Spider not looking to split hairs here, so help me please...

"Evolution couldn't have had anything to do with it. It honestly has nothing to do with how hot and spicy the chilis are, it's the fact that capsaisin is toxic even in small doses to most mammals and no other mammal has the ability to detoxify capsaicin that humans have.'

'All mammals can handle various amounts of capsaicin, but humans are the only species that chooses to eat chili peppers and we are also have a high tolerance for capsaicin.'

I fully agree with humans choose many foods outside of what biologically they appear to be evolved to eat...and with what appears to be minimal harm...including chilies.

As to why this is so....I have an open ended mind on that...

lizardking19,


"and honestly when did anyone call u a hitler? "

It wasn't in this thread. The person in question has a habit of calling anyone with whom she disagrees a Nazi or Hitler.

"Furthermore i chose not to combat ur ignorance when u (spider) said that there was no connection between hiv and aids that was proven nearly 20 years ago "

http://www.ddponline.org/rasnick.pdf
http://www.mercola.com/2001/sep/5/hiv_aids.htm
http://www.ourcivilisation.com/aids/not/index.htm
http://www.virusmyth.net/aids/perthgroup/
http://news.netscape.com/story/2007/04/09/leading-scientists-cliam-hiv-does-not-cause-aids/
http://www.natural-health-information-centre.com/hiv-does-not-cause-aids.html
http://notaids.com/en/proof
http://www.duesberg.com/papers/ch2.html
http://www.virusmyth.net/aids/
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3983706668483511310

A whole lot of PHDs say that HIV doesn't cause AIDS, but that's for another thread.

Ooops...what do I need assistance with?

The first quote appears to have a different meaning to the second...which do you feel it is...

That mammals of all species can handle, (tolerate, without harm to them) capsaicin, but elect not to eat it?

Or capsaicin IS toxic to most mammalsas they have no means to detoxify it, and hence dont eat it?

Spider wrote:
“But we can talk about one subject: "Chili Pepper as relates to human evolution" without discussing creationism.”

I already explained it but you took it as an insult. There is no problem associated with chili pepper and evolution. If you understood how evolution works you’d also understand why this isn’t a problem.

One way to maybe help you understand why it’s unimportant is to explain a little bit of chemistry.

I won’t attempt to teach you chemistry myself, but hopefully this site with their nice pictorials of molecules will suffice. Assuming that you have any clue at all how enzymes actually work.

http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/features/capsaicin.shtml

Notice that Vanillin, Eugenol, Zingerone, and Capsaicin are all made form the same organic benzene ring.

Any enzyme that can handle anyone of these molecules can most likely handle them all because it will most likely begin disassembly with the benzene ring which is the key distinguishing factor of these molecules.

Vanillin is found in vanilla beans, balsam and cloves, it also comes from oak, which leeches into wine that is stored in oak barrels. So it would have been plentiful in the Old World.

Eugenol is found in bay leaves, allspice, cinnamon, and cloves, again plentiful in the Old World.

Zingerone of course is found in ginger.

I’m sure there are even other foodstuffs that would have a similar molecular structures as Capsaicin if you do a serious dedicated search you could probably find many more. I found the above web site within seconds.

So even if it would have been a problem for evolution, it’s not a problem anymore, right? You just didn’t search for the correct information. Either that, or you don’t understand how chemistry works.

Does this answer suffice?

Is this "debate" over now? Or is there still something you don't understand?

Jess642,

I'm sorry, I can see how that wouldn't be clear.

Capsaicin is toxic, but all mammals can detoxify capsaicin to varying degrees. Humans have an unusually high ability to detoxify capsaicin. A link I posted earlier showed that more than a small amount of capsaicin resulted in physical harm to the animal, while the human subjects consumed large quatities of capsaicin without harm. Small amounts of capsaicin is beneficial to all mammals, but only humans can deal with large amounts.

Abracadabra,

That thread does not suggest that "Any enzyme that can handle anyone of these molecules can most likely handle them all because it will most likely begin disassembly with the benzene ring which is the key distinguishing factor of these molecules."

But what I can tell you is that the link I posted earlier compared high does of capsaicin in humans vs animals and found that humans don't suffer ill effects at high doses.

Thankyou Spider, that makes a whole lot more sense to me.

Thankyou Abra....that sheds a much clearer light on it all..much appreciated.

Yes, I know that site doesn't explain how enzymes work. But if the only way to convince you is to give you a 4-year college course in organic chemstry and cell biology I'll surrender right now. It wouldn't be worth trying to convince you.

Spider wrote:
“But what I can tell you is that the link I posted earlier compared high does of capsaicin in humans vs animals and found that humans don't suffer ill effects at high doses.”

So animals probably didn’t eat a lot of vanilla, basil and ginger. That’s understandable.

Most animals will reject pure spices. And they certainly don’t make “meals” where they just add a little bit of spice to a dish. That’s something that humans do.

So again, no surprise.

You’re trying to make a mountain where there’s a mole hole.

In fact, you've just given evidence of why evolution probable DID play a part in all of this actually. Humans ate foods that were similar in chemical composition to Capsaicin and animals didn't.

By questioning chili peppers you inadvertently gave evolution support. As if it needed any.

i dont feel like arguing anymore tonight either (though I kinda want to) but ill say this: the people debating on this thread could talk circles around most people (thats a compliment to all major participants) so im wiiling for now to agree to disagree goodnight and goodluck etc etc im tired

spider you just don't change

evolution chilli?? with beans?? Ok soI didn't read the beginning..I am allowed these peculiarities because *ahem* I have a triangle brain and wear a shiny hat

It was interesting for me...I like Chilies...and peppers..they have so many amazing uses..and one we also use it for here, is intestinal worms...it sure cleans em out!!!

Shiny hats are the salvations is some discussions...and only the extremely gifted have triangle brains.

~~~

Triangle Brains
and molecular chains
with spicy hot peppers
to run through our veins

A Shiny New Hat
on Scrödinger’s cat
using quantum mechanics
to explain where it’s at

Intestinal Worms
given Chili confirms
evolution by species
will kill all our germs

To question a theory
like as if it’s belief
is bound to produce
gastronomic relief

~~~

I’m just having fun with comments made by Cherub and Jess.
If there’s a message in the poem it wasn’t intentional.

Ahhh Abra is simply marvy!!

And no small chilies were harmed in the making of it..

Just out of curiosity and if anybody else posted this I am sorry to be redundant, thread got a little "seems like old times there for a bit": What type of birds ate these chillis and where did these types of birds migrate to if they were indeed a migrating type bird? My theory is as the bird had the natural immunity, possibly if they did migrate to the region of your evolutionary man could they not have become food and passed the immunity on to man through means of "you are what you eat" type of thing.

Another question I have is how many oceans did life evolve from, just one or several?

Abra

Wench wrote:
“Another question I have is how many oceans did life evolve from, just one or several?”

No one knows the answer to that question. At best we can only guess.

My personal guess it that life on earth arose in several differnet places and eventually all merged together.

The reason I believe this is because I see evolution going back even further than just the history of the earth. The heavy elements that are required for life are created in the stars. Carbon being the ultimate important element. Carbon is the key because of it’s atomic structure. It is my belief that just as DNA is seen as the blueprint for life, carbon atoms are the blueprint for DNA.

Therefore, I believe that carbon, along with all the other elements in the correct proportions, will naturally come together to form DNA given the correct conditions and enough time. Earth obviously had the correct proportions of elements, and the correct conditions all over its surface. And time scales were in the billions of years. Therefore it seems natural to me that life would have evolved starting at various places on the planet. This is purely speculative on my part, but it’s more than just “pure” speculation. It’s based on what I understand about chemistry and physics.

However, there are things to consider.

For example, the early earth was anaerobic (no oxygen). So only anaerobic processes (or life) could evolve at that time. In other words, there were limitations on what kinds of organic processes could flourish. So we weren’t going to have a huge diversity of different kinds of things evolving. The conditions of the planet itself put constraints on that.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that, on another planet where the conditions may have been slightly different, the same elements could have possibly evolved into a totally different kinds of life forms. So even thought the carbon atom contains the blueprint for DNA, the earth may not be a very good example of all the different kinds of things that DNA can evolve into.

It may even be possible that other structures similar to DNA but somewhat differnet might also evolve under different conditions on differnet planets. In other words, the carbon atom may contain a “blueprint’ for a very large diversity of life-forms.

We know that humans are not the sole end product of DNA. We can see all sorts of living creatures around us that have also evolved from DNA. Humans are only one of many. We tend to think that we are special because we are arrogant. But we really aren’t special in any significant way biologically speaking.

If life evolves so easily, then we might ask why life didn’t evolve on other planets within our solar system. Well, to begin with, we can’t be absolute sure that it hasn’t. But on top of that, the conditions and combination of elements just weren’t right. Carbon can’t hold organic bonds together at much over 120 F. So this rules out planets like Mercury and Venus. Primitive life may well have gotten a foot hold on mars and just died out due to lack of sustained environment. We really can’t say with certainty at this point.

Some scientists believe that there may be life on some of the moons of Saturn where constant volcanic activity might provide the needed warmth. However, the constant seismic activity may also prevent life from evolving to much complexity.

I personally believe that the universe itself is full of life. There are over 100 billion galaxies in the observable universe. Each containing approximately 100 billion stars. Yet there are only slightly more than 100 different chemical elements in the entire universe, and they are always being produced by nova and supernova in roughly the same proportions.

In other words, the cosmic soup is the recipe for life and it’s the same soup everywhere we look.