What It Means to Be 98% Chimpanzee

Folk Beliefs About Human Genetic Variation Predict Discrete Versus Continuous Racial Categorization and Evaluative Bias

“…In contrast to this view, modern genomic science has indicated that people share all but a minuscule portion of their genetic information with everyone else on the planet (Feldman, Lewontin, & King, 2003). Moreover, when comparing across groups of people who self-identify with a particular race, researchers have found that the genetic variability that does exist tends to be greater within than between groups (e.g., Marks, 2002). While contentious debates have raged in biomedicine as to whether the between-group differences that do exist indicate that ''race'' is a meaningful biological concept (Risch, Burchard, Ziv, & Tang, 2003vs.…”

Life Times

“…Yet when popularised, the dissemination of molecular anthropological argument can further misleading impressions, as in the argument that differences between humans and chimpanzees are minimal because we share '98 per cent' of our DNA. As one advocate turned critic has argued, such contention creates an exaggerated sense that humans and chimpanzees are close relatives (Marks, 2002: cf., Barnes and Dupré, 2008). This is a diffi cult proposition to maintain when humans and chimps do not appear to be alike.…”

“…In other words, there remains a strong case for human exceptionalism, in spite of attempts within social science and popular media to anthropomorphize other primates (Meyer, 1999; Newton, 2007). Human beings remain strongly distinctive from other primates if only because we are ‘bipedal and culture-reliant’ (Marks, 2002: 44) and exhibit exceptional technological flair (Burkitt, 1999; Newton, 2007). Though molecular anthropologists accept that ‘humans possess culture and apes do not’ (Relethford, 1990: 248), they have tended to downplay the differences between humans and other primates (eg Relethford, 1990).…”

The Ontogenesis of Human Identity

“…However, it seems that Homo sapiens and Pan troglodytes share 94-5-97% of the genome; cfr. Olson, 2000;Chen and Li, 2001;Marks, 2002. It should be noted that the forensic scientists have extremely sophisticated methods to identify a DNA as a human DNA; cf.…”