I have a theory I would like to share. It may or may not be ridiculous, I seem to have no barometer for these things...

Human civilization has created conditions which have changed the course of human evolution detrimentally. No longer do the fastest, smartest and strongest survive. Today untold millions of humans are living that would not survive were it not for modern society.

I would guess that every single one of you knows one, if not many people who fall into the category of 'would not survive if not for modern civilization'. I have a cousin with diabetes, a friend who had a brain tumor as a child, etc etc. Untold numbers of people survive illnesses, disabilities, any manner of things that it would seem natural forces uses to limit the population of species. Even sterile people who could not ever reproduce can now do so!

So I theorize that while natural selection simply can't be stopped, it has certainly been mitigated to an enormous degree. Does it follow that given enough time the human gene pool would 'weaken'?


What I mean by 'weaken':

I'm aware of the huge leap that word makes. 'Strength' in the context of this discussion is this: If you were taken out of a city, and placed in an environment for which your species spent tens of thousands of years adapting.... Would u survive? Or would you not fare well without your zylodrophin and frazzleitol (imaginary medications ;-)


What do you all think? Thanks for reading my craziness

aren't humans *evolving* since we're no longer required to be fast/smart/strong to survive? adaptation.

the loss of deprecated talents/abilities does not equal de-evolving imo, quite the contrary.

i could also totally be misunderstanding your question.

We are undoubtably creating a enviroment, where the weak in body and mind survive and mutiply.
I dont think this development can be seen as a plus for the human race.
Where it will lead to, who knows?
With more advances in medical science,keeping ever more people alive, the problem can only increase.

On the other hand, if the science exists to help people, it should be used.
It will be for future generations, to judge if this is the best path to take.

Before humans invented levers, only the strongest could month move a rock.

Before they developed warm clothing only the healthiest could survive cold weather.

+1

I think i understand what OP is getting at. Id say we are getting further away from the median at both ends. While advances have made possible the opportunity for dumber, slower, weaker, and smaller humans to survive, the best of the best are at the same time smarter, faster, stronger, bigger, etc. than they used to be.

OP probably watched Idiocracy and thought that he'd pass off the ideas as his own.

Evolution isn't about the strongest, smartest, biggest or deadliest. It's about whatever works, and the better it works the more success it will get - sometimes the very success becomes a downfall of its own and overexpenditure of available resources will pose a natural limitation.

So no, you can't really change evolution into making things worse or better, it isn't normative. Making some new types of societies and becoming geographically very diverse...these things just change the playing board, not the rules.

There is no such thing as "devolution." There is only evolution.

This. It is just a definition that corresponds to some change in a subset of the universe. If you want to try and attach some subjective semantic meaning to the word "devolution" then please make the meaning very precise and then state your claims.

here comes the pedantic (+possibly autistic) brigade

Could I characterize your view as Genetic Evolution has been replaced by Cultural Evolution as the driving force behind human evolution?

OP- you're not alone. Darwin thought the same as you:

Descent of man:
"With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health. We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination. We build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed and the sick; we institute poor-laws; and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment. There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small-pox. Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. It is surprising how soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself, hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.

The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy, which was originally acquired as part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered, in the manner previously indicated, more tender and more widely diffused. Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation, for he knows that he is acting for the good of his patient; but if we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with an overwhelming present evil. Hence we must bear without complaining the undoubtedly bad effects of the weak surviving and propagating their kind; but there appears to be at least one check in steady action, namely the weaker and inferior members of society not marrying so freely as the sound; and this check might be indefinitely increased, though this is more to be hoped for than expected, by the weak in body or mind refraining from marriage."




Not letting the ******ed to breed seems to be at least a temporary solution. Anyone still up for that?

Everything is depreciating- not improving.. Good point OP.

i find this comment to be shallow and pedantic. shallow... and pedantic.

...just like the meatloaf.

Why would we want to evolve to survive in the wilderness? Evolving to fit civilization seems more reasonable given that none of us live in the wilderness..?

Of course the issue is what happens when civilization collapses due to any number of reasons (overpopulation, lack of oil, etc) Not many of us can survive in the wilderness if there is major change in our environment. Then again evolution is all about thriving under a given set of circumstances and a large % of us will die out of there are major changes so I dont wish to sound like a zombie apocalypse crazy.
Bottom line is we are evolving to rely more and more on technology and as long as that does not change we are still good, but once the **** hits the fan we will die out like moths near a lamp fire.

Even in the most absurd apocalyptic scenario you could dream of technology would exist in abundance. The "wilderness" does not exist in that humans need to survive in it and has not existed for the entire existence of our species. If you're only saying many people will die due to potential catastrophe well duh? You have no point at all.

I was thinking more in terms of how the American society is so service dominated that we've "outsourced" a lot of our basic manufacturing base to third world nations. Sure there will be technology left but it takes time to rebuild those sectors. In this sense we are more vulnerable to some catastrophic event then economies who are more "primitive". Ie we've developed further away from the environment which we evolved in that a return to the wilderness has a larger negative impact. And yes of course we cannot devolve and a bunch of us will die, but relative to other we might die more easily, hence the OP's use of "devolved".

Evolution is random mutations in the offspring of each new generation. Some of those mutations are improvements and increase "fitness", others are harmful and result in death. Modern society indeed makes it so that bad mutations get passed along when they should be removed, but all this means is that if society crumbled and we reverted to the wilderness the unfit would disappear after a number of generations and the fit would remain. So no, the human race is not devolving, rather the fit are essentially "sponsoring" the unfit bloodlines to stay around.

Remember, we have 6 billion members of our species rather than just a few hundred thousand. The number of fit humans is still immense and much greater than it ever would have been without our developed society.

To "evolve" simply means to change over time.

It is a mistake to imply that evolution has a goal or direction.

If humans were instantly transported to Mars they would all die! Zomg we are unfit!

+1

They don't? What evidence do you have of this?

You realize that it works both ways, and humans created the conditions for many of these illnesses to be so prevalent?

If you took a fish out of water, would it survive? Probably not.

But no, humans haven't stopped evolving, and in fact recent evidence suggests that human evolution is accelerating (Hawks et al PNAS 2007).

This.

Remember also that Darwin pointed out that the swelling of a population is an essential part of evolution. Eventually that bloated population comes under pressure from some environmental change. Maybe it's weather or climate, maybe it's a predator, maybe disease, or any number of pressures. In any case the population is subject to selection, and experiences a decline in numbers, but a rise in fitness if it can avoid extinction.

Humans are merely in the stage where the population is swelling. No big deal. Certainly not a reason to resort to eugenics and start systematically murdering our "weaklings" or undertaking similar or less dire projects.