836 BOOKS in BRieF OPINION biological diversity. will allow us to test patterns of new data are emerging that within populations. developmental traits are favoured examining how certain genetic and steps of evolutionary change, 2010), he focuses on the individual & the Predictable Genome foreseeable. In that the evolution of genomes is the world. which we can apply our wisdom in and stress still alter the degree to compassion and empathy. making, emotion and cognition, have given us insight into decision- the past 50 years, scientific advances social change over the centuries. In emotion and ethics has influenced 2010) how thinking about intellect, resources that society should tap into. intelligence and talent are abundant s has been promulgated for decades, the idea of preprogrammed success their biological blueprint. hard work and circumstance, not that top performers are moulded by development and concludes science of genetics, cognition and nurture over nature, he examines the henk shows instead that human Evolution, Development, h Wisdom h and philosophy. neuroscience interweaving of h by theme explored Wisdom is the 2010). Us Genius in All of s writer David argues science genes alone, stem from our t concluding intertwined, are inextricably development evolution and his book that s biologist David e alent does not volutionary tern argues in henk in e explains how e explains in all in his (Doubleday, s tephen (Roberts, a y lthough f

(Knopf, et chance avouring The of the exhibit is the least scientific: a photo booth stab wound to the chest. The most crowded part Iraq, who had arthritis and probably died from a States. He was a 40-something male, found in only Neanderthal skeleton housed in the United precious fossil in the collection: 130 bones of the practise forensic anthropology with the most with the face of a modern human. People can prominent brow ridges of a 350,000-year-old pithecus africanus sloping face of a 2.5-million-year-old expanding . play that correlates climate fluctuations with brainstheirgot bigger, disaccordinga to new environments and faced new challenges, and build social networks. As they encountered hearth to share food, find safety from predators years later, early began gathering at the began about 1.7 Palaeolithic for chopping, cutting and scraping animals for food. The use of hand axes in the lion years ago that allowed the killing of large conserve heat in colder European climes. H. body for dissipating heat, narrowlong, a having adaptedhotclimates,to Whereas isonly marginally taller. ite skeleton of Turkana Boy stands next to the adult compos size, a child skeleton of to carry babies. In a striking comparison of body A. cool and warm. Walking on two legs helped ing as climate fluctuated between wet and dry, Lucy, walked upright and climbed trees, adapt includes the fossilized partial skeleton named ecus afarensis. 3.6-million-year-old footsteps of communicating using symbols. bigger brains, increasing social networks and changing body sizes and shapes, developing foods,and tools new withexperimenting milestones of early humans: walking upright, past 6 million years. struggle to survive changes in climate over the how human traits evolved out of our ancestors’ David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins depicts tory in Washington DC. The US$20.7-million Smithsonian National Museum of Natural His means to be human opened last month at the itwhat exploringexhibition permanent A s ©

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A Australopith l l r i g Australo h t named named s which r e s mil e r v e ------d The permanent exhibit casts climate change as Janet Fang make a difference.” adds: “Our intentions, the decisions we make, lation to a few thousand breeding adults. Potts when vast swings in climate reduced the popu ens species has also been fragile”, says Potts. eagle talons. Although we have survived, “our of hominin bones etched by crocodile teeth or early human attacked by a leopard or in displays short video playing the chimp-like squeals of an through— whether music, suspenseful in a gives constant reminders that life is precarious species, More than a dozen species identified. Only our more than 6,000 individuals discovered so far. like the grimace of a .” smiles look different from ours and are more Smithsonian’s Human Origins Program. “Their muscles attach”, says Rick Potts, director of the are bolted to a huge wall display, representing blank gazes offered by their , 76 of which — allow a more personal connection than the from Indonesia and a male a 1-metre-tall female ‘hobbit’, your prehistoric ancestor. that transforms your picture into a portrait of the driver of human evolution. ‘eleventh century’. existed in the first century. It should have read we wrongly stated that Chaco Canyon’s society views of collapse’ ( In the picture caption of the Book Review ‘Two Correction Seven Seven reconstructed busts — including that of Above skulls,the a label reads: “Fossils of almost 70,000 yearsbecameextinct ago Homo sapiens is a news intern at NATURE Nature

looked at where smile where at looked like modern humans, “we the corners of the mouth whether they could turn up 15 species. To determine , remains.” The exhibition

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