Evolution Talk

Over the course of billions of years a small region of specialized cells began to develop sensory organs. These light sensitive cells slowly developed into eyes. Behind them another organ began to develop. It's still there, buried beneath everything else that has developed to become your brain today.

In 2013 a secret that had been hidden for hundreds of thousands of years in a South African cave was discovered. Bones... many bones. Upon inspection by a team of specialists a picture began to emerge. At the center of it all is a new species of hominin - Homo Naledi.

In this episode of Evolution Talk we take a look at some of the theories which have attempted to trace the evolution of music, from Charles Darwin to philosopher Daniel Dennett.

Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis was fascinated with the origin and evolution of life. If there was a creator, finding the keys to his work had to involve careful study of the facts and an examination of the natural world with critical eyes.

Coevolution often involves an arms race. You have a predator and prey both upping the game. Like a bat and a moth. Each one trying to outdo the other. If the change in one organism is linked to a change in another organism, genetically speaking, then coevolution is said to have occurred.

Without water there would be no life. We are lucky. Extremely lucky that it is here at all. Especially in its liquid form. It doesn't need to be. In fact, as far as the universe is concerned, water in its liquid form is almost a rarity.

In this episode of 'Evolution Talk' I am joined by a very special guest - Stephanie Keep from the National Center for Science Education (NCSE). Among her many talents as a writer and educator, Stephanie also loves to correct misconceptions that involve the science and study of evolution.

In the era known as the Cambrian, an era which kicked off 541 million years ago, life exploded. Natural Selection began to produce new creatures, one after the other. A parade of unique forms and shapes that had never been seen before.

For years the appendix has been considered a vestigial organ. In 2007 researchers at Duke University began to take another look at the appendix. While taking their closer look something interesting began to emerge. Something that had always been there but had remained hidden, or unobserved for centuries. Your appendix, that little organ that we so often remove and forget, just might be useful after all.

What does radiation do to us exactly and why do we care? The American geneticist Hermann Joseph Muller worried about it back in the 1920s.