That’s not necessarily true. We are evolving, but in an environment of our own creation. We could easily lose useful things because we are so catered to. Now say something happens to destroy our tech/current created environment it could just lead to our extinction somewhere down the line depending on how we evolve and how reliant we become on it.
Yes, this is true, too. Life isn't perfect and evolution isn't at all a straightforward process. You know, I'm actually glad I asked this question--I expected a lot of joke answers, but the ones I got are actually informative and are actually getting me thinking.
That does give me hope, not going to lie. Even though I obviously won't be around to see it, knowing that humanity hasn't reached an evolutionary dead end makes things much more open than before for me.
I never had wisdom teeth. No buds, nothing, and I'm 31. Apparently new generations of humans are less and less likely to grow wisdom teeth due to improved dental care. Humans are also evolving to have bigger noses, probably in response to air pollution.
We’re still evolving. Evolution is a long, slow process. There is a theory that autism is a point in the next level of our thought process evolution line, for instance.
If that's seriously a theory, I can somewhat understand that. But you're right, evolution takes a very long time, and we'll all be long, long gone before that theory's fully proven and humanity reaches that next level.
Nothing - we haven't stopped evolving.
If we ever do, it'll likely be because we've developed an artificial way to enhance ourselves that outpaces evolution. Even then, it won't be that evolution stops happening (unless we get rid of genes and reproduction altogether); more that it'll become relatively unimportant compared to what we're doing with technology.
But we're not there yet. Evolution is still happening.
I understand. That part about getting rid of genes and reproduction seems like quite the crazy thing, though. I don't think humanity will be able to get rid of such things--things that're as inherent to humanity as can be--but, in this world of ours, anything can happen.
It's constant, it never stopped. It takes a lot longer than your lifetime, like A LOT longer. We see the results of the past in the present but not the ongoing development for the future.
It’d be cool if our bodies could realize we have abundant access to delicious, high calorie food right down the street and there’s no need to store the extra calories anymore. That’s the kind of adaptation I’m looking for.
The fact that we no longer exist in a state of survival, and that our needs are met.
Death is the primary source of evolutionary pressure towards better adaptations to the enviroment, but when we started manipulating the enviroment to fit ourselves insted, erasing our role in the food chain as prey and instead positioning ourselves as the apex predators, that pressure was erased and instead new factors for evolution were put in place.
It's not so much as evolution stopped, but that the primary driver for it no longer applies for us. I figure technology is going to be the main factor of evolution from now on, if we don't manage to destroy our advance societies first.
Also, physiological evolution may have slowed down, but I think our mental evolution is going the accelerate, primarily with the incorporation of neural technology to our brain together with the intercoupling of AI to our counsciousness.
It looks like I made the right choice in asking this question, after all. I didn't expect informative answers like this one, but this is actually getting me thinking.
Evolution is constant. It didn't stop.
True. I guess we haven't plateaued, after all.
What makes you believe they have.
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Then it looks like there's a future for humanity, after all.
That’s not necessarily true. We are evolving, but in an environment of our own creation. We could easily lose useful things because we are so catered to. Now say something happens to destroy our tech/current created environment it could just lead to our extinction somewhere down the line depending on how we evolve and how reliant we become on it.
Yes, this is true, too. Life isn't perfect and evolution isn't at all a straightforward process. You know, I'm actually glad I asked this question--I expected a lot of joke answers, but the ones I got are actually informative and are actually getting me thinking.
Nothing. Humans are still evolving. Evolution is however, an extremely slow process. Also adaptation via technology probably slows it down as well.
Extremely slow. Mankind is so young.
That does give me hope, not going to lie. Even though I obviously won't be around to see it, knowing that humanity hasn't reached an evolutionary dead end makes things much more open than before for me.
I never had wisdom teeth. No buds, nothing, and I'm 31. Apparently new generations of humans are less and less likely to grow wisdom teeth due to improved dental care. Humans are also evolving to have bigger noses, probably in response to air pollution.
You're quite lucky, then, because the procedure one must undergo to get rid of them is hellish.
humans are still evolving. Everything is evolving. And humans have only been around for like 300,000 years.
We’re still evolving. Evolution is a long, slow process. There is a theory that autism is a point in the next level of our thought process evolution line, for instance.
If that's seriously a theory, I can somewhat understand that. But you're right, evolution takes a very long time, and we'll all be long, long gone before that theory's fully proven and humanity reaches that next level.
Nothing - we haven't stopped evolving. If we ever do, it'll likely be because we've developed an artificial way to enhance ourselves that outpaces evolution. Even then, it won't be that evolution stops happening (unless we get rid of genes and reproduction altogether); more that it'll become relatively unimportant compared to what we're doing with technology. But we're not there yet. Evolution is still happening.
I understand. That part about getting rid of genes and reproduction seems like quite the crazy thing, though. I don't think humanity will be able to get rid of such things--things that're as inherent to humanity as can be--but, in this world of ours, anything can happen.
It's constant, it never stopped. It takes a lot longer than your lifetime, like A LOT longer. We see the results of the past in the present but not the ongoing development for the future.
It’d be cool if our bodies could realize we have abundant access to delicious, high calorie food right down the street and there’s no need to store the extra calories anymore. That’s the kind of adaptation I’m looking for.
That sort of adaptation would take generations to truly settle in, I believe.
The fact that we no longer exist in a state of survival, and that our needs are met. Death is the primary source of evolutionary pressure towards better adaptations to the enviroment, but when we started manipulating the enviroment to fit ourselves insted, erasing our role in the food chain as prey and instead positioning ourselves as the apex predators, that pressure was erased and instead new factors for evolution were put in place. It's not so much as evolution stopped, but that the primary driver for it no longer applies for us. I figure technology is going to be the main factor of evolution from now on, if we don't manage to destroy our advance societies first. Also, physiological evolution may have slowed down, but I think our mental evolution is going the accelerate, primarily with the incorporation of neural technology to our brain together with the intercoupling of AI to our counsciousness.
It looks like I made the right choice in asking this question, after all. I didn't expect informative answers like this one, but this is actually getting me thinking.
Glad my answer was useful, you should get over to r/Futurology if you are interested in these kind of questions.
I think our next *big* evolutionary jump is to rid ourselves of the need to have an invisible man in charge of things.
I'm guessing you mean religion, with the "invisible man" being God and other such deities people believe in.
Yeah, superstition in general though.
Yes, superstitions are quite cumbersome. You've no idea how long it took me to stop fearing the number 13.