Has Human Evolution Stopped?

[Colmc54]

In fact, having reached our pinnacle of scientific discovery are we now on a regressive path leading to our eventual extinction as a species ?

[CrapAtCryptics]

I`m not sure you could call us primitive in this sense. However, we do have many problems to do with development. There are new diseases every day it seems, obesity is growing ( no pun intended ) and the number of people with mental health issues seems to be going through the roof. Have we just reached our natural peak and the gene pool is deteriorating.

[Khandro]

We are in a sense destroying ourselves by medical intervention. For the elderly it is of little consequence, but for the young it means the passing on of whatever defects they had, which I'm afraid, means the weakening of the general human genome.

[jomifl]

what you might call 'weakening' of the human genome could be described as adaptive evolution.

[scowie]

We are not driving ourselves to extinction, for god's sake! You need to climb down off that bandwagon, Colmc54. Maybe this will help...

[Mosaic]

We are on no pinnacle of evolution, and time moves on leaving the present as insignificant overall

[Colmc54]

The changes in our society are driven by stochastic human dynamics. Not evolution but chaos or un-natural selection. In this process our prospects for passing on your genes to the next generation are better if you aren't particularly intelligent and are prepared to be indoctrinated and compliant. The survival of the mediocre, not the fittest.

[Khandro]

Has Human Evolution Stopped?
You could be forgiven for thinking so reading some of the posts on AB

[jomifl]

Colm. in that scenario the mediocre would be the fittest. Fitness is just a measure of fitness, nothing else.

[jim360]

I don't see how we can say that it has. Evolution is a process with typical timescales measured in at least tens of thousands of years (in mammals, at least), and that's probably an underestimate.

To be sure, our ability to shape the environment around us, combat diseases, and generally mess with natural processes has changed things somewhat, but I don't think that means that human evolution has "stopped". Ask again in a few hundred thousand years, maybe.

[Hypognosis]

Not that it counts as evolution (I file it under 'variation') but do google
"6 finger family"

No banjo-related humour, please.

[jomifl]

Hypo, I manage perfectly well playing the bango with 8 fingers.

[jomifl]

How a family manages with only 6 fingers, that would be one finger on each hand. I suppose they would have 6 thumbs which would be a help.

[Zacs-Master]

I suspect we have reached an age where technology and science will accelerate our evolution, masking whatever our natural evolution / regression (I'm undecided) would have been, eg antibiotics / nano technology etc.

[Colmc54]

The progress in science and technology is reducing our dependence on our own intelligence. Why learn to read a book or a map when we have Sat Nav, audio books, films and DVDs? Why bother to memorise anything when in seconds we can Google for the information we need.
Evolution operates through our genes not our broadband and if we no longer need to use our mental capacity so much then we will end up evolving a brain that has less and not more cognitive ability (that thing so often claimed to make us so different from other animals).
Antarctic fish have no need for red blood cells in their circulation. Evolution has removed them over time because the oxygen levels in the icey water are so high red cells are an unnecessary waste of resources.
I suspect in time we will undergo divergent evolution into two or more sub-species.

[Zacs-Master]

How can you have progress in science and technology at the same time as a lessening of intelligence?

[Colmc54]

OK. Only a small minority of the general global population are involved in the development of the tech that is slowing down, if not reversing our evolution. Hence they mlght drift away from the rest of us and ultimately evolve into a new species.

[Peter Pedant]

No I agree with Colm
i think the human race has stopped evolving
xc for a very few
so we'll be extinct xc for thos who survive and who might very well develop the ability to fly to and exist/live oon Mars

it is a regressive path but one we are doomed to

[woofgang]

If you think you know the answer why are you asking the question?

[Zacs-Master]

So,we're heading for the eventual extinction of our species. But not until we've 'evolved' into two separate sub species. And what duration of time are we talking here, millennia? Epochs?