Embryo Questions
Do you want to try your hand at this? Which one’s the chicken? the rabbit? the salamander, the fish, the human?
(The picture was taken from the Scientific American of February, 1994, from an article by William McGinnis and Michael Kuziora: The Molecular Architects of Body Design)
The Evo-Devo (evolution-development) biologists tell us that all forms of life have pretty much the same beginnings. And in many, as above, pretty much the same look, at least in the early stages of development. Also we’re told that pretty much the same groups of HOX genes in the five examples above, and in all other animal forms, determine exactly what changes will occur throughout the development process, leading to the great diversity of life that we see about us.
Given that the embryos of the fish, salamander, chicken, rabbit and human (in that order above) are almost identical in the early stages of their development why is it that we humans continue to set ourselves apart from all other life forms as if somehow we were special, and that all other life was there for our benefit?
Why also is it that humans, developing from identical embryos and who are mostly alike, why do they go on killing each other? And why is it that those who are most alike, as the peoples of the Middle East, kill one another with a particular vengeance and savagery?
