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Human Species May Split In Two
gEvil (beta) writes "According to an article at the BBC, an evolutionary theorist in London suggests that humanity may split into two sub-species within the next 100,000 years. From the article: 'The descendants of the genetic upper class would be tall, slim, healthy, attractive, intelligent, and creative and a far cry from the "underclass" humans who would have evolved into dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like creatures.'" No missing link here, we already have the troll-like humans to prove it.
*Snort!* Ha ha ha ha ha ha....... heeeee ha ha ha ha ha! *sniff*.......
:-)
In all seriousness though, there is nothing new here as this certainly plays off any number of sci-fi subjects going back to the late 1800s and early 1900s. People have been obsessed with this sort of thing for years and in fact, was the basis of racial profiling, discrimination, murder and genocide by the Nazis in the 1930s through eugenics.
The funny thing though is that even though many folks are obsessed with image and "beauty", people will choose mates for a variety of different reasons, that sometimes boggle the mind in their complexity or pathology and as long as you have people that are..... less than attractive with large amounts of financial reserves, you will always have confounds in the system. Other confounds are simply human relationships. For instance, my wife and I decided to date and then marry only after we had been good friends for some period of time. The fact that she is physically attractive was only incidental which brings up a whole other category of people who meet and then fall in love over the Internet without ever having met in person.
Oh, and speaking of confounds, the increasing use of plastic surgery among those that 1) have real reason to use it (true disfigurement) and 2) are just vain enough to want it (lips, cheeks, chins, breasts) will have an effect on this as well, leading to a whole new aspect of relationships. What is false advertising when it comes to body modification? Breasts are pretty easy to detect, but what about that nose which might have been bobbed? Straightened? What about those cheekbones? Teeth? All of these mods and others will confound any selection pressure and likely will increase in their statistical impact the more important "beauty" becomes to societies.
But hey, you know..... The Clone Wars will take care of all of this sort of nonsense..... or will it be Skynet?
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That he's got his use cases mixed. Intelligent, creative people are far less likely to pay attention to personal appearance, where beautiful people are far less likely to pay attention to mental pursuits.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
"He carried out the report for men's satellite TV channel Bravo." Because I go to Bravo for all my evolutionary biology needs. This sounds like a joke, really. The guy in question got a cheque from a tabloid TV channel, nicked HG Well's idea, and laughed all the way to the bank. Nice work if you can get it.
"Nothing can shake my belief that this world is the fruit of a dark god whose shadow I extend." - Emil Michel Cioran
The problem with this is that throughout history, the ruling class has changed many times. The rich and powerful tend to get beheaded from time-to-time, making way for a new rich and powerful set. Putin has little lineage from Catherine the Great, Chirac has little relation to Marie Antoinette...
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
They're bigger, stronger, and faster than even just two generations ago.
That's not evolution - that's steroids.
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You just made me think of something ... if there was a split in our species, how many people would find it a novelty to try to "mate" with the other species, and eventually bring us back to 1 species? The only way it would seem like they'd stay split is if the new species had a different # of chromosomes ...
... sweet, can I have some more cheetos?
Troll 1: Hey Biff, I just banged a Homo Tallenperty
Troll 2: Unga bunga
Seems like this would be repeated on both sides until we'd all be back to our mildly ghoulish yet mildly attractive selves of today.
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It assumes that rich people will stop having sex with poor people. Anybody see any logic flaws here?
Is there any evidence at all to support these predictions? I didn't see any in the article. His credentials (London School of Economics) hardly convince me that he's an "expert" in the field of... what? Super-futuristic anthropological speculation, I guess.
No one alive today knows what the next 100,000 years hold for humanity. No one. It's just too complex a subject and too long a time period to make any reasonable predictions about. Heck, no one even knows what the next 10 or 100 years hold, let alone 100,000.
This is just a typical sensationalistic "news" story designed to attract eyeballs. It's not based in science or reality. You can make up your own long-term predictions with just as much authority.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
What kind of idiocy is this "genetic theory" from Oliver Curry? Where is the evidence for humans abandoning at least hundreds of generations of "racial" mating exclusion in favor of thousands of generations of "class" inbreeding? Where's the selection criterion forcing that division of mating opportunity by work in much more extreme degree than the millenia-old class system that has failed to produce the results Curry predicts in the future?
Humans have been dependent on "technology" to reproduce for many thousands of generations. Tech is freeing us ever more from any selection criteria except infectious disease (just more unevenly). Current tech trends make genetics ever less important to using tech, which further decouples it from evolutionary mechanics.
Curry just wants smooth-skinned women with big eyes and "pert" breasts, who he thinks will prefer "graceful" nerds like him to the exclusion of the "robust" people who like tech less. So what? So he thinks HG Wells' The Time Machine is a prediction of our future more than a social satire on Wells' Victorian classist society. He should stick to hack SF rehashes, and leave the genetics to people who are realistic enough to actually get laid.
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make install -not war
In the "modern" system in the USA, economics imposes a different sort of evolution. As people become richer, they have fewer children. As people become poorer, they have more children. Those with the wits to become rich essentially become extinct, leaving a nation of teaming poor people.
In short, the socio-economics of free markets kills of the smart people by voluntary extinction.
Read Aldus Huxley's Brave New World
But I would argue that the only impetus to become rich is poverty. When you have nothing, you have more drive to succede, and liberal capitalism allows that. If you are born rich, or already rich, what drive is there to create anything new? Some people obviously have it, and never are satisfied, but they are the very rare exception. The most innovative ideas come from the ranks of the "poor and stupid" as you call them. Think of the founders of Google, or Andrew Carnegie, or even Jim Carrey. At one point in his life, Jim Carrey lived in a station wagon with his family. Now he makes $20 million+ a movie. If Jim were rich, or even just upper middle class, would the drive been as strong?
I think history proves that the overall condition of society constantly improves, with a setback here and again. There may still be a huge gap between today's rich and poor when it comes to looks, money, talent, education, whatever. But compare today's poor with the poor of a hundred years ago, and things are marginally better (thinking in industrialized countries... Africa is another story). I think the socio-economics of free markets kill off the rich caste, because they become complacent. Is this a bad thing? I think not. Look at the Forbes 400... not a lot of inherited wealth there. When it comes to being rich, ideas and drive count more than beauty and status.
Self-referential Sigs are cool on /. these days...
54
Wow, you sure have a shiny opinion of India. The fact remains that the caste system is still in strong effect. On the way to the Microsoft campus in Hyderabad, you see people living in vinyl tents along the sidewalks. These people are the untouchables, nobody helps them or even looks at them. It's worse than the homeless here in the US, because at least there are hundreds (if not thousands) of nonprofits dedicated to feeding/bathing/caring for the homeless. If you're homeless in India, you are truly fucked. And about the only way to be homeless is to be born homeless, and thanks to the caste system you will stay that way until the day you meet your untimely demise. Another sad point is that during the tsunami that wrecked Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, and India's coast, India denied any public information regarding the number of dead or missing. Why? Because everyone who lives on the beaches and coastlines in southern India where the tsunami hit is in the garbage caste. They were uncounted and the Indian government refused and barred assistance from any agency. That's pretty damn bad.
:)
Education is lifting Indians up, but not Indians in the lowest part of the caste. The middle class is emerging along with the upper class. It's the opposite of what's happening in the US, where the congregational focus of wealth is just becoming more and more concentrated into a very thin sliver of the populous, eroding the middle class and widening the gulf between all classes. However, the US also maintains a caste system but it's based more on personal wealth and education than bloodline. Americans at least have opportunities to get ahead, even if the glass ceiling is dropping lower by the hour for the middle class. Minimum wage hasn't budged in over a decade and congress is holding it down by the throat. In fact, the current US minimum wage, after being adjusted for inflation, is the worst it's been since 1955. $5.15 today is the equivalent of only $3.95 in 1995 -- lower than the $4.25 minimum wage level before the 1996-97 increase.
I know how easy it is to sit back and point fingers and say 'well this country has these problems, they must be doing something wrong', so I provided the bit about the US in contrast to admit that yes, we all have our economic and social issues to deal with. Hope I enlightened someone today.
Uh.
... huh look at that, Prince Charles looks.. mighty.. not.. royal.
Look at our politicians.
Look at leaders of industry.
Dubya ain't pretty. And.. Ted Kennedy? Hello?
SOMEONE TELL ME BALLMER IS HOT -- I DARE YOU.
So how about royalty, they've had a few centuries of selective breeding right?
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.