftecam-brian tuna on white bread.

DAY THREE: IHEHUNTER.CA'HENER

Early man depended onnature to provide the baslc

packets of these condimentswith you. lf you can't finda convenient hot dog stand,seek out a bar that servesfree hors d'oeuvres andeat your fill. Stuff your re-maining pockets with asmuch free food as possible,along with any loose bagS ofsu gar or'low-calorie sweeten-er that you can easily layhands on. Keep alert for anyfree books of matches.

Finally, head to the nearestbakery and make a dessertout of any pastry samplesthat may have been placedin little dishes on the counter.On the way home, pick

91

WIOLE EVOLUTION ALTIANAC

DO-IT-YOU RSELF MUTATION KIT:ORCHESTRATING EVOLUTION AT YOUR KITCHEN TABLEBY HEMANT CHIKARMANE

YOU DON'T NEED TO BE A MOLECUIAR BIOLOGIST TOSEE EVOLUTION IN ACTION. EXPLORE THEMUTATIONS THAT DRIVE NATURE'S DIVERSIry WITH AHOME LAB, AND LET SACCHAROMYCESCEREVISIAE, A COMMON YEASI BE YOUR GUIDE.

The idea of orchestratingevolution yourself seems likeheady stuff indeed. Butwith our Do-lt-Yourself Muta-tion Kit, described in thepages that follow, you shouldbe able to observe theprocess at your kitchen table.We'd like to start you offwith some basic biology:Individual organisms andentire species change as aresult of mutations in genes.You might think of a geneticmutation as a spelling mis-take within the subunits thatcompose the gene. Sincemost mutant organisms havetrouble adjusting to theenvironment, it's a good thingthat mutations are rare. Of

molecular biologist I'lemantChikarmane at the MarineBiological Laboratory,Woods Hole, MA 02543.

INSTRUCTIONS

After you have received yourkit, open it up and rnakesure all the materials arethere. You should find five pe-tri dishes labeled as follows:ADENINE NEGATIVE A and ADE.NINE NEGATIVE B (these two

, plates lack adenine, an essen-tial nutrient); coPpER A andcoPPER a (these two platescontain copper salt, whichcan kill the yeast); andMASTER, a master olate thatcontains a cocktail of nutri-ents on which all forms of

Before you begin, read theinstructions once throughand keep these basic labora-tory principles in mind:

Cleanliness and sterilitv,Make sure you work at aclean table with as little draftas possible. Wipe the tableclean with an antisepticsuch as Lysol before and af-ter you work. Since the aircontains bacteria and fungithat can contaminate yourexperiment, be careful not toopen your petri dishes unlessyou are working with them.Since your fingers also haveall sorts of bacteria on them,do not touch the sterilesurface of the olate withyour fingers. Transfer of organ-isms should be done onlywith the sterile pipettes or ster-ile toothpicks. After eachexperiment, wash up with anti-bacterial soao.

Spreading culture on thepbte. fo isolate mutantsthat have evolved, you mustspread yeast from the cultureuniformly on the petri dish. Todo so, place the petri dish onthe table and lift the coverwith your left hand, placing itbeside the dish. Pick up theculture tube of yeast withyour left hand and shake it (fig-ure 1). Then unscrew the topand place that on the table,too. Pick up a steri le pipette,squeeze the top, and dip thetip into the yeast culturetube (figure 2). Slowly releasethe bulb to draw yeast cultureinto the pipette. Hold the tipof the pipette about a quarterinch above the center of theopen plate. Gently squeezethe pipette bulb so that two tothree drops fall on the sur-face (figure 3). Discard thepipette into a waSte contain-er f i l led with bleach. Cao the

tube. Now pick up the spread-er and hold it so that theshort arm gently touches thesurface of the petri dish.Spread the liquid evenly overthe surface (as shownin figure 4) and carefully ro-tate the plate.

Growing yeasf. After youhave spread the culture onyour plate, leave it alone atroom temperature (70-75" For 22-25' C) for one to threedays. (Keeping the petriplate at 85' F or 30' C will pro-mote faster groMh.)Through the course of theseinstructions, this wil l be re-ferred to as incubation.Yeast wil l f irst appear as pin-head-sized dots and mayultimately assume a diameterof an eighth of an inch.

Transferring yeast f romplate to plate. Open apetri dish and, using a steri letoothpick, remove a yeastsample about the size of a pin-head (figure 5). Open thesecond oetri dish and touchthe tip of the toothpick tothe surface. Slide the tooth-pick gently, making a streakabout half an inch in length.Discard the toothpick and donot reuse.

THE EXPERIMENTS

1. Selecting for mutants thatregain a lostfunction. Normalyeast cells have the ability tomake their own adenine, anessential component of DNA.The yeast strain in yourtube, however, has a muta-tion in the gene called adeT(for adenine). As a result ofthe mutation, an important en-zyme is no longer active andthe yeast cannot make ade-nine. Without adenine, yeastcannot replicate (unless yousqpply the adenine yourself).

course, every so often amutant is better suited to agiven habitat than itsancestors. When that hap-pens, the mutant organismwill have more offspring thanits nonmutant siblings. Asevolution takes its course. themutants will thrive.

To see the orocess inaction, all you've got to do isfollow the instructions below.Your guide for this journey ofexploration will be Saccha-romyces cerevisiae, a com-mon yeast. Since the yeastgrows rapidly, you will beable to observe the results ofeach experiment in two tothree days.

To order the kit, send a$20 check or money order to

yeast can grow. You shouldalso find a tube of yeastculture, four steri le soread-ers, four steri le pipettes, and40 sterile toothpicks. Keepthe kit in the refrigerator unti lyou decide to use it. Foreach experiment, take out on-ly those items that you actu-ally need.

To help ygu with your exper-iments, get hold of a maiker,as well as paper and pencilto keep track of your results.We also suggest that you go,to the drugstore and buysome antibacterial soap, an-tiseptic, an'd ordinarybleach (ask the pharmacistto suggest appropriatebrands). A small container forwaste would help, too.

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ABRIEF HISTORYOF HUMAN flTIESCIENTISTS EXPLORINGHUMAN ORIGINS PICK A FEW BONESBY DELTA WILLIS

The study of human evolutionhas been plagued bypersonal conflicts and idiosyn-crasies ever since CharlesDarwin began his study oflife aboard the HMS Beagle.Discussing the search for hu-man origins, Mark Twainnoted that "scientists have al-ready cast much darkness

on this subject, and if theirinvestigations continue, weshall soon know nothingat all." Of course. researchersnow know a greal dealabout human ancestors. Butthe arguments and coun-terarguments between themgo on, In fact, judgingfrom newspaper reports, it

ffiffi;;hominid found in two SouthAfrican caves. Thoughtto be an evolutionary deadend.

Australopithecus

'thought by manyto be ancestral to humans.Lucy is a prime example ofA. afarensis. '

Australopithecusafricanus.This hominid resem-bled A. afarensis

but had a rounder,more humanlike head andwas found mostly in Africa.(The Taung child was one.)

Apelike creaturethought to bean early ancestor

The life line above depicts species on the evolutionar.y journey leading upto Homo sapiens sapiens.

Geologist CharlesLyell publishesthe first volume ofhis monumentalPinciples of Geolo-g]1 which provesthe earth is muchmore than 6,000years old. This,along with the fossilrecord, suggeststhere has been tre-mendous changeamong plant andanimal life.

Neanderthal man,represented by onlya iew oieces ofthe skeleton. includ-ing a skullcapard leg bones, is dis-covered in Ger-many's NeanderValley.

Darwin oets every-one excited inhisbF,okThe OdginofSpeobswhenhe suggests naturalselec{ion as th€means by whichevolution works.(Damin proposesthat individuals varyrandomly in nature.Those variantsbest adaDt€d to theenvironment thriv€-and sventuallyprevaiF-throughthe creative force ofnatural selection.)

ln The Des@nt ofMan,Daryinsuggesls that Africais the place io lookfor missing links.The re6on: The con-tinent was "for-merly inhabited byextinc{ apes closelyallied to the gorillaand chimpanzee,"the two sp€cies clos-est lo hurnans,

Dutch anatomistEugdne Dubois re-signs from aca-deme and announc-es that he will returnwith the missinglink. He sels out forJava, a large islandin Indonesia, anddoes indeed return'with the first evi-de(wd ftomoetgr-lus, or upright man.

Avery large human-like skull and asmall apish law arediscovered at Pilt-down in England. Re-searchers, includingpaleontologist A.Smith Ir'oodward,sugEest that the Piltdown remains repre-sent the oldestknown link betweenhumans and apes.

Henry FairfieldOsborn of theAmerican Museumot Natural Historyproclaims a singletooth tound in theSnake Creek fossilb€ds of Nebraska irevidence of "the

lirst anthropoid apeof America."

Charles Darwinsets out on the voy-age ollhe Beagle,taking along Lyell'swork. DaMin isnot the official natu-ralist onboard but iscnosen asacompan-ion tor lhe captain,Robert Fitzroy. Histicket is his ability toafford the trio.

A protessor fromBonn namedAugust Franz Mayersuggests thebones belonged toa MongolianCossack travetngthrough Prussiaafler Naool6on's re-treat. Accordingto Mayer, pain hadcaused the.manto furrow his fore-head, explaining thebold brow ridges;aslorthe man's bo,v-legs, Mayer says,they can be tracedtoa iobasacavalryman atop ahorse:

Darwin ventures topublish aftermore than two dec-ades of fear that hisideas would beviewed as heresy byhis religious fam-ily ard Vrctodan Eng-land as a whole.The Church. afterall, holds thathumans have beencreated by God.He goes to press on-ly when AlfredRussel Wallace isabout to scoophim with a remark-ably similar theoryof natqral selection.

Due in part tochauvinism and ra-cism, early investigators prefer to look formissing links any-where but Africa:England, France,Gennany, Spain, Chi-na. and even NorlhAmerica.

When critics refuseto agree wilh his as-sessment, Duboislimits their accessfor turther study, hid-ing the fossilsbeneath his diningrogm floor.

British anatomistArthur Keith, jealousthat the remainshave not been givento him to study,challenges l bod-ward's reconstruc-lion. Keith's goodfriend Elliot Smithsides with theother man, endingthe Keith-Smithf riendship.

More leeth arefound at the sile,and the "Nebraska

man" is reclassifiedas an e)dinct pig.

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seems that the fields of evolu-tionary biology and paleo-anthropology have been hostto professional battles andpersonal wrangles in spades.

To illustrate the monkeybusiness that has often accom-panied the search for miss-ing links, we have created acouple of time lines: a Discov-

ery Line, to depict importantscientific discoveries abouthuman origins, and an InsideLine, to illustrate the be-hind-the-scenes footnotes tothose discoveries. To helpyou put it all in context, we al-so presenl a life line that illus-trates a reasonable timetablefor how hominid species aclu-

ally evolved. (When readingthe life line, you'll note someincongruities, but our num-bers merely reflect the data ofa science still in the processof being unearthed.)

As.you read through ourcharts, you'll probably realizethat bigheadedness aff lictsthe human species in more

ways than one. After all, sci-entists don't deserve allthe heat. They belong to thesame species as the restof us. and their behaviortends to reflect the apish andterritorial-though thorough-ly conventional-viewthat success lies in displacingthe competition.

Australopithecusboisei. Foundin East Africa,

this hominidresembled robus-

fus but was notably larger.

Homo habilis.The first species

in the genusHomo, H. habilis,

or handy man,remains have been

found in East Africa.Habitisappears to have livedaround the same timeas the appearance of thefirst simple stone tools.

Homo erectus.A more evolved,bigger-brainedversion of habi-lis, erectuslivedEarth for 1.6 mil-

lion years. Erectus createdadvanced tools and also mas-tered fire. (Examples of H.erectus include the Java manand the Peking man.)

Homo sapiens (archaic).These ancient human forms,which seem to haveevolved lrom erectus, beganappearing in the fossilrecord around 500.000years ago.

Professor RaymondDart studies asmall apish skullcalled the Taungchild, from theTaung limestonequarry in SouthAfrica- Dartnames the new spe-cies Australopith-ecus.

Scottish paleontolo-gist Robert Broomproves RaymondDart right in his asser-tion that australo-pithecines were hom-inids by findingmore evidence inSouth Africa.

Mary Leakeydiscovers the skullol Proconsul,now thought to beour oldest ances-tor, on Rusingalsland in Kenya'sLake Victoria.

The Piltdownfnd, ex-posed as a hoax,turns out to b€ a reFatively modern hu-man skull combinedwith an ape's jaw.

Mary Leakey discov-ers a 1.75-million-year-old australopith-ecine skull atOlduvai Gorge inTanzania, mov-ing the cradle of man-kind trom SouthAfrica to East Africa.

The oldest, mostcomplete skull ol alarge-brained ances-tor is found nearKoobi-Fora in north-ern Kenya by aresearch team ledby the Leakeys' sonRichard. Named1470 (after its muse-um accessron num-beo, the skull issaid to be 2.8 millionyears old. lf thedating holds, theskull will confirm Lou-is l€akey's theorythat the large-brained genus Ho-mo existed millionsot years ago.

PaleontologistDonald Johansonand his team dis-cover a range ot{ossils more than 3million years oldnear Hadar in Ethio-pia. These fossils in-clude Lucy and a .group dubbed theFirst Family.

Most paleontolo-gists, including .Arthur Keith and Lou-is Leakey, dis-miss Taung as anodd ape. Dartand the Taung childbecome the sub-ject of vaudevilleJOkeS.

Broom, who likesto search tor {ossilsin the nude, iscalled "about as hon-est as a pokerplayer" and is twicebanned from hisown research sile.

The Leakeys cele-brate the discoveryby conceiving theirthird son, Philip.

The person whoplanted the hoax isnever found.

The discoverybrings Louis andMary Leakeyfame and more tor-tune tnan theyhave ever known;support from theNational Gqograph-ic Society enablesthem, in Louis'swords, "to do morein two years at Oldu-vai than we havedone in the preced-ing thirty." Eventhough Mary makesthe discovery, Louistakes the spotlight,writing "Finding theWorld's EarliestMan" for NationalGeographic.

this reunion, the el-der L€akey diesof a hea( attack.Subsequently, afierce controversyover the age ofthe skull pits scien-tists from the OmoRiverexpedition, ledby F. Clark Howell,against Leakey'steamfrom Koobi-Fo-ra. Richard Leakeyexhibits a "distinct

coolness" towardhis mother, MaryLeakey, when she isskeptical of theolder date; he is al-so accused ot sup-pressing scientificda-ta that do not sup-port his theory.

The discovery in-spires a reunion be-tween Louis andRichard Leakey,who have not gottenalong for severalyears. (As a teen-ager, Richardvowed to clo any-thing but lollow in hisparents' footsteps.)A few days after

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&i

ABRTEF HTSTORYOF HUTTAN TIftIEPALEOANTHROPOLOGISTSCAN BE APISH AND TERRITORIAL, JUSTLIKE THE REST OF US

humans). Ana-tomically modernhumanswith skel-

first appeared in the fossil re-cord about 60,000 years ago.

WMary Leakeyand her leam in Tan-zania discoverthe oldest evidenceof our ancestors'upright gait, the La-etoli footprints,preserved by a layerof volcanic ash. Thefootprints aresaid to be 3:7 millionyears old.

Johanbon declaresthat Lucy andthe First Family aresmalFbrained austra-lopithecinesancestral lo modernhumans.

Anatomist AlanWalker discoversthe Black Skull, so-called becauseof a manganese pa-tina, in Kenya.Everyone agreesthe skull lorces anew drawing of ourfamily tree,but there's no con-sensus on asingle drawing.

The theory ot Eve,proposed byAllan Wilson, sug-gests a singlepoint of origin for allmodern humans,descended from afe-male in Africa. Wil-son and his teambased this findingon a study utilizingmitochondrial DNAas a marker to tracehuman ancestry.

Johanson and'histeam trom Berkeleyrelurn to Hadar,where lhey find alarge upper jaw withpart of the tace.

Richard Leakey,now less involvedin fossil hunting,heads up the KenyaWildlife Service.He is renowned forsaving Kenya'selephants from ivorypoacners.

ffiPaleontologistRon Clarke saysthat because of herpoor eyesight,Leakey has inadver-tently carved ane)dra heel into a setof footprints duringthe excavalion,crealing a third hominid where thereshould be only two.

Johanson's claimchallengesthe L€akeys'theorythat our 3-million-year-old ancestorswere a speciesof the genus Homo.

Richard Leakey andJohanson appearin a U.S. televisiondebate hostedby Walter Cronkite.ln front of a nationalaudience, Leakeydraws a big Xacross Johanson'schart of the humanfamily tree. lt isn'tthe lree that irksLeakey so much asCronkite's prologue:"Before the discov-ery of Lucy madeDonald Johanson acelebrlty, theking of the mountainin paleoanthro-pology was RichardLeakey."

Richard t€akey sug-gests that theskull proves therewere actually twoaustralopithecinespecies at Hadarin Ethiopia. Johan-son announ@s aconsensus amongolher colleagues .that there was onlyone speoes.

Fossil finderspursue a Bones ver-sus Blood Waragainsl the molecu-lar biologists.

The bones nowsuggest thele mayhave been lwospecies at Hadar,not one.

Richard's wife,Dr. Meave Leakey,is now head ofpaleontology at theKenya NationalMuseum, where sheoversees a teamot accomplished fos-sil Jinders knownas the HominidGang.

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