Evolution: Are you being brainwashed?

[Squall7]

So you are saying that we would have to be an even bigger population (we already have almost 10 billion people in the world.) for natural selection to occur?

Nah, I was saying that because of the size, it may be natural that we as a populace may start seeing (and arguably have been seeing) a decrease in fertility. Perhaps nature's way of controlling population sizes, perhaps a bit of unrecognised problems with our industrialised and commercialised society, may be a bit of both... Indeed, we're starting to see more and more, people marry and reproduce not out of the best match to themselves, but other manufactured reasons. The quelling of polyogamy for example - arguably structured contrary to man's nature (of spreading the seed), in favour of the nuclear family, which is ideal in producing the workforce needed to maintain our capitalist society (slight Marxist/Neo marxist thought, but arguably true). Not saying that polyogamy is the way to go, but it IS against human nature and produced in favour of the system in which we live.

- The key to the left side represents the number of children produced by a couple. So to maintain the population, each couple would have to have 2 children. Anything under that constitutes as a population decrease.
Of course, this is ignoring many other factors, such as the deal with China.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub-replacement_fertility

You bring up an interesting point on our society being damaged by us, so do you think pollution, causing mutations in species, have much to do with the natural selection of species?

Yeah, we've seen evidence that marine life is affected by chemicals that we produce:

The substance, nonylphenol - a breakdown product of spermicides, cosmetics and detergents - is discharged through the sewerage system and is widespread in the aquatic environment.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3071549.stm
Kinda scary to think that we're having such a massive effect on marine life - which is enivitably part of the food web in which we are a part of.

Likewise, the more man becomes knowledgable, the less natural selection plays a part. This site explains that the human species can live without men!
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4227604

Men's ability to produce sperm makes them an invaluable resource for the human species. But what if you could produce sperm without men? As NPR's Joe Palca reports in part two of his series The End of Men, that may soon be possible.

However, to have natural selection, one generally has to live in a natural environment (or as close to "natural" as one can get). But mutations are caused by numerous factors, both natural and artificial.

But tackling your question head on: pollution is manufactured by way of man. Any mutations caused from that are therefore fault of man as well. Technically, to have "natural selection", one has to live within "nature". However, the term nature is very unstable when it comes to influence, as man is both part of nature, but also manipulator of it at the same time.

Hope you find this insightful and useful. :thumbsup:

 

[Hochiminh]

- The key to the left side represents the number of children produced by a couple. So to maintain the population, each couple would have to have 2 children. Anything under that constitutes as a population decrease.

I honestly think that the population will keep increasing, so I'm not really getting this "population decrease" stuff.

The quelling of polyogamy for example - arguably structured contrary to man's nature (of spreading the seed), in favour of the nuclear family, which is ideal in producing the workforce needed to maintain our capitalist society (slight Marxist/Neo marxist thought, but arguably true). Not saying that polyogamy is the way to go, but it IS against human nature and produced in favour of the system in which we live.

I can see how spreading the seed in more than one female can diversify, and maybe change natural selection. Good emphasis.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3071549.stm
Kinda scary to think that we're having such a massive effect on marine life - which is enivitably part of the food web in which we are a part of.

I think that as long as food is cooked to the right temperature, then these altering factors should be lessened. (I'm a shift manager at a hot dog restaurant, yeah) The same can be said for cold meat served cold below 40 degrees Farhenheit. As a general rule of thumb, bacteria that cause foodborne illnesses thrive between 40-140 degrees Farhenheit. Plus, food left out for more than four hours needs to be recooked back to its internal cooking temp. Well, that's my food prep schpeel today! But this only relates to humans and food. Other species, like fish eating other fish, is a totally different can of worms. Technically speaking, if all marine life dies due to illness, then other species whose prime source of food is marine life will die via starvation, and then those species who eats those species will die, and so on, which in turn will limit our (human) food choices until all other species die, and we run out of food. That would not be a good extinction scenario for the human race-starvation...reminds me of the dinosaurs...

Likewise, the more man becomes knowledgable, the less natural selection plays a part. This site explains that the human species can live without men!
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=4227604

Lol...reminds me of Demolition Man, where maybe in the future, sex may be prohibited, in order to reduce STD's and AID's. In my opinion, I would definitely not be against that.

But tackling your question head on: pollution is manufactured by way of man. Any mutations caused from that are therefore fault of man as well. Technically, to have "natural selection", one has to live within "nature". However, the term nature is very unstable when it comes to influence, as man is both part of nature, but also manipulator of it at the same time.

Not entirely true-true being the fact that pollution is caused primarily by humans, but you still would have to factor in natural causes of pollution such as volcanic eruptions, spilled oil, littering by a species, and even sound, even though it's a small part. And yes, the ozone does vaporize most of the pollutants from the air, but obviously it was doing much better before us. I still believe that there will be some kind of geothermal shift, maybe even in the catastrophe of a major earthquake, in which is predicted to wipe out the some shorelines of major coastal areas and cities in 2017, including Oceanside near San Diego. I even think that Hurricane Katrina was man's fault, with our pollution affecting global weather. But this is just my theory.

Hope you find this insightful and useful.

They were all helpful, fascinating reads that had info that I never thought to consider or even know. Hope to hear from you soon.

 

[coolsmile]

I'd have to disagree there. I learnt about evolution in school, and I understand know it isn't meant to explain the beginings of life.

Yeah, because that's you, but not everyone is as intellegent and most are gullible

Right now I'm too tired to reply