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For lots of facts and FAQs on this whole Evolution/Creationism debate, try http://www.talkorigins.org/
Darwin, Darwinism & Evolution / Natural Selection
- Thread starter Justin_Anstey
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Xanatic: Of two close species or sub-species, equally well suited to the environment, the one that reproduces best will be most likely to survive over the generations.
The degree of reproduction is the crucial point. A perfectly adapted species that reproduces slowly will be overtaken in numbers by a species that reproduces faster, even though less well adapted initially. And the faster reproductive rate will also increase the adaption to the environment, since there are more creatures for selection to work on.
I tend to agree about pandas, though, although they do occassionally eat insects and small creatures, I learned recently - they probably get trace elements this way.
The degree of reproduction is the crucial point. A perfectly adapted species that reproduces slowly will be overtaken in numbers by a species that reproduces faster, even though less well adapted initially. And the faster reproductive rate will also increase the adaption to the environment, since there are more creatures for selection to work on.
I tend to agree about pandas, though, although they do occassionally eat insects and small creatures, I learned recently - they probably get trace elements this way.
i was watching wildlife on one over the hols and i saw film of a panda eating some kind of forest antelope (muntjac or something). It was already dead but the panda ripped it to bits and ate it. Not so cuddly after that....
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who ever said panda's were cuddly?
cas
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adaptation based on behavior
I think that one of the criteria for evolution is technological development. Yes, there may be conditions that science is able to cure for those that may not be able to survive and reproduce in an enviornment with no medical science. But how have humans arrived at the top of the food chain?
It's our ability to pass on what we've learned in our generation and pass it on (through the ability to record information, have a common language that can be learned to access the information acquired by ancestors, whether the media be animal skins, rocks, paper, or computers.
So, because of our ability to modify our environment to ensure our survival, the criteria for natural selection changes. We still live as tribes (i.e. political boundaries). We are still hunters and gatherers -- we are successful because we've become more efficient at it.
However, the next phase is about to occur: we WILL run out of resources because we are able to save so many and they are able to procreate. This is why there is exponential global population growth. We remain hunters and gatherers but we need to seek out new terrains to ensure survival. Almost every terrain is occupied and in a couple of hundred years, we will deplete oursevles and there will be no way for the earth to sustain the bio load.
We come to a fork in the road: do we turn back now or do we march forward? To say that we should stop advancing medical science is backwards. We have the ability to change our environments to survive -- we cannot change from that -- to turn our backs on it and to say that we should live au-naturel and let those who cannot survive be eliminated from the survival game is to say that we ought to step backwards and go back to letting our environment control us when we have gone forward and grown beyond this. We cannot go back. We need to be stronger by breaking biological barriers that prevent us from going to new terrains. One of the factors contributing to the success of homo sapiens is that we are able to modify our environment to suit our purposes (of survival). This is the ONLY way it can be if we are to continue as a species. If we reduce our population numbers, it means that we'll need to enforce a quota on birth rate (there will be civil unrest because people cannot exercise their birthright to procreate).
We need to learn to terraform other planets to make them habitable. The earth is finite. An asteroid could come along and wipe everything off the face of the planet. So, staying here and enforcing a birth rate and renewing our resources will not ensure our survival. We need to socialize and have more brains working on more pressing problems (like how to make another planet habitable, how to detect and avoid large, planet-colliding objects). We can be great in numbers but success (in terms of our evolution) is a result of everyone working together as a tribe. Sounds corny but I can't see any other way for humans to progress any further.
Given current conditions right now, the bio capacity is nearing a point where it is possible, in a few centuries, for the earth to be overloaded. Either we let nature optimize our numbers (through plagues, lack of resources, lack of space, aggression due to overcrowding) or we can increase the amount of space and accessibility to resources to accommodate our growing numbers.
This problem will not go away over time and we still have enough resources to dedicate towards space exploration and finding new worlds to make homes in the future. I think that we might be at a point in civilization development where our numbers, living conditions, availability of resources, etc. facilitate a climb on Darwin's ladder. I suspect that the universe seems empty because very few species are able to make it of their planets, even though a countless species of anything and everything have occured, because such conditions exist once in an eon and (I can imagine) -- and even though the optimal conditions for the ability for space travel and colonizing of other worlds exists (in terms of resources), the species must also choose to work for the common good of giving descendents other homes in the stars. It is so so so possible ... we may even see it start in our lifetimes (because social and technological development undergoes an exponential ripple effect, too). It is almost within our grasp. So close, yet still so far.
I think that one of the criteria for evolution is technological development. Yes, there may be conditions that science is able to cure for those that may not be able to survive and reproduce in an enviornment with no medical science. But how have humans arrived at the top of the food chain?
It's our ability to pass on what we've learned in our generation and pass it on (through the ability to record information, have a common language that can be learned to access the information acquired by ancestors, whether the media be animal skins, rocks, paper, or computers.
So, because of our ability to modify our environment to ensure our survival, the criteria for natural selection changes. We still live as tribes (i.e. political boundaries). We are still hunters and gatherers -- we are successful because we've become more efficient at it.
However, the next phase is about to occur: we WILL run out of resources because we are able to save so many and they are able to procreate. This is why there is exponential global population growth. We remain hunters and gatherers but we need to seek out new terrains to ensure survival. Almost every terrain is occupied and in a couple of hundred years, we will deplete oursevles and there will be no way for the earth to sustain the bio load.
We come to a fork in the road: do we turn back now or do we march forward? To say that we should stop advancing medical science is backwards. We have the ability to change our environments to survive -- we cannot change from that -- to turn our backs on it and to say that we should live au-naturel and let those who cannot survive be eliminated from the survival game is to say that we ought to step backwards and go back to letting our environment control us when we have gone forward and grown beyond this. We cannot go back. We need to be stronger by breaking biological barriers that prevent us from going to new terrains. One of the factors contributing to the success of homo sapiens is that we are able to modify our environment to suit our purposes (of survival). This is the ONLY way it can be if we are to continue as a species. If we reduce our population numbers, it means that we'll need to enforce a quota on birth rate (there will be civil unrest because people cannot exercise their birthright to procreate).
We need to learn to terraform other planets to make them habitable. The earth is finite. An asteroid could come along and wipe everything off the face of the planet. So, staying here and enforcing a birth rate and renewing our resources will not ensure our survival. We need to socialize and have more brains working on more pressing problems (like how to make another planet habitable, how to detect and avoid large, planet-colliding objects). We can be great in numbers but success (in terms of our evolution) is a result of everyone working together as a tribe. Sounds corny but I can't see any other way for humans to progress any further.
Given current conditions right now, the bio capacity is nearing a point where it is possible, in a few centuries, for the earth to be overloaded. Either we let nature optimize our numbers (through plagues, lack of resources, lack of space, aggression due to overcrowding) or we can increase the amount of space and accessibility to resources to accommodate our growing numbers.
This problem will not go away over time and we still have enough resources to dedicate towards space exploration and finding new worlds to make homes in the future. I think that we might be at a point in civilization development where our numbers, living conditions, availability of resources, etc. facilitate a climb on Darwin's ladder. I suspect that the universe seems empty because very few species are able to make it of their planets, even though a countless species of anything and everything have occured, because such conditions exist once in an eon and (I can imagine) -- and even though the optimal conditions for the ability for space travel and colonizing of other worlds exists (in terms of resources), the species must also choose to work for the common good of giving descendents other homes in the stars. It is so so so possible ... we may even see it start in our lifetimes (because social and technological development undergoes an exponential ripple effect, too). It is almost within our grasp. So close, yet still so far.
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hi escargot,
I'm serious -- an animal's social behavior has to be a factor in determining whether or not it will survive to reproduce and it will govern how long its existence in the universe will be. Capability for long periods of space travel and learning to modify environments to sustain life is the only way we can improve the odds for the survival of our species.
I'm serious -- an animal's social behavior has to be a factor in determining whether or not it will survive to reproduce and it will govern how long its existence in the universe will be. Capability for long periods of space travel and learning to modify environments to sustain life is the only way we can improve the odds for the survival of our species.
escargot
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phgnome,
I wasn't joking! Hawking has written on this subject.
Adaptation to surroundings is one thing: adapting surroundings themselves is quite another. We need Richard Dawkins here.
I know someone who knows him...
I wasn't joking! Hawking has written on this subject.
Adaptation to surroundings is one thing: adapting surroundings themselves is quite another. We need Richard Dawkins here.
I know someone who knows him...
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escargot said:
he'd really hate this message board...
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I've always felt that the term "top of the food chain" was odd. A chain is used to symbolize something cyclical isn't it? Then how can there be a top of it?
And humans are not the only species changing it's enviroment to suit themselves.
And humans are not the only species changing it's enviroment to suit themselves.
escargot
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A cyclical chain, hmm, d'you mean a bicycle chain?
The 'chain' image represents the dependence of each link on the next. 'Top' of the food chain is the creature which eats the next 'link' down and is not eaten itself. Think lions & antelopes.
A true cyclical image would be a wheel so we're back to pushbikes. Not much use on the Serengeti Plain.....
The 'chain' image represents the dependence of each link on the next. 'Top' of the food chain is the creature which eats the next 'link' down and is not eaten itself. Think lions & antelopes.
A true cyclical image would be a wheel so we're back to pushbikes. Not much use on the Serengeti Plain.....
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Thanks, all, for straightening out my moths. Been about 12 years since I've seen the video, so I'm suprised I even remember it at all. Anyway, it's a very good point about the reproduction rate. Take a look at the lemmings.
It's very difficult to say exactly what fittest is. What's fittest today might be extinct tomorrow, even with a great reproduction rate. Once life gets a-goin', it's darn near impossible to predict what's going to pop up. It's even more difficult to predict what will survive. My point with the moths was the definition of 'fittest' completely reversed in a matter of years.
It's very difficult to say exactly what fittest is. What's fittest today might be extinct tomorrow, even with a great reproduction rate. Once life gets a-goin', it's darn near impossible to predict what's going to pop up. It's even more difficult to predict what will survive. My point with the moths was the definition of 'fittest' completely reversed in a matter of years.
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"Fit today, gone tommorow"
Well, it really should be cyclical shouldn't it? I mean worms feed off dead humans. So we are not the top of a chain, just another link in the great big bicycle chain of life. Just all living our life the best we can hoping to go to heaven and meet The Big Bicycle Repairman that made it all.
I have a feeling I am going all silly now.
Well, it really should be cyclical shouldn't it? I mean worms feed off dead humans. So we are not the top of a chain, just another link in the great big bicycle chain of life. Just all living our life the best we can hoping to go to heaven and meet The Big Bicycle Repairman that made it all.
I have a feeling I am going all silly now.top of the food chain should maybe apply to "those that are not actively hunted as a food source by another animal". Then humans (if you forgive the odd lion or tiger), lions, tigers, killer whales and great whites count as top of their food chains. They die from other ways and are broken down by saprophytic organisms to complete the cycle.
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aren't food chains and food webs just convenient ways of explaining stuff at gcse level - i'm not sure they're really meant to be treated as laws of physics which fail if you find an exception to them.
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I think food chains are just models. But, generally, I think it works on the principle of universal optimization -- it looks like a lot of things will mutate/change until it is optimized for its environment. It looks like atoms and molecules naturally tend to do this. As long as there are groups of animals/plants/atoms/molecules in whatever state, they seem grow and reconfigure themselves naturally until they reach equilibrium in a given environment. I can see how it happens but I just find it really amazing that it happens without anyone controlling it -- that the dynamics of universal optimization work so autonomously.
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It's perhaps easier to understand if you ask "How could it be otherwise?". The answers you get tend to require things like (eg) water flowing uphill, or broken cups reassembling themselves.phgnome said:
Why are penguins so well adapted to the Antarctic? Well, they'd be bloody useless elsewhere, such as in the Sahara. Conversely, camels wouldn't like it in the Antarctic. Creatures either adapt to their environments or they die out - it really is that simple.
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It seems to me, and the reason why I started this thread in the Urban Legends/Folklore section, that people appropriate any available ideas, no matter how apocryphal or misunderstood, to suit their needs, that they're just excuses we use to justify whatever we want to do. As such, human notions of progress, e.g. equality, are against nature, (and I'm not saying that is a bad thing).
Is it possible that the current perception of Darwinism as adaptation to changing environments instead of progression in sophistication is also a similar misinterpretation to fit today's needs? It sounds a little bit like political correctness to me: We're all individuals but equal, etc..
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The idea of evolution as adaptation suggests to me that some aspects of humans -or even the species as a whole- could have simplified in the past before 'complexifying' again. Perhaps that Cremo fella's evidence is right and is from human beings, or even some other currently existing species, who were more sophisticated in the past and have since 'evolved in simplicity'. Perhaps they caused one of those past five extinction events as we are supposedly causing the next. It, at least, sounds like a good idea for a sci-fi story, an alternative to the Planet Of The Apes that could illustrate the supposed true nature of evolution. Be warned, I want a percentage of any royalties plagiarists!
Would an example of a human feature that has simplified be the appendix? It was a second stomach wasn't it? Or was that something else? Is that what 'atrophy' is?
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Incidentally, isn't it more correct to say that short-sightedness has more to do with people's eyes being damaged by the new demands on them by our lifestyles changing far more quickly than evolution? One quarter of us are apparently myopic, that can't be down to dodgy genes, can it? Similarly with asthma, our more controlled, artificial environments don't quite suit our bodies.
-Justin.
Is it possible that the current perception of Darwinism as adaptation to changing environments instead of progression in sophistication is also a similar misinterpretation to fit today's needs? It sounds a little bit like political correctness to me: We're all individuals but equal, etc..
----------------------
The idea of evolution as adaptation suggests to me that some aspects of humans -or even the species as a whole- could have simplified in the past before 'complexifying' again. Perhaps that Cremo fella's evidence is right and is from human beings, or even some other currently existing species, who were more sophisticated in the past and have since 'evolved in simplicity'. Perhaps they caused one of those past five extinction events as we are supposedly causing the next. It, at least, sounds like a good idea for a sci-fi story, an alternative to the Planet Of The Apes that could illustrate the supposed true nature of evolution. Be warned, I want a percentage of any royalties plagiarists!
Would an example of a human feature that has simplified be the appendix? It was a second stomach wasn't it? Or was that something else? Is that what 'atrophy' is?
---------------------
Incidentally, isn't it more correct to say that short-sightedness has more to do with people's eyes being damaged by the new demands on them by our lifestyles changing far more quickly than evolution? One quarter of us are apparently myopic, that can't be down to dodgy genes, can it? Similarly with asthma, our more controlled, artificial environments don't quite suit our bodies.
-Justin.
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Don't forget that Darwinism faced massive opposition. The reason it survived this is because it is such a good theory. But it never claimed a decisive trend towards sophistication. Sophistocation is just an abstract, subjective thing in any case.
Besides, Darwinism does not really go along with political correctness. Living by Darwinism is a very machievellian affair: the only success is life, become sub-standard and you die. If society of Darwinistic, we would kill people with genetic disease, or at least sterilise them, in order to improve our gene pool. Luckily we have a sense of human rights.
You're right about myopia and asthma though. This is because we are well adapted to our prehistoric lifestyle, but not to this very recent environment that we ourselves have created. We have not had time to evolve to it. I'm a bit scared of what we might look like when we do
Besides, Darwinism does not really go along with political correctness. Living by Darwinism is a very machievellian affair: the only success is life, become sub-standard and you die. If society of Darwinistic, we would kill people with genetic disease, or at least sterilise them, in order to improve our gene pool. Luckily we have a sense of human rights.
You're right about myopia and asthma though. This is because we are well adapted to our prehistoric lifestyle, but not to this very recent environment that we ourselves have created. We have not had time to evolve to it. I'm a bit scared of what we might look like when we do
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Someone's bound to say it, so it may as well be me -DanJW said:....we are well adapted to our prehistoric lifestyle, but not to this very recent environment that we ourselves have created. We have not had time to evolve to it. I'm a bit scared of what we might look like when we do
the dreaded GREYS?
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Apparently, according to an article I read in Magonia a while ago, little men with large heads were used to represent both space aliens and the future of human evolution right from the earliest sci-fi.
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DanJW,
Sorry, I think I got a little mixed up. I meant social Darwinism and the popular (mis)understanding of Darwinism. I have no idea what Darwin wrote and said, did he ever make it clear to avoid confusion that his theory was not about "a decisive trend towards sophistication" ?
My point about political correctness was that maybe it made Darwinism go along with it, and those people just adapted it to suit their ends. So in their view genetic disease is part of evolution's random production of variety and, potentially, tomorrow's genetic advantage.
http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=social darwinism
"social Darwinism
n.
The application of Darwinism to the study of human society, specifically a theory in sociology that individuals or groups achieve advantage over others as the result of genetic or biological superiority."
Would that mean the studier of human society's biased idea about what is superior plays a role?
-Justin.
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DanJW,
Sorry, I think I got a little mixed up. I meant social Darwinism and the popular (mis)understanding of Darwinism. I have no idea what Darwin wrote and said, did he ever make it clear to avoid confusion that his theory was not about "a decisive trend towards sophistication" ?
My point about political correctness was that maybe it made Darwinism go along with it, and those people just adapted it to suit their ends. So in their view genetic disease is part of evolution's random production of variety and, potentially, tomorrow's genetic advantage.
http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=social darwinism
"social Darwinism
n.
The application of Darwinism to the study of human society, specifically a theory in sociology that individuals or groups achieve advantage over others as the result of genetic or biological superiority."
Would that mean the studier of human society's biased idea about what is superior plays a role?
-Justin.
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Also, I hear some thought that the BBC's 'Walking With Dinosaurs' series said more about modern society than it did about dinosaurs, with the makers going too far in their assumptions about how the beasties behaved and attributing idealised values to them. Caring sharing Tyrannosaurus Rexes, anybody?
-J
-J
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If our thoughts about dinosaurs are different from those of the Victorians, this is probably because we have access to much more evidence now than they did.
(No, that's ridiculous, people don't base ideas on evidence, do they? So our views on dinosaurs really are a reflection of Blairite politics. Good, I'm glad I got that sorted out, then.)
(No, that's ridiculous, people don't base ideas on evidence, do they? So our views on dinosaurs really are a reflection of Blairite politics. Good, I'm glad I got that sorted out, then.)
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They supposedly went far beyond the existing evidence, hence my use of the word 'assumptions'.
Oh, what the hell. Why let the lack of evidence get in the way of a good idea?
-J
Oh, what the hell. Why let the lack of evidence get in the way of a good idea?
-J
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Justin, what is your opinion of the idea that Tyrannosaurus may have been a scavenger, rather than a hunter?
(I think it's a load of Bantha Poodoo, personally)
(I think it's a load of Bantha Poodoo, personally)
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I dunno Inverurie
Didn't Karl Marx believe in the very misinterpretation of Darwin's ideas discussed here?
Which would mean his notion that societies naturally and inevitably evolve from feudalism, through capitalism and socialism to communism is built on a foundation of myth, wouldn't it?
-Justin.
Actually, while thinking about it:
http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2012
Didn't Karl Marx believe in the very misinterpretation of Darwin's ideas discussed here?
Which would mean his notion that societies naturally and inevitably evolve from feudalism, through capitalism and socialism to communism is built on a foundation of myth, wouldn't it?
-Justin.
Actually, while thinking about it:
http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2012
where's my coffee?
Sorry if this is ground already covered, but S.J. Gould, et al have made a pretty convincing argument for what they call "punctuated equilibrium."
Instead of the traditional (mis)interpretation of natural selection being slow and incremental, these guys suggest that adaptation occurs with startling speed (from an evolutionary standpoint). Once a population is seperated from others of its species, and/or finds itself in an altered environment, latent adaptations manifest themselves.
My third arm, for example, is incredibly good at making gin and tonics!
Sorry if this is ground already covered, but S.J. Gould, et al have made a pretty convincing argument for what they call "punctuated equilibrium."
Instead of the traditional (mis)interpretation of natural selection being slow and incremental, these guys suggest that adaptation occurs with startling speed (from an evolutionary standpoint). Once a population is seperated from others of its species, and/or finds itself in an altered environment, latent adaptations manifest themselves.
My third arm, for example, is incredibly good at making gin and tonics!