Evolution - where are we going

finlma

I'm just interested in people's thoughts about the future intellectual evolution of humans. It seems to me that it is the people with lower IQ, lower socio-economic status and greater religous believes that start having children younger and have more of them. Also people at the other end of the spectrum (a lot of people reading this probably) are having children later and having fewer of them. Leads me to think that we are going in a bad direction.

lookinforpicnic

Erwin Schrodinger made the exact same point 60 or so years ago. Well are we de-evolving...? depends on what you have in mind when you are talking about evolution (and progress etc another story), biological evolution has virtually stopped there isn't any selection pressure anymore to improve typical biologically atributes like muscle tone, speed, agility all that kind of stuff, and intelligence well that is alot more complicated not only because it has a very large cultural component so it can't be passed on by genetic means as simply as eye colour can etc. but also the process of natural selection doesn't have to be substrate specific (i.e. apply only to DNA), as if you look at natural selection as an algorithm that is substrate neutral well then cultural phenomenon can evolve in the exact same way DNA did. So evolution can continue apace and if you think that cultural entities like tools language etc etc play a very large part in the mind and intelligence well then you need not despair that we are going backwards...far from it

Schuhart

lookinforpicnic wrote:

We are de-evolving

You could set that to music. Or at least something bearing a rough relationship to music.

Presumably evolution has to be seen in a broader context that just our species. If the human population increases, its presumably a sign of its success relative to other fauna.

Intuitively it would seem unsafe to assume that we're immune to biological evolution. Do we really think that our descendents will run out to eternity as Homo Sapiens? For the sake of argument, consider the possibility of planned genetic manipulation. People might be unsettled by the thought now, but possibly in the future a parent will be regarded as remiss if they don't pay for an array of genetic technology to be installed in their offspring.

Scofflaw

As far as it goes - we are still evolving. A good example is lactose-tolerance, which is still pretty concentrated in people of Western European origin, and is also relatively recent.

However, bear in mind that a creature successfully adapted to its niche has no particular pressure on it to change drastically, so changes are likely to be incremental rather than dramatic.

As to the de-evolution caused by the larger families of the poor, this was one of the major worries of the eugenecists. Consider, though, that the poor and the rich do not commonly interbreed - so instead of a general decline, we have a potential for fission into two sub-species, H. sapiens inferior and H. sapiens superior perhaps...such a thing is only possible, though, if society stratifies for several thousand years across the entire planet.

Additionally, of course, we can pretty much guarantee that the poor will be the ones who suffer in any upcoming resource crisis.

Finally, and so important that it makes everything before it superfluous, the poor are neither stupid, nor genetically unfit. The additional health complications they tend to suffer compared to the "elite" result from a combination of poor diet, poor working conditions, and the psychosomatic effects of knowing that they are at the bottom of the heap.

cordially,
Scofflaw

pH

If you think about it evolution may outsmart us.

For example - there must be selective pressure against all forms of contraception. If there is anything (genetic) about a person in the western world that makes contraception less effective then that will be selected for.

Also it would appear that we have 2 strong desires regarding children - to have sex and to love and nurture our kids. Contraception allows us the sex without the kids, but any strong 'genetic desire' to have children could explode in a population where if you had genes that compelled you to have kids, modern society/technology would allow families of 20+ and each of the children would to some degree inherit the same desire.

Zillah

There's no such thing as de-evolving. That statement is loaded with the erroneous assumption that evolution has a goal or plan.

And yes we are still evolving. Pressure to survive for the average western person is not what it used to be, but until the point where no human being dies ever again evolution will still affect us. Cancer, infectious diseases and a litany of other biological causes of death are selective criteria, as are banking decisions, colour preference and spouse selection. Everything can influence a person's survival or reproduction and genetics can influence every aspect of a human being.


Its all a bit moot though. While we're still evolving, the time scale of evolution is far too slow to matter anymore. The future of the human race will be determined technologically. I can explain better with a question: How long might it be before technology will allow a human being to dictate their very form and nature of existence? I know it sounds extremely far fetched, but its totally plausible. A thousand years of technological development? Ten thousand? A hundred thousand? Lets assume 100,000 years for now. Thats the year 102,008 AD, fifty times longer than the time since Jesus was alive. The gap between now and then is a thousand times longer than the gap between now and 1900. Its likely (assuming we haven't been destroyed or had some sort of super Dark Age) that human existence will be unimaginably changed by then.

And in evolutionary terms 100k years is nothing. A drop in the ocean. Technology will absolutely transcend evolutionary limitations.

Also, there's the likelyhood that some form of artificial intelligence will inherit the future, as the moment we make something smarter than we are, it can make itself even smarter faster than we can improve ourselves and will rapidly outstrip us in every endeavour:)

robindch

> some form of artificial intelligence will inherit the future

What a horrible thought -- intelligent design is true after all!

Scofflaw

Zillah wrote:

Also, there's the likelyhood that some form of artificial intelligence will inherit the future, as the moment we make something smarter than we are, it can make itself even smarter faster than we can improve ourselves and will rapidly outstrip us in every endeavour

Yes, but we can give it religion - that way it will decide to limit itself...for its own good.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Fallen Seraph

I *believe* that there was a paper published a few years ago which proposed that geniuses who came from a specific "race", if you will (I don't know the correct/better word for it), of jews were most likely the result of evolution having occurred around the middle ages which selected those with higher intellectual capacities (better money-lender means bigger family/less persecution) and this is what gave us Freud, Einstein and Mendelschosshen.

Also, while it isn't particularly my field, the whole proposal of humans branching off into two different species seems like daft scaremongering to me. I really don't think that there's a great genetic gap between rich and poor, and I can't say I've heard of any evidence which supports this. And the argument becomes completely redundant if we end up living in a true meritocracy (which is probably the best way to go).

Schuhart

Zillah wrote:

Technology will absolutely transcend evolutionary limitations.

I just wonder should that be qualified in some way - something like 'natural evolutionary limitations'.

What's on my mind is that if humans develop technology that allows them to 'evolve' in a particular direction, presumably the ability of the species to consciously change becomes part of the evolutionary process.

lookinforpicnic

Zillah wrote:

There's no such thing as de-evolving.

Sorry that was a typo by me I forgot the 'we' "Well are we de-evolving...?" and the question mark, i have edited it. I was just as asking the question that the person who started the thread implied. And I said in the answer that talk of progress and the like is another story.. of course there is no direction or destination in evolution it is powered by a mindless mechanical algorithm, even though you could take a design stance and argue for improved designs and what not but that is another topic.

Zillah wrote:

Pressure to survive for the average western person is not what it used to be

Thats putting it lightly. But of course as long as there is change and selective pressure on such changes there is going to be evolution. The thing is that if we just consider biological evolution (passed along in the germ cells) to say we are still evolving is trivial, must changes today are not selected for because unless you have a serious abnormality you should be able to reproduce. Cancer or heart disease or other diseases which kill us off act primarily after we have reproduced so in these cases any handy variant that arises will not be selected for

Zillah wrote:

but until the point where no human being dies ever again evolution will still affect us

not necessarily...in principle we could all stay the same forever living and dying no change no evolution

Zillah wrote:

Its all a bit moot though. While we're still evolving, the time scale of evolution is far too slow to matter anymore. The future of the human race will be determined technologically.

Yeah completely agree...

Zillah wrote:

Also, there's the likelyhood that some form of artificial intelligence will inherit the future, as the moment we make something smarter than we are, it can make itself even smarter faster than we can improve ourselves and will rapidly outstrip us in every endeavour:)

Yeah, our hope will be... if you can't beat them join them or be them...:)

bonkey

finlma wrote:

I'm just interested in people's thoughts about the future intellectual evolution of humans.

What do you mean by "intellectual evolution". Evolution, in the strictest sense, is genetic.

It seems to me that it is the people with lower IQ, lower socio-economic status and greater religous believes that start having children younger and have more of them.

And? There is no definitive link between these traits and genetics. They would appear to have little to do with evolution.

Incidentally, what you describe has pretty-much always been the case. Poorer, lesser educated people have traditionally had larger families on average than richer, better educated ones. Its been that way for centuries, if not milienia.

Leads me to think that we are going in a bad direction.

It got us here. Was this a bad direction to have come?

And as someone pointed out...evolution isn't about good/bad directions. Its not about reaching some higher goal.

And if you think about it...the minority rich are taking a disproportionate amount of the world's resources for themselves. The easiest way for the majority poor to combat this is through sheer force of numbers. Larger family groups etc. allow efficiencies of scale, as well as giving - at a macro level - the potential to eventually overthrow the rich "overlords" through sheer mass (as has happened periodically through history).

Seems to me like its a great strategy, not a bad one.

lookinforpicnic

bonkey wrote:

What do you mean by "intellectual evolution". Evolution, in the strictest sense, is genetic.

Yes in a very restrictive myopic sense. Simply because genetic evolution is the best example of the process (natural selection) we know (it provoked discovery of the process), doesn't mean natural selection has to substrate specific. If we produced little robots with the ability to change and reproduce by non-genetic means, we would have a case of evolution of these little creatures... similarily ideas, environmental props, technology etc can all be susceptible to natural selection and thus an evolutionary process, so we can talk of intellectual evolution but of course this is a cultural phenomenon has nothing to do with poorer or less bright people reproducing. Intelluctual evolution depends on continued access to information.

bonkey wrote:

Incidentally, what you describe has pretty-much always been the case. Poorer, lesser educated people have traditionally had larger families on average than richer, better educated ones. Its been that way for centuries, if not milienia.

A very very very insignificant timeframe for someone emphasising genetic evolution

bonkey wrote:

It got us here. Was this a bad direction to have come?

Thats absurd, poorer people having more children didn't get us here today, there has been virtually no genetic changes that have influenced what makes us human in last 2000 years. We were here long before we had the ability to have enough resources and technolgical savvy to enable poorer people to maintain large families. What made us what we are today from a biologial point of view was most probably a massive selection pressure occuring over the last few milliion years on ours brain and its ability to incorporate various environmental structures tools and the like and of course its ability to use language (or at least the proto varieties). I'd bet that poorer people having large families wasn't a phenomenon that existed back then

Zillah

lookinforpicnic wrote:

even though you could take a design stance and argue for improved designs and what not but that is another topic.

But then what decides what counts as "improved" if not natural selection? And if natural selection has deemed a less complex design to be effective in the enviornment, who are you to claim its going backwards, you with your archaic, overly-complex, easy to break biological machinery

The genetic equivalent of a square brick will inherit the future

The thing is that if we just consider biological evolution (passed along in the germ cells) to say we are still evolving is trivial

But thats the very point! 99% of our evolution was done in trillions of trivial steps. So your father died of heart disease when you were 25. Not a big deal in terms of survival but I'd bet theres a small statistically relevant change in survival rates. He's not around to advise you anymore, watch your back or look after the kids. Even if something only changes your chances by 0.1%, give it a thousand generations and it will have manifested.

Rich tapestry, rich tapestry.

not necessarily...in principle we could all stay the same forever living and dying no change no evolution

So people are dying? What causes them to die? The traits that affect that are subject to evolution, even if its a decision to kill yourself after 10k years of life.

Yeah, our hope will be... if you can't beat them join them or be them...:)

Cyborgs for the win! It does raise interesting issues actually. What would we consider the human race anymore? If I can decide my form will be a roiling mass of microscopic robots with decentralised processing, do I count as human anymore? My personality still exists, lets assume I'm still sentient.

Schuhart wrote:

I just wonder should that be qualified in some way - something like 'natural evolutionary limitations'.

What's on my mind is that if humans develop technology that allows them to 'evolve' in a particular direction, presumably the ability of the species to consciously change becomes part of the evolutionary process.

Definately. The new fields of analysis we'd have to develop would be very interesting. In such a world I suspect meme theory would become all the more relevant and the parallels to genetics all the more prominent. If the only distinctive quality of a human being is their mind, then the unit of inheritence becomes the idea, not the DNA.

Scofflaw

bonkey wrote:

Poorer, lesser educated people have traditionally had larger families on average than richer, better educated ones. Its been that way for centuries, if not milienia.

Important point. "Poorer", and "less well educated" are not genetic conditions, and they are what correlates with larger families. Some posters appear to be in danger of assuming that the poor are genetically inferior. This is not the case - it is a false Social Darwinist argument.

Consider the possibility that having large families provide the poor with more possibilities to move up the social ladder, whereas having fewer children allows those already some way up the ladder to concentrate their resources on ensuring their offspring do not fall back down again.

All the time, though, bear in mind that poverty and lack of education are not, repeat not, genetic characteristics.

cordially,
Scofflaw

bonkey

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Yes in a very restrictive myopic sense.

No, in the sense of what the term evolution means with any sort of established scientific applicability.

I'm not being needlessly pedantic here. Evolution as a term implicity suggests other things such as natural selection. IF we want to use it to apply to something then we should either be able to show that the associated terms also apply or clarify that they don't.

THe concept of natural selection as applied to genetics only applies to inheritable traits. If you have a genetic advantage, it will pass on to your descendants, giving them a genetic advantage, and thus will become more prevalent from the fact that you gain advantage.

Education gives you advantages, sure....but its not an inherited trait. That you are well educated says that you have an advantage, but not your kids nor your grandkids other than the indircet benefit they get from you. Your great-great-great grandkids.....no....no lasting benefit.

Similarly, if you have a poor education, there's nothing to stop your kids from having a good one, their kids having a poor one....and so on. There are simply no inheritable traits in this regard. So while education gives you advantages, there is little reason to believe that good/bad education will have an evolutionary effect.

Simply because genetic evolution is the best example of the process (natural selection) we know (it provoked discovery of the process), doesn't mean natural selection has to substrate specific.

Correct. It doesn't. However, until you can show it meaningfully applies to a different substrate, then you don't really have any basis to refer to some other substrate in those terms.

A very very very insignificant timeframe for someone emphasising genetic evolution

Thats partially my point.

The timeframe being discussed is insignificant, but the "current trend" that the OP referred to is therefore either nothing current at all, or is a very very short-term one and thus has no meaningful aplpicability to a long-term multi-generational concept such as evolution....even if we set aside the question of inheritability.

Thats absurd, poorer people having more children didn't get us here today

Then there is no reason to believe it will bring us anywhere tomorrow either.

, there has been virtually no genetic changes that have influenced what makes us human in last 2000 years.

If its genetic-evolution we're talking about, then the "current trend" - as you correctly point out - is of far too short an established timeframe to mean anything from an evolutionary perspective.

If its not genetic evolution we're talking about, but some measure of progress that allows for shorter-term relevance, then the "current trend" that the OP feels is a big threat not only is it effecting where we go from here, it was equally a factor in how we got here.

Either its too short to be meaningful, or its as much as part of how we got here as it is of where we're going. You can take your pick...I don't mind.

What I do not believe can be argued is that this is something new, but well-enough established to show a downward trend...unless we suggest that the last several hundred years at least have been part of this trend. I dno't think the OP is suggesting that stone-age, bronze-age or early iron-age man was the pinnacle that we're falling away from....but I believe we can establish the inverse relationship of eduction/wealth and family-size back at least that far.

joe_chicken

Schuhart wrote:

Presumably evolution has to be seen in a broader context that just our species. If the human population increases, its presumably a sign of its success relative to other fauna.

The best thing about evolution is it's simplicity. It's not about "good" or "bad"... simply about "best fit".

lookinforpicnic

Zillah wrote:

But then what decides what counts as "improved" if not natural selection? And if natural selection has deemed a less complex design to be effective in the enviornment, who are you to claim its going backwards, you with your archaic, overly-complex, easy to break biological machinery.

Yeah, but you can get concepts like improvement and the like into a mindless process (if you so wish), it simply requires taking some kind of pragmatic stance to get a grip on it. Like a Dennettian 'design stance' (similar to an engineering perspective) where you can postulate a design space and look at the trajectory of various designs and how they fair with others etc. Or you can take a Dawkins approach and look at evolution as producing more and more improbably designs (climbing mount improbable). If a brick did inherit the earth well that would be a travesty from this more pragmatic perspectives.

Zillah wrote:

But thats the very point! 99% of our evolution was done in trillions of trivial steps.... Even if something only changes your chances by 0.1%, give it a thousand generations and it will have manifested.

I'm afraid I don't agree, well i agree with the statement I just don't believe it is operative today as there isn't sufficient selection pressure today to enable a 0.1% increase in your chances to manifest. What made us human was most probably a selection pressure occuring over the last few million years in out ability to incorporate tools and language, so any trivial step (of course evolution is all about trivial steps) to improve (i.e. make us better language users) that today will simply not be selected for, or any other trivial step (where is the selection pressure?), only disastrous mutations will be weeded out.

Zillah wrote:

So people are dying? What causes them to die? The traits that affect that are subject to evolution, even if its a decision to kill yourself after 10k years of life.

Again all about death biological evolution doesn't care about dying only reproducing... or more specifically not dying before you reproduce.

Zillah wrote:

Cyborgs for the win!

Yeah, the way we incorporate technological and cultural probs (not to mention language) to our lives are you sure we are not cyborgs already:)

lookinforpicnic

bonkey wrote:

Education gives you advantages, sure....but its not an inherited trait. That you are well educated says that you have an advantage, but not your kids nor your grandkids other than the indircet benefit they get from you. Your great-great-great grandkids.....no....no lasting benefit.

Similarly, if you have a poor education, there's nothing to stop your kids from having a good one, their kids having a poor one....and so on. There are simply no inheritable traits in this regard. So while education gives you advantages, there is little reason to believe that good/bad education will have an evolutionary effect. .

Of course..

bonkey wrote:

Correct. It doesn't. However, until you can show it meaningfully applies to a different substrate, then you don't really have any basis to refer to some other substrate in those terms.

I have in mind meme theory when i talk about intellectual evolution

bonkey wrote:

Then there is no reason to believe it will bring us anywhere tomorrow either.

I don't..

bonkey wrote:

If its not genetic evolution we're talking about, but some measure of progress that allows for shorter-term relevance, then the "current trend" that the OP feels is a big threat not only is it effecting where we go from here, it was equally a factor in how we got here.

I just think biological evolution today is trivial, any 'progress' today is going to be passed on horizonatally through culture

bonkey wrote:

What I do not believe can be argued is that this is something new, but well-enough established to show a downward trend...unless we suggest that the last several hundred years at least have been part of this trend. I dno't think the OP is suggesting that stone-age, bronze-age or early iron-age man was the pinnacle that we're falling away from....but I believe we can establish the inverse relationship of eduction/wealth and family-size back at least that far.

Yeah sure...

robindch

> [Scofflaw] All the time, though, bear in mind that poverty and lack of education
> are not, repeat not, genetic characteristics.

No, they're not, but if a tendency towards religious belief were found to be genetic (which seems possible), and local religious beliefs asserted that you should have as many kids as possible, then it's possible to postulate a link between one genetically-determined predisposition and the fact of poverty (caused by over-population).

Malcom Gladwell wrote an interesting article in The New Yorker last year about something fairly similar -- the large change in Ireland's dependency ratio over the last forty years, as the effects of contraception increase as the church's influence in the bedroom has decreased:

http://www.gladwell.com/2006/2006_08_28_a_risk.html

...which, he claims, is one of the core reasons for Ireland's current prosperity.

Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic wrote:

I'm afraid I don't agree, well i agree with the statement I just don't believe it is operative today as there isn't sufficient selection pressure today to enable a 0.1% increase in your chances to manifest.

A couple of points:

1. the lack of pressure you refer to applies only to the last 50 years at most. The last few events that almost certainly impacted human evolution would be the two world wars, and the 1918 flu pandemic.

2. the lack of pressure you refer to applies only to the First World, even in the timeframe above. Even then, it only applies to the better off bits of the First World.

Outside both those limits, the selection pressures of famine, disease, war, and so on remain pretty much as they have been throughout human existence.

cordially,
Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic

Scofflaw wrote:

A couple of points:

1. the lack of pressure you refer to applies only to the last 50 years at most. The last few events that almost certainly impacted human evolution would be the two world wars, and the 1918 flu pandemic.

2. the lack of pressure you refer to applies only to the First World, even in the timeframe above. Even then, it only applies to the better off bits of the First World.

Outside both those limits, the selection pressures of famine, disease, war, and so on remain pretty much as they have been throughout human existence.

Ok. But you have to careful here... sure events have impacted human life etc but you have to look how they have influenced biological evolution (what genetic changes provided advantage and were retained). Talk of war and famine does effect human life but its effect on biological evolution may be minimal..ok maybe someone could have a mutation which caused certain metabolic changes that effected how much they needed to eat, and thus made them more likely to survive a famine (but i would argue that this would be neglible compared to other cultural interventions often circumstantial that could feed someone)...but war clearly circumstantial.. any advantage or disadvantage today would be technological. Disease.. yeah ok, but also a large contributing factor to whether people in 3rd world countries survive depends again often on circumstances independent of biology .. whether they live in country with access to medical resources etc. Culture (countries, medicine, technology) has such a massive part to play in life today all over the world that the effect of simply biological evolution will be reduced dramatically

Zillah

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Again all about death biological evolution doesn't care about dying only reproducing... or more specifically not dying before you reproduce.

I think you're over simplifying. Evolution is about more than "live until you reproduce". You must ensure the survival of those offspring. And having living parents until you've truly grown beyond them is an evolutionary asset.

Once you die, you can no longer reproduce. If you're alive, there's a small chance, however unlikely, that you'll reproduce again. Thats one of the reasons death is so important to the issue.

Ok. But you have to careful here... sure events have impacted human life etc but you have to look how they have influenced biological evolution (what genetic changes provided advantage and were retained). Talk of war and famine does effect human life but its effect on biological evolution may be minimal..ok maybe someone could have a mutation which caused certain metabolic changes that effected how much they needed to eat, and thus made them more likely to survive a famine (but i would argue that this would be neglible compared to other cultural interventions often circumstantial that could feed someone)...but war clearly circumstantial.. any advantage or disadvantage today would be technological. Disease.. yeah ok, but also a large contributing factor to whether people in 3rd world countries survive depends again often on circumstances independent of biology .. whether they live in country with access to medical resources etc.

I think your main error here is that you're not thinking in large enough scale. Things like technology and culture are affecting our survival and future far more than evolution, but thats because evolution isn't important any more, not because it isn't happening.

If you have ten million people in a country affected by famine, all other things equal, the same chance of being hit by a bus, meteor, bandit or angry bull, if you have a thousanth of a percentage chance of surviving better over your peers, then it matters. Your children inherit that and thousands of generations later everyone alive has that mutation because they're all related to you.

Also, theres little point in specifying "biological evolution", it seems to imply that intellectual/social/emotional traits are any less subject to genetics as muscle tone and eye sight, which is untrue. There's a reasons human societies across the globe are fundamentally identical in many ways.

Culture (countries, medicine, technology) has such a massive part to play in life today all over the world that the effect of simply biological evolution will be reduced dramatically

This is an especially relevant point. All those environmental penalties are applied to everyone that is affected. If we say "living in a war torn country" reduces you and your children's chances of survival by 50%, then if you have a trait that increases your chances of survival by 1% then you are on a total of 49%, everyone else is 50%.

Evolution is still going on, but it takes so long to manifest that it doesn't matter anymore.

Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Ok. But you have to careful here... sure events have impacted human life etc but you have to look how they have influenced biological evolution (what genetic changes provided advantage and were retained).

Mmm. Not quite. If an event kills a large enough proportion of the breeding population (WW1 is a good example, because it killed young men in huge numbers), then the evolutionary trajectory of the population will be changed.

This effect is called 'genetic drift'. It's not specifically selective, in the sense that it doesn't select for better adaptation, but simply knocks out a large enough chunk of the population to bias the gene pool.

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Talk of war and famine does effect human life but its effect on biological evolution may be minimal..ok maybe someone could have a mutation which caused certain metabolic changes that effected how much they needed to eat, and thus made them more likely to survive a famine (but i would argue that this would be neglible compared to other cultural interventions often circumstantial that could feed someone)...

Famine can have major effects - in fact, food scarcity is, with predation, one of the two primary drivers of natural selection in wild populations!

Consider, for example, a population with access to cattle in a time of relative food scarcity. If one group has the genes for lactose tolerance (and so can digest cow milk as adults), and the other doesn't, then one group can benefit only by eating their cattle, whereas the other group can use their milk in addition - and thereby have access to a more renewable protein and energy source. They will out-survive the lactose-intolerant group.

lookinforpicnic wrote:

but war clearly circumstantial.. any advantage or disadvantage today would be technological.

See above for genetic drift. Also, you are again thinking of First World armies, as opposed to the frequently quite primitively armed conflicts in the Third World.

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Disease.. yeah ok, but also a large contributing factor to whether people in 3rd world countries survive depends again often on circumstances independent of biology .. whether they live in country with access to medical resources etc. Culture (countries, medicine, technology) has such a massive part to play in life today all over the world that the effect of simply biological evolution will be reduced dramatically

Again, this is almost totally incorrect. Major pharma companies are First World, and have little interest in the Third World. Diseases that impact huge populations, like dengue fever, do not get a thousandth the research budgets that headache tablets for western headaches benefit from. The majority of Third World populations cannot afford even those drugs developed for diseases that impact both First and Third World, like AIDS, because the pharma companies will not release them in the Third World at a price that would undercut their profitability in the First World. AIDS treatments currently costs c. $10,000 per year - a price far outside the budget of most Third World families.

So, no, disease continues to be a huge selection driver for the 80% of the planet that does not have access to Western medicine.

cordially,
Scofflaw

finlma

Thanks for your input and discussion. I don't come from a science background and haven't study evolution in any depth but its a question thats been on my mind for a while.

Thanks for clearing some things up - what a clever bunch you are.

Scofflaw

finlma wrote:

Thanks for clearing some things up - what a clever bunch you are.

...with very small families...

cordially,
Scofflaw

Zillah

Scofflaw wrote:

...with very small families...

...but the resources to keep us where we are...

lookinforpicnic

First off, I've just came across this forum recently and its great, so hi to all the regulars. Back to the topic.

As a general point, as scofflaw pointed out I do have in mind the whole time highly developed countries and where they are going in evolutionary terms, I didn't really think about 3rd world. I suppose implicitly I expect (its just a hope tho) that they will achieve development similar to 1st world countries, and so to look at the future of evolutionary development and such I focused on the 1st world. Also Zillah I keep referring to biological evolution because I do think evolution is continuing apace..faster by many orders of magnitude than ever before...but that this is not passed on vertically through the genes (biological evolution) but horizonatally through culture (meme theory and all that).

What I am arguing (which ye may or may not agree with) is that when we reach a certain level of cultural development as in first world countries (and what I hope to be in the future 3rd world countries) that biological evolution of favourable traits will come to a virtual standstill, simply because cultural influences will far outweigh any useful biological mutations and thus there will be no selection pressure. But I am of course assuming that things well stay developed and civilized etc.

Just a couple of points

Zillah wrote:

I think you're over simplifying. Evolution is about more than "live until you reproduce". You must ensure the survival of those offspring. And having living parents until you've truly grown beyond them is an evolutionary asset.

Once you die, you can no longer reproduce. If you're alive, there's a small chance, however unlikely, that you'll reproduce again. Thats one of the reasons death is so important to the issue.

These considerations are perfectly accurate when there was no such things as orphanages or adoption, don't think they apply in modern society.

Zillah wrote:

Also, theres little point in specifying "biological evolution", it seems to imply that intellectual/social/emotional traits are any less subject to genetics as muscle tone and eye sight, which is untrue. .

That was not my intention (see above)

Scofflaw wrote:

Mmm. Not quite. If an event kills a large enough proportion of the breeding population (WW1 is a good example, because it killed young men in huge numbers), then the evolutionary trajectory of the population will be changed.

This effect is called 'genetic drift'. It's not specifically selective, in the sense that it doesn't select for better adaptation, but simply knocks out a large enough chunk of the population to bias the gene pool..

Yeah quite right I didn't consider genetic drift, I was concerned with selection of favourable traits, just because the thread was about progress where are we going etc. its not easy to predict the effects of genetic drift.

Scofflaw wrote:

Consider, for example, a population with access to cattle in a time of relative food scarcity. If one group has the genes for lactose tolerance (and so can digest cow milk as adults), and the other doesn't, then one group can benefit only by eating their cattle, whereas the other group can use their milk in addition - and thereby have access to a more renewable protein and energy source. They will out-survive the lactose-intolerant group...

Nice little example, but how representative is it? I don’t know. What I do know is that in a 1st world country we could simply give the lactose intolerant folks some lactase and the selection pressure is gone.

Scofflaw wrote:

Outside both those limits, the selection pressures of famine, disease, war, and so on remain pretty much as they have been throughout human existence.

This statement is surely false, if we go back 2000 or 3000 years the effect of famine or disease would have a stronger impact than today. Even for the poorest countries, aid is still available to a limited extent and thus cultural intervention can upset the normal biological evolution that would occur i.e. a vast proportion of unfit individuals may survive for purely circumstantial reasons thus masking a biological adaptation to some extent

Zillah

lookinforpicnic wrote:

What I am arguing that ye may or may not agree is that when we reach a certain level of cultural development as in first world countries (and what I hope to be in the future 3rd world countries) that biological evolution of favourable traits will come to a virtual standstill, simply because cultural influences will far outweigh any useful biological mutations and thus there will be no selection pressure. But I am of course assuming that things well stay developed and civilized etc.

But, what about the following hypothetical traits:

- Cancer resistance.
- AIDS immunity.
- Broad spectrum infection resistance.
- Lack of susceptibility to the thousands of birth disorders such as Down Syndrome or Autism.
- Immunity to heart disease.

And they're entirely of the simple and biological kind. There's literally billions of potential mutations that could make a person's survival chances increase.


My main point to you would be this: For something to be relevant in terms of selection pressure, it does not need to kill you or your young, nor does it need to prevent you from reproducing. All it needs to do is alter your chances of survival from the status quo, in the slightest amount. If you step on a nail thats a tiny change in your chances compared to the guy who didn't. If you get two colds during winter compared to the guy who got one, thats a change in survival chances for you. Being ten percent more likely to get cancer compared to everyone else is a virtual death sentence for your familial line, it'll probably be gone within a few short tens of generations.

Whatever impact you think any trait might have, you need to multiply that impact by hundreds to represent future generations inheriting it.

These considerations are perfectly accurate when they was no such things as orphanages or adoption, don't think they apply in modern society.

Yes, they do. You're thinking in too black and white terms. Its not about survival or not, reproduction or not. Its about probablitities. An orphan is less likely to survive and reproduce because they don't get the vast network of support that a familiy gives.

For it to matter to evolution they don't need to get left out in the rain to die alone. If they have any sort of social handicap compared to non-orphaned children then they're likely to be singled out by natural selection. (This is of course assuming there's some trait that is leaving orphans around, be it mental or physical)

Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic wrote:

As a general point, as scofflaw pointed out I do have in mind the whole time highly developed countries and where they are going in evolutionary terms, I didn't really think about 3rd world. I suppose implicitly I expect (its just a hope tho) that they will achieve development similar to 1st world countries, and so to look at the future of evolutionary development and such I focused on the 1st world. Also Zillah I keep referring to biological evolution because I do think evolution is continuing apace..faster by many orders of magnitude than ever before...but that this is not passed on vertically through the genes (biological evolution) but horizonatally through culture (meme theory and all that).

What I am arguing (which ye may or may not agree with) is that when we reach a certain level of cultural development as in first world countries (and what I hope to be in the future 3rd world countries) that biological evolution of favourable traits will come to a virtual standstill, simply because cultural influences will far outweigh any useful biological mutations and thus there will be no selection pressure. But I am of course assuming that things well stay developed and civilized etc.

In general, I agree with the point. Effectively, selection pressures are removed if there is no resource scarcity, and western civilisation does its best to remove those pressures.

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Yeah quite right I didn't consider genetic drift, I was concerned with selection of favourable traits, just because the thread was about progress where are we going etc. its not easy to predict the effects of genetic drift.

Well, to reiterate the point, evolution doesn't 'progress' - that's why I prefer the term 'trajectory'.

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Nice little example, but how representative is it? I don’t know. What I do know is that in a 1st world country we could simply give the lactose intolerant folks some lactase and the selection pressure is gone.

Well, 75% of the world can't digest milk as adults, and the mutation that makes it possible is largely confined to those of Northern European origin, but is also found in a couple of small African groups.

Those in the First World who are lactose-intolerant tend to simply avoid milk, rather than using lactase, which only reduces the symptoms.

lookinforpicnic wrote:

This statement is surely false, if we go back 2000 or 3000 years the effect of famine or disease would have a stronger impact than today. Even for the poorest countries, aid is still available to a limited extent and thus cultural intervention can upset the normal biological evolution that would occur i.e. a vast proportion of unfit individuals may survive for purely circumstantial reasons thus masking a biological adaptation to some extent

The 1980 famine in Karamoja, Uganda was, in terms of mortality rates, one of the worst in history. 21% of the population died, including 60% of the infants.

cordially,
Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic

I'll focus on your main point first (which is our main source of disagreement):

Zillah wrote:

For something to be relevant in terms of selection pressure, it does not need to kill you or your young, nor does it need to prevent you from reproducing. All it needs to do is alter your chances of survival from the status quo, in the slightest amount....Its not about survival or not, reproduction or not. Its about probablitities.

Ok, that is all fine...when we apply it to wild animals like spiders or antelopes. An increased probability of survival (due to some genetic variant) over many generations even with a minimal amount of selection pressure is going to result in a greater proportion of the useful genetic trait...... but there is a major caveat i.e. All other variables have to be equal. All other things are generally equal when it comes to wild animals they have evolved to function in a very specific niche, there is not much options available to antelope to deviate from the norm (both individually and over generations).

Us on the other hand are completely different we have tons and tons of options due to culture that can completely wipeout any 1 % probability difference. For example if a women has a high susceptibilty to breast cancer today (in developed nations) then she can take precautionary measures to reduce her chances of acquiring cancer (plenty of antioxidants and regular screening) these measure whether they are taken or not (which depend on cultural influences and not genetic) completely upset any minimal probability which you think somehow can manifest itself over generations..it can't not today..

Zillah wrote:

If you step on a nail thats a tiny change in your chances compared to the guy who didn't. If you get two colds during winter compared to the guy who got one, thats a change in survival chances for you.

Sorry, are you for real? You have to understand that minimal probabilities only have an effect over many many generations when there is no other conflicting variables. Minimal probabilities have to build up over generation and over another and another and another and so on... which requires selection pressure for the specific trait over each generation as well.
It works nicely in an evolutionary textbook to explain something like the evolution of the eye. But today things are much more complicated, technological interventions can in one generation simply wipe out any minimal probability.

Zillah wrote:

Being ten percent more likely to get cancer compared to everyone else is a virtual death sentence for your familial line, it'll probably be gone within a few short tens of generations.

Death sentence...sorry but i really think this is way way of the mark (see above and if you want me to elaborate further I will)

Zillah wrote:

But, what about the following hypothetical traits:

- Cancer resistance.
- AIDS immunity.
- Broad spectrum infection resistance.
- Lack of susceptibility to the thousands of birth disorders such as Down Syndrome or Autism.
- Immunity to heart disease.

And they're entirely of the simple and biological kind. There's literally billions of potential mutations that could make a person's survival chances increase.

Survival chances increasing are meaningless without sustained selection pressure over generations. It would take a while to go through your traits and spell out why it would be hard not only to generate specific favourable mutations (for some at least) but also how they could be selected for, but a simpler quicker point would be: well no matter how many mutations you can dream up there is vastly more technological advances that could occur that would change the probability of survival and upset dramatically any slow cumbersome genetic influence.

Zillah wrote:

Whatever impact you think any trait might have, you need to multiply that impact by hundreds to represent future generations inheriting it.

Again applies only to simple 'textbook' evolution without conflicting variables



Scofflaw I'm afraid the lactose-intolerant folk are just going to have to get used to soya:)

Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic wrote:

Scofflaw I'm afraid the lactose-intolerant folk are just going to have to get used to soya:)

I'll take that as an 'agree to differ' - or, perhaps, an agreement to agree, since I accept your point re. the First World, and it seems you accept mine re. the majority of humanity.

cordially,
Scofflaw

lookinforpicnic

Scofflaw wrote:

I'll take that as an 'agree to differ' - or, perhaps, an agreement to agree, since I accept your point re. the First World, and it seems you accept mine re. the majority of humanity.

Yes its an agreement to agree.:) Even though I would add (reluctantly - as its nice to be agreement) that i believe that the pockets of biological evolution that have and could occur in 3rd world countries will probably have minimal impact in the evolution of favourable biological traits over the long term (for the 3rd world and for humanity as a whole), as sustained selective pressure on a biological trait over generations will not not amount to much (even in the 3rd world) (due to cultural influences) and will become less so as technology impacts on these cultures further. But in truth I have a limited knowledge on the real goings on of various 3rd world countries in terms of mortalities or selection pressures etc, I'd have to do some research in the topic if I wanted to argue that point applies to all humanity (which I think it does even at present, and which i think will certainly apply in the future if technology does advance in these countries). Of course if it does apply in the future (i.e 3rd world countries become developed) well then any miminal biological evolution that is occuring now and in the last 1000 or so years will be rendered obsolete, and thus we won't have much change biologically.

ballsofire23

I am not a "troll" that term makes me slightly psychotic lol. I don't know what a little monster from a fairytale has to do with a nonsense poster??
Anyway, if we are living in a world striving for better and improved genetics, how do we cope with the fact if being small or short for a male is considered a more primitive evolutionary characteristic; how do we tell our short race member that it is ok to be short and that we want future generations to be taller?
Confidence among our less intelligent population is obviously vital to the survival of our human race in the evolution department.
Cystic Fibrosis gene was necessary during the time of barbonic plague in Europe. So many of our genes I believe are mutating for a reason and these changes can cause abrupt abnormalities in metabolism or funtion of organs in the body.
But in many years to come, these changes can be useful in prevanting our slightly changing environment from damaging us.
Global warming I am sure is changing our genetics slowly. We will have colder winters hotter summers, that requires adaptation?

Red Hand

ballsofire23 wrote:

I am not a "troll" that term makes me slightly psychotic lol. I don't know what a little monster from a fairytale has to do with a nonsense poster??
Anyway, if we are living in a world striving for better and improved genetics, how do we cope with the fact if being small or short for a male is considered a more primitive evolutionary characteristic; how do we tell our short race member that it is ok to be short and that we want future generations to be taller?

It isn't really down to "primitive evolutionary characteristics"-I think you are looking at the aesthics side of things. It may be more aesthically pleasing to have a tall person in say the temperate First world, but in terms of body cooling etc and other evolutionary adaptions, a tall person might find it difficult to cope in the environs of the pygmy.

Confidence among our less intelligent population is obviously vital to the survival of our human race in the evolution department.
Cystic Fibrosis gene was necessary during the time of barbonic plague in Europe.

In what way? I never heard of that, could you please provide a link?

So many of our genes I believe are mutating for a reason and these changes can cause abrupt abnormalities in metabolism or funtion of organs in the body.
But in many years to come, these changes can be useful in prevanting our slightly changing environment from damaging us.

I don't think there is a reason with evolution. Yes, mutations occur, and yes, some mutations may benefit some segments of a species compared to the non-mutated type, but I don't think there is a purpose to evolution. It just happens with living things.

Global warming I am sure is changing our genetics slowly. We will have colder winters hotter summers, that requires adaptation?

Well, humanity in the past has evolved to deal with such climatic changes. An Inuit or Suomi may have a more compact body shape (spherical objects have a low surface to volume ratio) than, say, someone from a more temperate climate.

Scofflaw

Jeremiah 16:1 wrote:

In what way? I never heard of that, could you please provide a link?

A single copy of the cystic fibrosis mutant gene seems to confer some immunity against typhoid, rather than bubonic plague.

Another mutant gene, thought to provide some immunity against AIDS, seems to have emerged at the time of the bubonic plague, and probably provided some immunity against it.

Jeremiah 16:1 wrote:

I don't think there is a reason with evolution. Yes, mutations occur, and yes, some mutations may benefit some segments of a species compared to the non-mutated type, but I don't think there is a purpose to evolution. It just happens with living things.

To think anything else is to commit a teleological fallacy.

cordially,
Scofflaw