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1. •  
     CommentAuthoridoru345
   • CommentTimeApr 24th 2006 edited

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   About a year ago, as winter marched in, we experienced a full on house invasion here at casa de DRM.
   
   Mice, it seemed, were everywhere leaving their hantavirus rich scat on spaces as varied as computer keyboards and stove tops.
   
   Urgent action was needed. Victory (of a single battle because, of course, they win the war in the end) was won once electronic mouse traps - mobile electrocution modules really - were bought and placed in well trafficked locales.
   
   Our guests are staying out of sight - for now, perhaps convinced through the pheremone communication network our home is a death trap for their kind. Even so, we know it's only a matter of time till the next wave.
   
   ...
   
   During this mini-crisis, the closeness of rodents became very clear. That is to say, the rodents were exploiting a vector they've adapted - or evolved - to take advantage of: urban and suburban density.
   
   I wonder how rodent evolution would differ if humans hadn't come onto the scene or, we had different sorts of minds - not suited to or interested in building large and complex habitations.
   
   If we remained small scale nomads, or never branched off from our cousins at all and still lounged in the forest, what sort of rodents would there be on earth?
   
   Surely some kind of co-evolutuon of rodent and human has occured. Has anyone researched this? I'd be surprised if not.
   
   Also, what other animals have changed their behavioral and perhaps, evolutionary trajectory as a consequence of humans being such busy, world changing creatures?
   
   And, the opposite, how have they steered our development?

2. •  
     CommentAuthorDanieru
   • CommentTimeApr 24th 2006 edited

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   Wow... Nice question.
   
   This thought often comes up for me when I contemplate the mass extinction of species now occuring on Earth (very likely due entirely to our presence on this planet). It usually helps put things into perspective for me to think of humans as purely another animal in the chain of evolution, but the moral minefield which arises from this when applied to our current domination of the natural realm leaves me cold. That the devastation of our natural heritage should revolve on moral issues which themselves were culturally aquired by our animal minds somehow sends me into outrage. Yet there is no justice in nature, and there never can be.
   
   I reckon this applies to what you were saying. The evolutionary niches that have been forged by our symbiosis with species such as the mouse, the cockroach, the dog, the cow, sheep, pig, wheat, potato, corn, rice, etc etc etc... are not ours to perceive. We did not create strains of wheat that were better suited to our needs. It could equally be said that wheat created our tendancy to act as its defensive, reproductive system.
   
   Wheat is a good example because it apparently only takes one mutation in one particular gene to turn self shedding wheat into non-shedding wheat. If humans had not been around the wheat which arose and did not shed its head would have been a useless evolutionary entity. Today, all wheat crops are related to that first genetic freak which did not shed its seed. If humans were to die out tomorrow so this wheat would find it difficult to sustain its lineage. The self shedding wheat varieties would once again reign.
   
   I remember watching a documentary years ago which put forward the theory that man and dog coevolved in a similar way to wheat. The argument went that human vocal tracts were advanced enough to provide dogs with a mutual communicative understanding. The dogs lived in our camps, we provided them with food. Thus their natural hunting ability was unnecessary, instead they turned their skills to protecting us. I doubt this theory is as clear cut as I have made out here, but it is interesting. Symbiosis is an incredibly powerful evolutionary tool. (I'm always amazed by the fact that the mitocondria in our cells used to be an entirely separate entity to us. It even has a different history of DNA!)
   
   I've ranted enough, but I suppose in conclusion I believe that all life is in some sense symbiotically governed. If man has never arisen, the mouse would still be a successful species (it is its breadth of adaptibility which makes it successful in our urban environments) although perhaps its would not exist on as many continents, or in as many evolutionary niches, as it does now.
   
   Humanity needs its animal and plant cousins (especially those born of domestic symbiotic evolution), and equally they need us. See Jared Diamond's amazing book 'Guns, Germs and Steel' for a heap load more on this...
   
   Check out this related link too:

   There are literally trillions of ways evolution could have gone differently. Some dinosaurs were pretty smart, evolving pack behavior and caring for their young. If every triceratops and velociraptor had not been wiped out 65 million years ago, would a civilization of sauropods walk the earth? It’s certainly possible but the potential for change goes back further, to the very structure of DNA. The very make-up of the cell is malleable.
   
   In fact, many other types of life might exist. Robert Hazen, a geologist at George Mason University and author of Gen-e-sis: The Scientific Search for Life's Origins, points out that an estimated hundred billion trillion (that’s a one with 22 zeroes) planets may support life in the universe. "Is it not possible," Hazen asks, "that every possible outcome is out there?"
   
   - 'Regenesis' link