The Next Stage Of Human Evolution mutants or community?

[mitchellmckain 0]

I posted the following in response a very different topic, but I did not receive any comments. So I thought it would be good to make it the focus of a new topic. So what are your thoughts about where evolution is taking the human race?

Everyone has seen X-men 1&2 about the "next stage of evolution." One of the funny things about evolution and history is that these are things that happen in everyday life, only participants are often unaware of what is happening all around them. I believe that we are in the next of evolution already.
Only it not Darwin's theory because he had no "next stage" in his theory. But there are stages. If we look far enough back into the past, there was a time that there were only single celled organisms. And if we look carefully at our cells we see evidence that these too were once composed of smaller more primitive independent units (similar to bacterial and algae). Darwin's theory cannot explain these gaps. According to his theory the individual cells should continue struggling against each other for survival, so that only the fittest survive.

But this is not what happened. If we look at our bodies we will find that most of our cells no longer have the ability to survive on their own. By working together and sheilding each other, protecting weaker members they have changed all the rules of evolution. For them it is no longer survival of the fittest, it is survival of the community.

The driving force of evolution is always variation. Leaps of evolution occur when something happens that make a whole new range of variation possible. The beginning of sexual reproduction was one of those leaps. But think now about the inherent limitation that Darwin's evolution imposes upon variation. When it is all about individual survival, then there is not much room for variation is there? We should all be farmers or hunters in that case, don't you think.

Isn't it clear that human beings have also taken a step into the next stage of evolution. Don't we now protect the weaker members of the community? Look at what liberation it has brought us. Look at the variety of man. Have we not changed the rules of evolution ourselves? The use of glasses is a perfect example of how we are in the next stage of evolution. Just as individual cells have overcome their limitations with the technology of its community (think of the human eye), we have overcome the limitations of our biology and individual evolution with the technology of the community of man. And just like the cells in our body, the community has become our greatest concern and our encompassing environment.

When you look at the human body where are the X-men? By forming a community of cells, we have allowed some cells to evolve fantastic specialized abilities that could not exist if they had to survive on their own. The neuron is a great example. I believe that the liberation from the need to satisfy the requirements for individual survival is a key stimulus for the next stage of evolution. In this case, where are the true X-men in today's humanity? Are they not those we call handicapped? Do not those who are blind develop their senses and abilities in ways that other people do not. I saw this special on TV this week about people with Williams syndrome, and in addition to physical difficulties they also had above average abilities in other areas like sociability, hearing and music.

As our society learns to accomodate and provide active social roles for the handicapped are we not changing the rules of evolution. Could we be creating the conditions for the next stage of human evolution where we will see the real X-men of our future.

[Moody 0]

I think the humans are going to destroy the earth, the last 1,5 centurie, we have been destroying the nature. All people think "oh, it's not that bad", but it goes really quick now. I think we will be in problems about 20 years. Maybe there also solutions by then, but there has to happen something, if we go further like this, the world will not be existing long anymore, mark my words.

[organicbmx 0]

i dont think that the extreme mutation that caused superpowers could ever be a reality with out other severly damaging mutations that would probably cause infant death.but im not sure what you are discussing - that we no longer evolve individually or that the x-men are on the way?i do agree that those in modern society that we consider to be lesser, or behind us [not me atually but as a group this is often the consensus] are serioiusly important. we have alot to learn about life from these so called 'handicapped'. these are people that often are compleatly devoid of prejudice and very different socially to the average person.i guess you might be tring to say that these people, who before 20th century medicine and care would have died or not flourished could cause the next step of human evolution. that is a very interesting point and worth considering to those who say evolution has ended it is only 'survival of the fittest' that has stopped.

[MajesticTreeFrog 0]

The next stage of human evolution will be adapting to the environment. Specifically, that means adapting to a poluted environment, unless we change our ways. It won't be fun as the shift happens.

[mitchellmckain 0]

i dont think that the extreme mutation that caused superpowers could ever be a reality with out other severly damaging mutations that would probably cause infant death.

Of course the X-men is pure fantasy. But it still represents the old darwinistic thinking that the next stage of human evolution wil be some kind of super human, smarter or stronger than todays humans. It is this thinking that I am attacking, by showing what I consider to be a more likely alternative.

i guess you might be tring to say that these people, who before 20th century medicine and care would have died or not flourished could cause the next step of human evolution. that is a very interesting point and worth considering to those who say evolution has ended it is only 'survival of the fittest' that has stopped.

This is of course exactly what I am saying. And I am saying that implications are far beyond anything we can possibly imagine. I am saying that the liberation of the handicaped will lead to a kind of supermen that we never imagined, but which could be just as profound and fantastic as those in X-men and The Fantastic Four. I see this possibility from parallelism with what happened in the same kind of shift of evolution from individual to community in our evolutionary past - like from single celled organisms to multicellular organisms.
Ann McCaffrey has just tentatively begun to explore the possibilities in books like "The ship who sang" and "The city who fought". There may be others and I would love to hear about them.

[abhiram 0]

I was just browsing through the forums and I came across this post. The next stage of human evolution.... hmmm.... you know, when I was in school, reading biology, history and all the stuff you remember for life but never actually get to put to practical use, there were many instances where Darwin would come to play. I mean, evolution is something that is supposed to have happened. How can we ever tell? Humans evolving from monkeys? Ok, taken into consideration that the monkeys are quite intelligent, but it seems ironic that the monkeys have continued to evolve in their own way. If the humans had really evolved from the monkeys, shouldn't the monkeys have ceased to exist? Seems strange that when there was a sort of mutation in the genes leading to the development of a much superior intellect, it didn't happen to all of them. I'm not trying to say that Darwin is completely wrong or mistaken... I just feel that there is something not right about the way things have 'evolved' (if you wish). IMO, there should have been something else also which must have played a role in this.


Coming to the X-Men, I really don't believe that super powers which can control nature and enable humans to change their shape and abilities is a stage in human evolution.

Of course the X-men is pure fantasy. But it still represents the old darwinistic thinking that the next stage of human evolution wil be some kind of super human, smarter or stronger than todays humans. It is this thinking that I am attacking, by showing what I consider to be a more likely alternative.

Smarter? Yes, definitely, I agree one hundred percent... but stronger? I don't think so. If we look at the way man has evolved so far, he has always been trying to make things more easier and less strenuous.... trying to get things done on their own, getting someone else to do it. It started with the wheel where he reduced his workload, then he started using animals, and nowadays, we use vehicles instead of walking. For sure, he has become smarter. But the body is becoming weaker. I would say that a million years down the line, we will come up with such amazing technological advances that it will become unnecessary for us to move or do any physical exertion at all. Maybe we'll become all brain and nothing else .... just like the alien invaders in the book 'The war of the worlds' (not the movie, I haven't seen it!!!) by H G Wells.

On a lighter note, we won't see such things happening for a very long time, and if you believe in rebirth, it'll take another thousand lifetimes before we reach that stage. Trying to guess the next step in human evolution is quite easy, but it's impossible to predict the actual course of human life.

[Dreamckr 0]

I have thought of this before as I was writing a book that I still have yet to finish. As I was writing I thought of how evolution works and if we did really evolve from cells to apes to humans, why did it end at humans? I mean humans have reamined basically the same for centuries. I wondered if maybe we stopped human evolution and instead forced the environment to evolve to meet our needs? Think about the way things would be if we had not built millions of buildings, or streets or had home appliances or anything that technology or industry has given us. What we we be if had to survive on the earth alone? How would we have evolved phisically, mentally and spiritually had we not instead transformed the world around us?

[sagaxx 0]

the next era will be the genetics era , maybe the mutants . The humanity is evolving so it won`t be surprising that the mutants will be the next step , but it could be the robots era so i think when the robots will be everywhere will start a war , a war who humanity will lose

[mitchellmckain 0]

the next era will be the genetics era , maybe the mutants . The humanity is evolving so it won`t be surprising that the mutants will be the next step , but it could be the robots era so i think when the robots will be everywhere will start a war , a war who humanity will lose

1064334000[/snapback]

Not a chance. Suvival and war is about adaptability, and human beings are the most adaptable machines on this planet. By the very fact that they are designed by human beings, man made machines, will never beat out mankind. Mankind's worse enemy will always be itself and if the man made machines outlast us it will be because we have destroyed ourselves.

[JUDGE_RELIC 0]

The next stage humans will be longer, thinner with more brain mass, modt of which still wont be used.I'm not sure if this will come before or after the nuclear holocaust.Mutants? X-men? you all read to many comic books!

[mitchellmckain 0]

Smarter? Yes, definitely, I agree one hundred percent... but stronger? I don't think so. If we look at the way man has evolved so far, he has always been trying to make things more easier and less strenuous.... trying to get things done on their own, getting someone else to do it. It started with the wheel where he reduced his workload, then he started using animals, and nowadays, we use vehicles instead of walking. For sure, he has become smarter. But the body is becoming weaker. I would say that a million years down the line, we will come up with such amazing technological advances that it will become unnecessary for us to move or do any physical exertion at all. Maybe we'll become all brain and nothing else .... just like the alien invaders in the book 'The war of the worlds' (not the movie, I haven't seen it!!!) by H G Wells.

 

On a lighter note, we won't see such things happening for a very long time, and if you believe in rebirth, it'll take another thousand lifetimes before we reach that stage. Trying to guess the next step in human evolution is quite easy, but it's impossible to predict the actual course of human life.

1064319400[/snapback]

On the contrary, it can happen a lot faster than you think. You see the usual course of evolution, what I call individual evolution, depends on genetic drift. Genetic drift comes to a stand still when the population becomes large and natural selection is done away with. However in this next stage will be a whole different process, and the initial impetus will be a tremendous increase in variation due to the lack of natural selection. It might not be that long in the future when what we call the handicapped become the majority. No the "lighter note" is not that it will be a long time coming, it is that our technology can more than compensate for our physical handicaps. This is the historical pattern. As individual cells learned to work together in communities, the communal "technology" quickly became more important than the survival capabilities of the individual cells. The great increase in the variety of cells that could survive in the community became the driving force of evolution for the whole community of cells.

[illini319 0]

well I think that to predict how humans will evolve is trickier than we may think. Why? because the entire biomedical field is hell-bent on making sure that the sick among us live longer. Not to sound uncompassionate, but before the advent of many medical advances, much of the genetically inferior traits were taken care of by themselves. But now, we can basically give any person the chance to live and the chance to procreate. Hence genes that can be undesirable remain in the gene pool. So... with that in mind... how will we evolve? I really don't know! I am NOT saying that we should let those who we consider 'genetically' weak die off! I am saying that perhaps our next step in evolution will be through a mechanism that isn't the conventional way of eliminating the 'unfit.' That through technological advances, we can tweak our bodies to become more fit, to become more adaptable and so on. Perhaps our fastest trait that is evolving is our scientific knowledge...

[dmnspwn1985 0]

In the case of human evolution it all comes down to us..before we ever get the chance to evolve we have to get passed the stage in science where everything we cant figure out gets stated as impossible, nothing is impossible and as soon as everyone starts to understand that, everything will start to fall in place....and in the case of what we will evolve into i have to agree with the one person that said super human strength is getting farther and farther away with every passing year, if we rely on just one of our abilitys then just that ability will evolve, when we use all of them they will all start evolving and that is when it will all start to unlock for us....

[iGuest 3]

I don't think the human race will get it's chance, war and the changing environment will see to that.

[iGuest 3]

I don't think that humans can evolve anymore. Natural selection calls for the survival of the fittest, but with humans there are invalids everyday being born and kept alive and integrating into our societies. If only the most athletic and intelligent of us were to live on and mate, surely evolution would progress. But since invalids continue to mate with others, we will remain stagnant in the evolutionary chain.-brandon