As any avid biologists know, Darwin's theory of natural selection is entirely based on two hypotheses: 1. Members of species have individual and diverse traits which have the capability to be passed onto their offspring. Basically, these means that all individuals have the ability to pass their unique, and occasionally beneficial, mutations unto their children. 2. Fight for survival. Basically, this means that in the harsh world of nature, every member of a species has to fight to survive with the set of inheritable traits they are given. Individuals with beneficial mutations most often survive longer and produce larger amounts of offspring, and thus these sub-species eventually become a dominant force in an ecosystem. But here we are in the 21st century, and humans have reached a level of evolution previously unknown on planet Earth. We have no natural predators, and thus no one need fight for survival. Also, the diversification of the human race ultimately means that those who mutate in accordance with their environment will more than likely never encounter others with similar mutations. Thus, we will be stuck as homo sapien sapiens until we eventually destroy ourselves some way or another.
I kind of see where you're going with it. No predators We create the environment around us to make things easier rather than having to adapt to it. Maybe we have reached the stage where only our minds can evolve...(doo doo doo doo*twilight zone music*)
Well see how long that lasts. Peronsally brains are the new bronze but one day we will have a formidable predator or advisary to once again fight to survive.
Yes k6er, but not in the way nature intended. Our adversaries of the future will not fight us hand to hand, but with technology. And even the smartest human can't survive a laser beam to the dome...
i partialy believe in what darwin is saying, yet as a christian, i am against evolution. heres what i think about the above. You guys are looking at it a bit different because of what the statement says. yes, mutations and such...which are rare, and uncommon, are not the only thing proving evolution. lets say...this is only an example....that an early wolf was chasing some early rabbit type roddent. the rodent does something that gets it away to safety. the rabbit then repeats this through out his life until he passes these traits to it young. another rodent...that was evolving at the time...lets say a "dud" rodent...would get killed easily and eventualy become scarse until it went extinct. (dodo bird) animals that live through the bad situations like cold weather changes...lets say they burrow under ground to lay in warmth of earth all winter...while others dont do this and die off...the smarter critter is now a burrowing animal and would fit itself with new tools for their new environment. foods would change, would it need its fur anymore... maybe their hands would change to digging paws like that of a mole. see what im saying? those underwater cave dwelling species that are completly white and have no eyes didnt get like this because of a freak mutation. the mutation took thousands of years to lose the eyes and colorful patterns. thousands of years is hardly a nanosecond on the clock compared to the earths life. animals that adapt survive...and then evolve to make them best at what they do. as for humans evolving...i could see it. already people are developing carpal tunnel from typing and using technology. eventualy in thousands of years...who knows where something like this could lead. people do need to evolve because someday this world wont be fit for us. wether is global warming, or an ice age. people will change and have to fight to survive. people living in space is in the near future. even the moon seems like reasonable place to live these days. would you all agree that once inhabiting the earth, then being able to live in space isnt evolving? this could just go on and on. in space people lose muscle mass. thousands, maybe hundreds of years would make quick work of this. people never having to use their muscles, even standing and walking strength, again. everything is effortless in space. well there you have it. im high as hell and this was a very interesting topic to think about
I'm not completely sure if we have stopped evolving, i can see the point being raised about medication affecting life capacity, but a lot of this is not to do with genes. For example in the 1600s, there was a cholera outbreak which affected people drinking water from a contaminated pump in london. This is bad luck, not bad genes. Plagues however, were affected a lot by genes, you either died, or lived. If we had another plague im sure we will see who has the genes to survive, and they will all shag each other in celebration. Think about severely handicapped births and people that cannot pass on their genes due to fail sperm. These people do not pass on their genes, and the species will not get their genes. This in a way is survival of the fittest. Evolution isn't necessarily the progressive improvement of the gene pool, random mutations happen. These random mutations are happening a lot more now that people are living longer and fucking with different people from around the world with different genetics. Genes are constantly shifting and changing. If anything evolution is probably happening at a faster rate than it was 200-300 years ago when people died from bad luck and didn't get to pass on their genes. edit: "But here we are in the 21st century, and humans have reached a level of evolution previously unknown on planet Earth. We have no natural predators, and thus no one need fight for survival. Also, the diversification of the human race ultimately means that those who mutate in accordance with their environment will more than likely never encounter others with similar mutations. Thus, we will be stuck as homo sapien sapiens until we eventually destroy ourselves some way or another." We have a natural enemy though, bacteria and virii, not always countered by vaccines. Its hard to imagine, but I don't think we are quite done evolving yet. I'm not saying we will be able to walk on 3 legs or grow to 10ft tall, but we are getting taller for example. You do raise a good point about the practicality of people with mutated traits sharing their environment adapted genes however, perhaps when we have our next ice age we will begin to see more mish mashing of genes when people migrate. People who live up mountains for example usually have bigger lungs and a higher haemoglobin count. Ive just thought, imagine if we are actually evolving to look like we imagine aliens to look like? ie no hair due to not needing it for warmth, gangly arms with little muscle due to robots, greenish skin due to low exposure to sunlight etc
I think some of you are missing my true point- looking back I guess I never really phrased it that well. What I'm trying to get at is evolution is a LOCALIZED process. It occurs when a species is forced to adapt to their local environment. With the diversification of the human race, aka people constantly moving around the globe and intermarrying with other races, evolution cannot realistically occur. It is extremely improbable that anyone with an advanced mutation will ever mate with another mutant, as long as we are living on earth. However, the possibility of humans evolving in space is quite different.
How about the trend of rich people having more kids? Generally speaking, the rich are usually of high intelligence, could intelligence be driving evolution atm? If it wasn't for people moving around the earth and spreading genes, who knows how suceptable we would be to certain bacteria as a group of populations. I think our very existance owes to how well we adapt to change and share genes with each other. Give it another 10,000 years and we'll see changes, over the last 10k years we have become smaller and have smaller brains. I haven't got a clue where we are headed, but that doesn't mean we arent changing. edit: i wonder if the aids problem in africa will sort its self out in time when the genes which make hiv resilient people is more widespread. It could turn out that everyone in Africa carries the hiv virus, but is unaffected by it due to genes. Much like chimpanzies which carry it but do not get the symptoms.
Read about eugenics, how we are weakening our gene pool by allowing genes that would previously be wiped out by natural selection. I am very curious to see what the eventual consequences of that will be. Bacteria are constantly becoming more and more resistant to antibiotics and we as a species are getting weaker, so if i had to guess that opens doors for pathogens to really do some damage
Luckily we're experiencing more variation and intermingling, this could help protect us against bacteria along with vaccines due to the herd immunity effect (if most are immune to it, its less of a threat). As with resistance to antibiotics i spose were fucked on that score until we invent some sort of nanobot which can kill any nasties and leave only healthy cells.
Jim Morrison: "yet as a christian, i am against evolution." That's funny, because evolution is against christianity! LOL But then you contradict yourself by stating reasons you think there is evolution. I don't recall it stating anywhere in the bible that christians must not believe in evolution. Why? Because humans hadn't come up with those theories at that point, had they? Some of us have evolved.
Predation is only a small portion of what encompasses natural selection. Every living organism has selection pressures. What makes you think we're diversifying as a species? If anything, I would say out technological, economic and social globalization is in the process of homogenizing the species. Why not? Interracial marriages are on the increase. Well I mean, I think you more or less understand evolution, better than the average bear, but your premises are pretty shaky. I can't agree with your conclusion.
Yeah thats a very interesting topic in itself. Although our current culture and civilization seems to be a very fragile entity, the actual human species is incredibility resilient to disaster situations. We inhabit this planet from one arctic circle and beyond for a reason.
The human race as a whole is unlikely to "evolve" significant biological features due to any particular environmental cue, because our populations are so spread out and intermingle to a degree which prevents significant changes to the genome both locally and for the species as a whole. Also, we use our evolutionary advantage (our brains) to respond to novel problems far more quickly than any evolutionary drive could respond, which removes the selective pressure. There are some changes that occur due to genetic drift though, such as the average height of humans increasing. Oh and for the record, evolutionary theory does not include "levels" of evolution; i.e. a human is not any more evolved than a rat. Organisms specialize into niches they can exploit, and so develop different traits (different, rather than more or less advanced on a linear plot).
I think if anything we will evolve ourselfs into machines. sounds far fetched and from a movie, but there have been a few shows on TV about technology we are coming up with, and this one guy can convert his thoughts into an FM frequency, which transmits to a computer to decode the information and lets him move a robotic arm by just thinking. the technology was made to help people who are paralyzed or anything else and cant talk, be able to talk. so if he can think and move a robotic arm, what would stop him from making a robot (when technology permits....soon) and installing his brain. combine that with a better energy source then we have today to run on and you have something that wont die unless killed. if we are all machines, disease and food and all that is not needed, and things like ocean exploration and space travel become a breeze.