S2E6: Evolution of Hands
Welcome to GBP, the Great Biological Podcast! Join your esteemed hosts Garrison, Bo,
and Pranav this week as we welcome a curious young scientist, Nicky J, onto our podcast to
discuss something that many people take for granted: their thumbs! Listen along as we dive into the evolution of the modern human’s thumb and hand. Not only will we discuss how our hands evolved from a primate’s hand, but also just how unique our hands and thumbs have become and all the fun things we can do with them!
We talk to Nicky J about how the human thumb was first seen long ago with the primate
Notharctus tenebrosus. From there the primate hand continue to evolve over hundreds of
thousands of years until we saw the Middle Pleistocene fossil from Kenya resembling the
modern human hand with a similar third metacarpal and thumb physiology. Likewise, we
continued to see thumb muscles evolve from primates with different thumb muscles connecting to the forearm being slightly similar to a primate’s but more advanced and certain complexes in the thumb.
The podcast also discusses how human and ape hand proportions are not as similar as one
would believe, since humans thumb to ring finger proportions are larger than a primate’s
proportions. We demonstrate how this difference in proportion is due to a human needing a
larger relative thumb in order to manipulate tools more effectively. Finally we show Nicky J how coevolution has occurred with the thumb in regards to pandas’ “false thumbs” and go on to discuss why every animal does not possess a thumb due to evolutionary constraints and behavioral dynamics of certain organisms and species.
This podcast is loaded with everything a listener could ever want: humor, drama, facts,
and a whole lot of entertainment. So sit back, relax, grab some popcorn, because the GBP will take you for a ride!
and Pranav this week as we welcome a curious young scientist, Nicky J, onto our podcast to
discuss something that many people take for granted: their thumbs! Listen along as we dive into the evolution of the modern human’s thumb and hand. Not only will we discuss how our hands evolved from a primate’s hand, but also just how unique our hands and thumbs have become and all the fun things we can do with them!
We talk to Nicky J about how the human thumb was first seen long ago with the primate
Notharctus tenebrosus. From there the primate hand continue to evolve over hundreds of
thousands of years until we saw the Middle Pleistocene fossil from Kenya resembling the
modern human hand with a similar third metacarpal and thumb physiology. Likewise, we
continued to see thumb muscles evolve from primates with different thumb muscles connecting to the forearm being slightly similar to a primate’s but more advanced and certain complexes in the thumb.
The podcast also discusses how human and ape hand proportions are not as similar as one
would believe, since humans thumb to ring finger proportions are larger than a primate’s
proportions. We demonstrate how this difference in proportion is due to a human needing a
larger relative thumb in order to manipulate tools more effectively. Finally we show Nicky J how coevolution has occurred with the thumb in regards to pandas’ “false thumbs” and go on to discuss why every animal does not possess a thumb due to evolutionary constraints and behavioral dynamics of certain organisms and species.
This podcast is loaded with everything a listener could ever want: humor, drama, facts,
and a whole lot of entertainment. So sit back, relax, grab some popcorn, because the GBP will take you for a ride!
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