Humans are preventing natural Evolution.
Classical understandings of evolution teach us that, through natural selection, only those who are adapted in a way which is best for that species' survival survive. As such, consider the implication of some laws (such as obligatory wearing of seat-belts) which prevent death. In a situation where wearing seat-belts is non-compulsory, those who choose not to wear seat-belts (who can be generalised as being non-cautious, 'stupid' individuals) are more likely to die in a car crash. Hence, only those who are smart enough to wear seat-belts will survive.
Another example would be that of requiring bike helmets to be worn on motorcycles. Laws prevent stupid people who wouldn't wear helmets from necessarily dying in accidents. Laws protecting us from our own stupidity are preventing natural Human evolution. What do you think?
Another example would be that of requiring bike helmets to be worn on motorcycles. Laws prevent stupid people who wouldn't wear helmets from necessarily dying in accidents. Laws protecting us from our own stupidity are preventing natural Human evolution. What do you think?
Comments (102)
Note also that evolution is indifferent to 'valuing' different species: stupidity has nothing to do with it. If, for argument's sake, there were to be a new plague that would wipe out everyone with an IQ over 80, all those that are left would be the most fit for their environment. There is no teleology of values in evolution (only, perhaps, a teleonomy of increasing complexity - where more complexity <> better).
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Is it not true to say that even though we, as Humans, may have evolved to create laws which prevent stupidity from killing people of our own race, that is not necessarily the best adaption to our environment? After all, the introduction of such laws has meant populations have boomed, which is now having a detrimental effect on not only our planet, but also our societies, with increased demands of governments to provide pensions/social welfare, etc. Saying that the creation of these laws is the best adaption to our environment really isn't true, especially considering these laws were added into our environment by Humans in a different scenario prior to their introduction.
The whole idea of 'evolutionary rejects' or that medicine and social innovations have somehow 'interfered' with some supposedly more 'natural' course of evolution is junk science and needs to be discarded at once.
This seems like saying that an aeroplane interferes with the natural process of gravity.
Just to add to what @StreetlightX said, evolution doesn't primarily "care" what the best adaptation to an environment is. Any gene that offers a competitive advantage will spread through the gene pool (all other things being equal) even if this perversely leads to maladaptation. Consider a population of birds who hatch their eggs at an optimal time of year with regard to availability of food. Now consider a gene that causes an individual bird to hatch earlier. That bird's young may eat more due to lack of competition for food from other hatchlings thus increasing fitness thus spreading the gene for the suboptimal hatching date around etc. In this way species can adapt themselves away from optimal environments. Once you've accepted that principle, there's no real problem to solve.
Of course there are (evolutionary rejects) - some unfortunate people are genetically prone to disease. Is it wrong to label them as evolutionary rejects. Of course I'm aware of the ethical aspect of such categorizations. However, in this case ethical ratings are irrelevant to genetic mutations.
Quoting StreetlightX
I think you're wrong there. [I]Natural[/i] evolution pits one's genetic composition (its strengths and weaknesses) against the environment (from bacteria to lions). This isn't the case with humans. We use medicines to shore up our immune systems, thereby prolonging our lives - making it more likely to bear children who then are carriers of a particular genetic defect. How is this not interfering with natural evolution?
Please read my reply to StreetlightX
Yes, because "evolutionary rejects" doesn't seem to mean anything. Evolution is simply "change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations". How does it make sense to pair the term "evolutionary" with the term "reject" ("inadequate, unacceptable, or faulty")?
At best you could perhaps use the term "evolutionary reject" to refer to any organism which doesn't contribute towards the evolutionary process, which would just be any organism that doesn't reproduce, but even that's a stretch.
No, that would be closer to natural selection, which is the commonly accepted means by which evolution occurs.
Would you say the same about animals building nests or sleeping in caves to avoid freezing to death?
And I don't understand how you can equate being susceptible to disease with having defective genes.
Perhaps I haven't worded it as well as I would have liked.
I guess the point I'm making is that given genetic mutation is random, it is inevitable that some traits will be harmful to an organism's survival e.g. if a polar bear had a mutation that made it furless it would most certainly perish in its subzero temperature habitat. It is they that I'm referring to as evolutionary rejects.
Quoting Michael
I don't see how one can sensibly differentiate between natural evolution and natural selection. Anyway the term natural selection is sufficient for me to get my point across which is that humans are interfering with natural selection by preventing deaths of people with genetically transmitted illnesses through the use of modern medicine. Isn't this interfering with the natural selection process - some of us should've died out long ago.
Quoting Michael
Animals building nests or sleeping in caves has nothing to do with what I'm saying. Suffice it to say that genetic defects are present in the population and they're being given the helping hand modern medicine.
I don't understand. Isn't a population composed of individuals? The collective drama must be, invariably, played out at the level of the individual. Am I wrong?
But for the concept of biological evolution to be meaningful. we need to be able to differentiate it from what humans do, such as artificial selection, artificial insemination, splicing genes, cloning, bring back species from extinction, CRISPR, etc.
That stuff isn't evolution, it's intelligent design by humans. And the father we go down that road, the farther from natural selection, genetic drift, etc we get. There is talk about being able to use a chicken to reverse engineer a dinosaur back into existence. That's not something evolution does. There's also been a lot of futurist speculation of using nanobots to aid our bodies in various ways. That's not remotely evolution. Or engineering viruses to fight cancer, create smart drugs, etc.
Yes you are wrong, as far as evolution is concerned. Individual genetic 'defects' mean nothing evolutionarily unless they come to define a species as a whole. Moreover, they are 'defects' precisely to the extent that by definition, they do not do so. So your entire line of reasoning is analytically wrong. Further, the fact that you don't understand the difference between evolution and natural selection - a basic distinction crucial to evolutionary theory - shows that you lack the some very basic understanding of the facts involved.
This sounds like someone who does not understand evolution and is also broad brushing the capabilities of everyone who does not like to wear a seat belt or wear a helmet.
1) Evolution would occur anyway, as people who refuse to wear seat belts and helmets would be selected against.
2) It takes one possible trait (prefers not to wear seat belt or helmet) and amplifies that to regard people as stupid. These people might be more "fit" for survival in every way, but this is not included in your model.
3) The natural/unnatural distinction between human societies and nature out there is false.
Technology isn't considered part of biological evolution. Do you disagree that we intelligently interfere with the natural world?
No it's not. We've created tons of things that would not exist in our absence. Twinkies, agent orange, concrete, plastics, splicing plant genes into animals, etc.
Climate change is largely being caused by human activity, not natural processes. Nature wasn't going to dig up all that fossilized plant material and spew it out into the atmosphere on it's own.
So technology is considered part of evolution. That's a new one on me.
I don't think collapsing such distinctions is useful. Yeah, we're all part of the cosmos. No, that doesn't help when distinguishing between human technological activity and biology.
Your belief means nothing.
Evolution is defined by heritable changes in the gene pool from generation to generation. Doesn't matter how they get there. Genes come and go. That's it.
Sure, do biologists consider technology to be a mechanism in human evolution?
I don't think that's true when it's the result of technological means, but if I'm wrong, then human activity would be considered a mechanism of evolution. I've never seen that stated.
Evolution could be stellar, it could be social, it could be sports, it could be evolution of the smartphone, and it can be biological.
What's not useful is collapsing all those into one meaning.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niche_construction
Again what you call 'collapsing things' is just basic science.
That's interesting, but the wiki article says it's not part of standard evolution.
How far can you stretch technology to be part of evolution? Would creating organisms from scratch still be evolution? Would self-replicating machines be biological?
If we came across a planet terraformed by aliens where they engineered all the life for that world, would we consider that intelligent design or evolution?
Sure, human activity including technological activity could be a mechanism of evolution. Why not? Artificial selection is.
Because humans will be able to do things that nature cannot without us, such as bringing extinct species back to life, or splicing in genes between vastly different organisms, like corn and fish.
So? Nature probably couldn't have made a Chihuahua without us either.
Right, I didn't think artificial selection was evolution, precisely because dogs would not evolve without human interference.
My understanding is that biological evolution is considered a natural, mindless process driven by several mechanisms such as natural selection, in which genes are selected for based on their fitness in a given environment and passed on to succeeding generations, leading to changes over time.
It's one mechanism. Don't get hung up on the "natural" idea.
Animals and plants create tons of things that would not exist in their absence. The atmosphere creates hundreds of things that would not exist in its absence.
I guess bird nests are unnatural, coral reefs are unnatural, and everything that atmosphere permits is also unnatural.
I believe the natural/unnatural distinction can be useful and may work in certain contexts when discussing certain topics. Evolution is not one of them: the human ability to rearrange and form matter in useful ways is probably one of our primary evolutionary advantages.
In a sense, twinkies are natural. They're made of matter, not some spiritual substance. But OTOH, they would not exist without sophisticated technology. There is no route for nature to take independent of intelligent design, save pure chance, to produce twinkies.
As such, we say that twinkies are artificial.
"Artificial selection is an artificial mechanism by which evolution can occur."
Rational Wiki
To an extent, sure. There is a continuum from natural to artifical, where you have beaver dams on one side and concrete jungles on another, and you can argue that they're the same thing, but the equivalent of a beaver damn or bird's nest can be created by water and wind, but concrete cannot.
Agreed, but it is considered an artificial mechanism. If biological evolution is just biological change over time regardless of what causes it, then okay, human technology can be part of that.
Although, I have to wonder if bringing species back from extinction is actually evolution under that definition?
It does. They're external protections which an animal uses to overcome its biological limitations. Just like medicine.
If you don't include making use of external protections like nests and caves as being elements of natural selection then sure, it interferes with natural selection - like building a fire, as without such a fire we are much like the furless polar bear.
But as far as I'm aware, the notion of natural selection doesn't just apply to static biological features, but also to the animal's ability to navigate and make use of the things in the world - which can include building nests, making fires, and manufacturing medicine.
And I wonder, do you find a difference between using medicine to kill germs and using spears to kill wolfs?
It would just depend on whether changes were made to the genes in the process. If cats die out and we bring them back as they were, they wouldn't have evolved.
So the Jurassic Park scenario where frog DNA is used to fill in the gaps in dino DNA found in embalmed insects would be evolution, because those dinosaurs would be different from the actual ones that walked the Earth pre-extinction?
Your position is that any change to the genes of an organism is evolution, full stop, no exceptions.
See SX's post above.
But an important part of science is categorization, and an attempt to "carve nature at the joints", or at least make useful distinctions.
So sure, technological changes to DNA is evolution in the broad sense. I'm questioning whether it's biological evolution in the scientific sense of how life diversified on Earth from the earliest life form.
I might as well add that it's heritable change obviously in biological evolution.
So cosmic radiation modifying genes is only evolution if it gets passed down, same with anything we do.
Cancer and the like is not evolution. Evolution results in heritable changes in a gene pool.
And what makes you think 'the scientific sense' of evolution is so narrowly defined? What empirical fact would sanction such an artificial definition other than pure prejudice?
Just everything I've heard and read about evolution. Biologists get to say what's biological evolution and what's not. I could be wrong or ignorant. Maybe biologists agree with you? I didn't think they did, but again, I could be wrong about that.
If you're objecting on philosophical grounds about use of terminology amongst the general public, that's fine, but philosophers can't tell scientists how to define their fields.
The term "biological" might be misleading you. It refers to the what not the how.
Are we just having a philosophical discussion over terms, or are we going by how the biologists use such words?
Not to an extent. Why and how is there a continuum? Natural and unnatural are mutually exclusive categories. You are either natural or unnatural. Why should I believe otherwise, beyond just as a way of talking about separating human activity from nonhuman activity (a separation that does not actually exist)?
Why are beavers altering their environment to suit their needs natural while humans altering their environment to suit their needs unnatural? Humans produce much more complex results and mix their materials in much more novel ways, but the core principle is the same. The beaver just uses one medium to alter its environment and is more simple than a concrete dam. However, the human is much smarter than the beaver and uses its intelligence to create a vastly more complex dam.
Scientists use the term to distinguish the evolution of organisms from other stuff. That's the 'what'. The 'how' is up for grabs as has already been explained.
I didn't come up with that definition of evolution. It's one I've absorbed. If I'm wrong, I'll change my mind on this. But it has to be accepted scientific terminology, not philosophical preference.
Personally, I think it's useful to make distinctions between natural and artificial, technological and biological, although there will be blurring of the lines at different points. I don't see that plastic is remotely natural, even though it's made up of natural elements. I also don't think that splicing fish genes into plants is natural either, or something that biological organisms do.
You're conflating the 'what' and 'how' again. Anyway, what I've been saying is straightforward scientific orthodoxy. 'Biological' is about the 'what' not the 'how' .
I don't think that's accurate. Mechanisms are an important part of science. Darwin needed to give an account for how evolution happened in order for it to become accepted science, not just note that species changed over time.
We could go on like this forever. If you find any evidence to suggest anything I've said is inaccurate or misrepresents the scientific view, let me know.
And what utility do such distinctions have when it come to evolution? In other words, what difference do these differences make, as far as evolution is concerned?
So what you're saying is that biological evolution is defined as heritable changes over time, full stop?
Because biology is the study of organisms, not technology or society.
Philosophical thought experiment. Aliens at some point came down and messed with hominid DNA leading to homo sapiens.
Upon discovering this, would biologists consider that evolution, or some form of intelligent design? Or is it completely useless to be able to make such a distinction in science?
Pretty much, and it can happen by 'natural' means including natural selection and lots of other stuff and various 'artificial' means. It's all equally evolution.
I don't think it is, thus the debates over intelligent design.
That being said, I don't think there is any evidence for intelligent design on Earth, just that it's possible somewhere, and we might do it ourselves one day.
You want me to define life for you? Can't you look it up? Is it enough to note that biology isn't geology, even though both are natural sciences? Human beings find it extremely useful to distinguish life from non-life, although both are made up of the same physical stuff.
But you can argue it's all the same, if you want. That it's all just a dance of atoms. I won't find it useful, and neither will science, but okay.
'Intelligent design' is a religiously inspired pseudoscience. It doesn't figure in the debate raised in the OP. If conscious agents cause changes in a gene pool (which are passed on) they are causing evolution.
Generally speaking, yes it is, but we can't rule out the possibility that aliens can intelligently design life forms, just as we have been artificially selecting for, and recently, editing the genes of various species. It's nonsense when it comes to life on Earth (regarding aliens or gods), but not as a possibility.
Quoting Baden
Agreed in the broad sense. I doubt it's strictly the biological definition, though.
Ok, but you still haven't presented any evidence backing up your thoughts and doubts. I at least quoted "Rational Wiki". As I said, if you can find a definition of biological evolution from a reliable scientific source that excludes artificial processes as causative, I would love to see it.
This is clearly a strawman. "gufflefloomps" and "flufflehoomps" aren't English words, but "natural", "artificial", "biological", and "technological" are.
I don't know what you mean by significance, but the relevance seems to just be a matter of terminology. Marchesk's claim is that we don't (and wouldn't) use the term "evolution" to refer to genetic engineering (for example), which is just like claiming that we don't (and wouldn't) use the term "mammal" to refer to some given cold-blooded animal. Asking for the significance of these claims (or, asking "what empirical fact would sanction such an artificial definition other than pure prejudice") doesn't really make much sense.
You can argue that we do (or would) use the term(s) in this way, but that doesn't seem to be what you're arguing.
Well, to be accurate, evolution has different definitions. In the most broadest sense, it just means change over time, and can apply to anything that changes. But in the context of life, evolution has a more strict scientific definition, and that's the one I'm concerned with.
Quoting StreetlightX
For me, I think it's very important to be clear on what a scientific field is and what it is not, and to not conflate that with other terminology. That doesn't help scientific discourse among the public at all, and it only leads to endless disputes like this one, which looks like a philosophical disagreement over how words should be used.
It's common enough in philosophy or religion or politics to import desired meanings into a scientific field, which can have bad consequences, or at the very least, muddy knowledge.
So this particular disagreement could easily take place in the context of GMO foods, and whether it's moral to do such a thing, where "natural" is considered good, and "unnatural" is considered bad, by some at least. Which would muddy the real issue, which is whether genetically modifying food might have undesirable side effects in a way that artificial or natural selection prevent, possibly. Or something along those lines.
And yet, it is an interesting discussion in it's own right. Where do we draw the line on natural and artificial (or cultural)?
I think it is an over-simplification to assume those who don't wear seat-belts, or those who make evolutionary-disadvantageous mistakes, are "stupid".
Evolution progresses in a relatively blind manner. What works survives and what doesn't is eventually eliminated most of the time. But it's not a clean and perfect formula. An otherwise healthy and fit organism can accidentally break a bone and die a few days later. A very intelligent organism may nevertheless have an lapse of perceptive judgement and fall to their death from up high.
Accidents are very real phenomena that are largely independent from any genetic fitness. There is no genetic code for forgetting to put on your seat belt - forgetting to put on your seat belt doesn't necessary mean you're stupid, it means your mind was elsewhere as the mind has a limited capacity. Perhaps you were late for work. Or perhaps you were thinking about what you had for dinner yesterday. This behavior is impossible to trace back to genetic code. Genes are only part of the story - an otherwise "fit" organisms may nevertheless fail in their environment simply because of accidental contingencies. Think about those tragic stories of young people who seem to have their whole life ahead of them until they die in a freak accident.
So when you say humans are preventing natural evolution by having laws against driving without a seat-belt, this is not entirely correct as these laws are not simply in place to ensure the survival of everyone who exists. They help remind those who listen that they ought to buckle up if they want to have a better chance at surviving.
One aspect of civilization that sets humanity apart from the rest of the biological world is the inevitable development of decadence. People who ordinarily would not survive "in the wild" are able to survive, and even "thrive" in the cocoon of society due to the increase in freedom. It is interesting to think, though, that perhaps civilization is not entirely "natural" in the sense of fitting-in with the rest of the world. Civilization, in many respects, sticks out like a sore thumb when compared to the rest of existence.
I've had some time to think this over. What seems clear to me is the following:
Dams, nests, webs, cities, and genetic engineering are not evolution in the biological sense. They are the byproducts of evolution. Dams aren't alive and don't pass their genes on to succeeding generations. Neither does concrete. As such, technology is not evolution, nor is the use of it.
BUT, evolution can and does act on the result of organisms modifying their environment. So we humans could use CRISPR to modify the germ line of an embryo, allow it to mature and be born, and then that person could have children and pass those modified genes on. That's not evolution. HOWEVER, evolution can act on the genetic modifications we made.
I'm rather certain that evolutionary science does not include genetic engineering as biological mechanism. It's technology, and technology (and culture) are not considered aspects of biological evolution by scientists.
At least I've never seen that claim, until today.
Look, I don't think you mean any of this maliciously, and I don't expect you to know the literature inside out - I certainly don't - but I do know that this 'strict definition' you keep citing is utterly contentious and it will not do for you to simply fall back upon it time after time - especially since it exists nowhere but in your head at this point. It doesn't even have the honour of being an argument from authority - you haven't citied a single one. Just please do better than this ignorance-spreading non-definition.
To be clear, do you think there are strict separation between fields of science? Particularly the life and hard sciences, such that what physicists study is not what biologists study, even though at times there can be overlap, since life lives in physical environments.
I've never ever heard a single biologists say that genetic engineering was part of biological evolution, but maybe they have?
I don't really understand this claim. What do you even mean by saying that webs are not evolution?
I think the relevant question is whether or not taking medicine or weaving webs to aid survival counts as "natural selection". Would you not say that spiders which weave webs are better suited to their environment than those that don't (assuming, for the sake of argument, that it makes it easier for them to catch prey)? And so those that weave webs survive to reproduce - passing on the genes that give them this ability - and those that don't die out? Or what about having a disposition to avoid colourful (mostly poisonous) plants?
I'd answer in the affirmative to both. So is there a difference between these situations and having the intelligence to make and take medicine?
Webs are byproduct of evolution, not the life forms that evolve. But we're playing rather loose with terms in this thread. It's true that webs and damns and even concrete impact evolution, since the environment is being modified.
It's similar to noting that a cosmic ray isn't evolution, even if it flips a gene that gets passed on. Neither was the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs, but evolution worked on the resulting life forms that were fit enough to survive the changes in the environment.
I'll simply request, by way of being constructive, that you take a read of the paper I cited on page 3. It explicitly lays out how evolution has nothing to do with - and actively subverts - the pseudo distinction between nature and culture.
Well, I agree that webs don't evolve (as webs don't reproduce). But I think the analogous question to the OP's is "does using webs to aid survival prevent natural selection?". I'd answer "no". In fact, webs are the naturally selected trait. So with that in mind, does making medicine to aid survival prevent natural selection? Or is the ability to make medicine a naturally selected trait?
Similarly, it's not helpful to collapse the distinction between biological evolution and other meanings of the term.
It's fine to want me to read a paper, but this is a philosophy forum, and you should be able to spell out the argument. I can link to papers and videos, too, and hope that posters read/watch them, even though odds are they won't.
It doesn't prevent natural selection, but it does change the outcome from what natural selection would have selected. Human interference isn't natural selection, it's artificial selection. We wish to artificially select for as many people surviving as opposed to lots dying to improve genetic resistance.
But sure, natural selection still acts on the result of our interference. In order to completely be rid of evolution, we would have to engineer life forms whose genetic copying was bullet proof. I don't know whether that's doable.
Right, so what about spider interference? Is that natural selection, or artificial selection (or spiderficial selection)?
So humans are naturally selected to manufacture medicine to prevent natural selection from selecting against some of us, just like spiders are naturally selected to produce webs that give them a survival advantage?
I think there's an important distinction somewhere along the line. At least when you get to the point of directly manipulating DNA in a manner that nature never would.
Also, I'm like 99.9% certain that cities and genetic engineering are not topics of biological evolution.
Also, I'm like 99.98% certain that nests and webs are not evolution, since evolution is a process that life forms undergo, not things like dams or nests.
It seems like you want to import your own philosophical views on how natural and artifical should be used (or not used) into science, when you know well that genetic engineering and cities are not a topic of study for evolutionary biologists.
It is interesting that SETI, forensics, and certain other fields that are widely acknowledged to be properly scientific rely on the presupposition that the outcomes of intentional processes are objectively distinguishable from the byproducts of natural processes; yet the same principle is somehow ruled out of bounds in biology.
My point here is not to argue for intelligent design, just to highlight a philosophical curiosity.
Agreed. There should be a way to tell whether a life form or biosphere was intelligently designed or the result of natural processes.
What's the counter argument? That intelligent design is meaningless or impossible? What if we found a world terraformed by aliens in which they continuously modified the organisms instead of letting them evolve on their own? Can we not distinguish between the two?
But is it not true that genetic defects which would normally kill certain individuals are now becoming more present in the species as a whole as those with genetic defects are becoming able to bear children with those same defects. Even though at the moment these defects may form a minority, the number of people with genetic diseases is rising, particularly through the advent of non-uteral birth.
So long as those traits do not negatively affect chances of reproduction within a specific environment, they will not be selected against by evolutionary mechanisms. By extension, the genes and behaviors that produce those traits will not be selected against. The fact that more people have diabetes today because of medical technologies does not mean we have somehow prevented "natural" evolution, but, rather, that we have changed the environment the species lives in, thus changing which traits are positive, neutral, or negative.
I like Charlie Lineweaver's take on the issue....the counter to the argument that we will be able to detect aliens by their wasteful radiation.
Nautilus recently had a very nice article discussing issues exactly related to this topic. It rightly points out that not just struggle but also cooperation plays a role in evolution, with the latter loosening the evolutionary pressures of selection in ways that foster variation. Technology thus ends up being an extension of this cooperative evolutionary mechanism, feeding right into the way in which we have evolved:
"As humans collected into ever larger groups, the discovery of increasingly complex technology was accelerated. In high-density settlements, artisans and innovators could specialize in their crafts and exchange ideas. Selection for tool development has had an associated pressure on our ability to co-exist peacefully in large numbers, and aggressive, uncooperative individuals may have been selected against."
The article refers to this aspect of evolution as the wonderfully named 'survival of the friendliest' or the 'snuggle for survival'. So again, the idea that technology somehow 'undermines' evolution gets things exactly backward: technology can be considered part and parcel of the evolutionary process no less than natural selection. The mistake is in thinking that evolution only ever involves selection pressure, and not modulations of that very pressure.