Sometimes, I read something and I can’t help but laugh and think “wow, that sure would piss a TON of creationists off” such as the following stories:

Chimps are more evolved than humans.

A study comparing human and chimp genes that appear to have evolved since we parted ways shows that humans have about 154 such genes and our nearest primate relative a whopping 233.

Which of course blows the theory out of the water that more evolved animals are thus “smarter” or “superior”. …But who is smarter, really? Who is ruining the earth again? Just kidding. Sort of.

The “bottom line is that this study underlines the risks of making generalizations about human evolution,” said Ajit Varki, a professor of cellular and molecular medicine at the University of California at San Diego.

Also: a human tied with a monkey in a memory test.

When playing a memory game, however, both humans and rhesus monkeys play equally well or, one might say, equally poorly.

Each species appears to possess a three- to four-item short-term memory limit, meaning that both monkeys and humans often have trouble remembering details about this number of items. This is especially true when the game involves comparing this amount of stuff with another amount.

Other points of interest:

A skeleton of a 10 000 year old mammoth of a 13.5 foot long rhinoceros sold for $421 200. … The other day I made a comment to a friend “You know, I owe the Canadian government in student loans 3 times the GNI of Zambia…” and the GNI of Zambia is only about…$500. …$421 200!!! Its molar sold for $6 480…

Water woes coming with warming.

Meanwhile, global-warming water problems will make poor, unstable parts of the world — the Middle East, Africa and South Asia — even more prone to wars, terrorism and the need for international intervention, a panel of retired military leaders said in a separate report.

“Water at large is the central (global warming) problem for the U.S.,” Princeton University geosciences professor Michael Oppenheimer said after a press conference featuring eight American scientists who were lead authors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s climate-effects report.

Yangtze River has been irreversibly polluted.

More than 370 miles of the river are in critical condition and almost 30 percent of its major tributaries are seriously polluted, the China Daily said, citing a report by the Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology, part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Sam mentioned in her Virginia Tech post that she is really thankful that she lives in Canada. It’s really not hard to see why. While Canada and America have the money and resources to spend $421 200 on skeletons of rhinoceroses other countries struggle to find suitable water to drip down their child’s throat. …So although I am also thankful to have been born in Canada and raised in such a privileged society - it’s sort of a bitter sweet “victory” when you think of all the other suffering in the world.

And really, if you say that to my mother she’ll say “Excuse me! What about the Natives!” …not so privileged just because they live in Canada. And Katrina created a third world country in America’s backyard. It’s staggering to see the lack of action by people - who instead buy $421 200 skeletons. I guess we all have our indulgences… I’m going to the museum tomorrow… instead of sending the $20 over seas to help combat something, or provide something. I’m also going to the Field Museum in Chicago in the summer instead of sending that money to help people. I can’t help but feel guilty about it.

Anyway - on one hand of course I agree with Sam in that Canada is great. On the other hand I have a pretty hard time being happy about my situation knowing that others are in such shitty ones.

Hopefully chimps will get on top of ruling the world soon!