Human Brain still evolving

Think humans are not getting smarter? New research shows a couple of brain-building genes changed at times that human society changed radically. A news report is found in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

The researchers found that not everyone has these genes, but evolutionary pressures are causing them to increase in the population at an unprecedented rate. Lahn's group is also trying to determine just how smart these genes may have made humans.

One of the mutated genes, called microcephalin, began its swift spread among human ancestors about 37,000 years ago, a period marked by a creative explosion in music, art, religious expression and tool-making.

The other gene, ASPM (abnormal spindle-like microcephaly-associated) arose only about 5,800 years ago, right around the time of writing and the first civilization in Mesopotamia, which dates to 7000 B.C.

Needless to say the coincidence of each mutation occurring at about the same time as a major change in human society strongly suggests that they are connected to human development and increased human intelligence.

An additional research program it suggests to me is to see if people who don't have these changed genes are more likely to disbelieve in Evolution or to believe in Intelligent Design. I know what my hypothesis would be.