I'm glad you asked about human evolution! Not only is it extremely interesting to learn about, it is very important and the next federal budget should include additional funding for human evolution research.
Studying human evolution has come a long way and new things are being discovered everyday. Considering that paleoanthropologists only started believing we evolved out of Africa in the 1940's, and this was a huge debate which worked (and continues to work) to break down a lot of colonialist thought and racism, there is a lot left to do. Studying the human past helps shape the way we think about ourselves and our future and more funding would allow more scientists from all around the world to work together to create more open discussions; and ultimately, create a more accurate view of our past and present.
Human evolution research also does a lot with genetics and this research helps us to better understand our bodies and health and can help us predict how we might have evolved and how we could evolve in the future. Better understanding how evolution could affect our bodies will be of great importance to our future lives and future health.
interesting idea to bring up racism and colonialism here. I wonder if we might need to give a bit more info on how these have affected the study of human origins but it is so impt to bring that up. and thinking about how genetics can be used (since everyone sees the validity in health research....in theory) is good cause it shows real world affects. Kinda like how work by anthros has shown how systemic racisim can influence the genome. good job!
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