The Great Tree

An essay on my love affair with Biology.

I just finished episode number two of the old TV series Cosmos by the late, great, Carl Sagan, entitled 'One Voice in the Cosmic Fugue.' Sagan was more well known for his work in physics and cosmology, he was a scientist whose head was more often in the stars than on earth. But, in this episode, he touched more on my favorite of the sciences: evolutionary biology.

 

Whereas cosmology may be the most humbling, because it is almost impossible to look at the entire Milky Way, the entire Universe, and not feel small and insignificant, biology might be seen as the most human-centered. I am continuously amazed more with the new evidences in biology than most all other science simply because every new discovery, no matter what it's about, is essentially about myself and fellow humans. All of biology, from the earliest and most simple organisms to the most complex, is the same. We are cousins to every living thing on this planet and so every new discovery is about a 'person' in our family. As Neil DeGrasse Tyson once said: "We are all connected. To each other biologically, to the earth chemically, to the rest of the universe atomically." Carl Sagan's most famous quote is "we are made of star-stuff."

 

Maybe it's arrogant of me, or at least hypocritical, that, like fundamental religious people, I simply can't understand how my fellow humans can't see, or can't accept, the beauty and wonder of evolutionary biology. The very idea, not just all people, but all known beings, are the same entity is something that is so awe-inspiring that I can't imagine thinking that it's somehow wrong or dehumanizing. In fact, I see the exact opposite. Look at a dog, a frog, a tree, they are as beautiful in their own way as the most beautiful woman and just as worthy of our admiration, for the same reason. Each are complex beings made from simple ones. Their very existence is the result of billions of years of perfecting.

 

I can see where people can look at a flower or a human and see a design. But, as I've read more and more about evolutionary biology the more I'm impressed with the scientific explanation over the idea of a designed origin. If there was a god or goddess, I feel, that would take the magic from our origins, that theory is simply not as inspiring or beautiful as that of biology. On the one hand, there is a Designer, a god or goddess who designs and creates a world, a people, a series of creatures, all that we see. But, on the other side, there is the truth of evolution, which says that we are all formed from one common ancestor, one common spring, and are still connected. We are a Mobius strip with the word Simplicity on one side, the word Complexity on the other, all complexity stemming from simplicity. Break us down, to our very atoms, and we are the same as every being, not separate as the deity theory would have us believe with one group holding dominion over another.

 

History and biology are interconnected. One is the study of our recorded and human story, the other is the study of our origins and the story of all members of  our family. With both, the knowledge of the past is necessary to our understanding of our present and our foretelling of the future. Though in both biology and history there is no way, as our understanding is now, to prevent catastrophies even though we see destructive habits repeated, with each discovery we learn a little more and are a little more hopeful that we can learn from these catastrophies. Maybe we can't, despite our best efforts, save the Florida Panther from extinction, for example, though we have the knowledge of our impact on species from our role in the extinction of the Dodo bird, but we can learn from our mistakes this time, and perhaps apply that new understanding to future problems.

 

But, history and biology isn't just about conservation efforts or understanding past wars to prevent modern ones, it's also about understanding who we are and why we do the things we do. There is so much about ourselves that biology can help us explain. I was blown away with the discovery of Ardipithecus ramidus, so far our earliest hominid ancestor, Ardi. There is a theory about Ardi's teeth, her canines that are much smaller than the canines of our closest relative, the chimpanzee. Her canines are longer than ours, though, so there is a link to say that Ardi's ancestor had long canines. Why would Ardi, and so humans, have small canines (which is a bad adaptation if you want to eat with efficency or fight) while chimps have long? The answer is something very, very human: the evoloution of Love.

 

Chimpanzees do not have pair-bonds. There is an alpha male who controls the rest of the group. Their world is controlled by aggression, the larger and stronger the male chimp the better off he is. However, humans, went along a different path. We descended from the weaker males of Ardi's past, the ones who had smaller teeth, and couldn't fight as well. Those that could walk further upright could hold more food to bring back to a potential mate and their children, they were better providers. Our earliest hominid grandmother made a risky decision to go with the weaker male over the one that could fight better, the male that would form a more emotional pair-bond with her over the one that was the leader of a large community. To be more romantic, though probably not accurate, she chose love and constancy over short-lived, hard-fought power.

 

Though we are no longer the same as our ancestors or living cousins, so much of our human decisions are based on this animal motivation. We still go for the man that we see will protect or provide for us the most, go for the woman that will most likely raise our children to adulthood. We still fight wars the same ways as when we were single-celled organisms and for much the same reasons when you get down to it, resources and perceived threat to ourselves. Our humanity, how arrogant to think that humanity is the sole provision of humans, stems from when we were still those single-celled organisms who worked together to create more complicated organisms.

 

With each discovery, we find that the list of things that make us human, as separate from our fellow creature, gets smaller and smaller. Far from dehumanizing, I find this to bring the animals up in my estimation. It used to be that we saw dogs as food and as pack animals, now they are our children. That didn't dehumanize us, but, I think, made us more human by expanding our emapthy and altruism. My dog, right now, is asleep on my pillow, my cat uses my lap as a bed, neither make me feel less human, but a better human that can share her love to all manner of creatures.

 

I can understand how someone might see this as all designed by some creator, and I can see why biologists find the discoveries of their science to be inpspiring. The emotion of those two types of people are the same though they stem from different understandings. I can find hope for a discussion between people of both mindsets that would educate both and inspire both while not changing, fundamentally, either ideal. I think that even the most hardcore atheist can agree that the world, with all its complexity and simplicity and diversity, deserves what a religious person would label 'reverence'. The people I can not understand, at all, are the ones that see the world, and see all of its beauty, and can't muster up any wonder or curiosity or awe. The ones that have no curiosity. How can you have no curiosity about our world, our species, our very being? There is so much wonder in biology, the epic battle of good vs evil,  random weirdness, beauty and ugliness, and that's just on our planet. Imagine what we'll find on other worlds. How can you not be curious? 

Reviews

[OT]

Brilliantly written, great research, reminds me of studying biology, when we used to wonder why certain things were like this and others like that. Very deep and great meaning behind it, I too question those who find no wonder in this great abyss!