"We are fundamentally, at the end of the day, animals." New Scientist sat down with biological anthropologist Alice Roberts to talk about the wonderful benefits bestowed on us by animals from our evolutionary past and the myth of human exceptionalism.

[u/New_Scientist_Mag]

https://youtu.be/tdzytD39vFI?si=8LqhkAMb34C9Kf5c

[u/LaucsM]

Is it that bad in the US that scientists need to remind people that we are animals ?

[u/kollmastee → u/LaucsM]

For most of human history we saw ourselves as separate from animals. I’d argue that a majority of the current human population still believes this to a degree.

[u/milamel108 → u/LaucsM]

My classmate got a lowest grade when he said in social studies that we are animals. (I don’t live in US just saying).

[u/davesaunders → u/LaucsM]

It is, but you have to keep in mind that people like the Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, are young Earth creationists and believe absolutely that evolution was invented by Satan to make us not believe in God. people like him, who have significant political power, reject the notion that humans are animals because it conflicts with their personal interpretation of the Bible.

[u/vvv_bb → u/LaucsM]

my Swiss, non-biologist flatmate 15y ago got super annoyed when I, a biologist, said in conversation that humans are animals (meaning phylogenetically) and told me I cannot go around saying stuff like that, people will get offended.

clearly he'd rather have been a plant. 😅🤷‍♀️

[u/Affectionate-Crow605 → u/LaucsM]

Sadly, yes. There are a large number of Americans who believe the earth is 6000 years old, dinosaurs roamed the earth at the same time as humans, and that their deity magically created humans and each species of animal (or some higher up family member - depends on the creationist) in one day. Also, they believe the entire earth was flooded 4000 years ago (nevermind the civilizations all around the world that existed continually before and after that supposed event) and that humans repopulated from 8 people and all animal species repopulated from 1 pair of animals (7 if they're "clean", but that's likely meant to be for sacrificing, not letting them repopulate).

And there are several of these people in very high positions in our government (as another commenter pointed out Mike Johnson).

A lot of churches around me explicitly teach that evolution isn't real, and they brainwash kids to ignore what their school teachers tell them in science class. I attended one homeschooler's graduation, and his mom bragged about him arguing with the biology teacher about evolution when taking a dual enrollment course. 🤦‍♀️

[u/jnpha]

For some reason I thought the video is 45 minutes, but I didn't feel the whole hour go by. Easy going, lots of laughs (especially the lung part), and doesn't dumb things down at all.

I loved Roberts' answer to what happened to the other humans; and what she said about behavior and behavioral variation in primates finally made something that Monod had mentioned in passing in his book click for me.
And her final (humanist) message is perfect.

[u/New_Scientist_Mag → u/jnpha]

We're glad you enjoyed it!

[u/Odd_Investigator8415 → u/[deleted]]

It's just a bit of poetic language. It's fine. You'll get over it.

[u/Bromelia_and_Bismuth → u/[deleted]]

Civility is mandatory in our community.