NationStates Jolt Archive

The bull-leaping fresco ("Toreador fresco") at Knossos. Restored panel, one of a series. Probably Late Minoan II, c. 1450, must therefore be, three thousand four hundred and fifty six years older than the photograph below it.

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Bull_Fighting.jpg

Fascinating that they have been ‘dancing with bulls’ for as long as we’ve had recorded versions of civilization itself (for all practicable rationales anyway).

Have we progressed. Are humans today essentially better or more advanced than we were three thousand (plus) years ago? Do we live the same lives, do we feel the same pains? Are we entertained and irritated in the same ways?

I’ll argue that we have stayed the same, we have not progressed, not one iota. Society and communities have progressed and changed, but the individuals have stayed the same.

What do you think you are, some kind of philosophizer?

Next thing you know your gonna think your a Eugoogleizerl.

We've gotten taller over the years.

We've gotten taller over the years.

mainly because of diet, not genetics

We continue to evolve.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4643312.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4222460.stm

3K years is a blink but a significant change is expected by 2100. By the turn of the next century, the recessive gene associated with "blonde headedness" is expected to fade from existence. As the decades tick on we'll see less and less of the "fair haired."

The Advice of an Akkadian Father to His Son, c. 2200 BCE

Give food to eat, beer to drink, grant what is requested, provide for and treat with honor. At this one's god takes pleasure. It is pleasing to Shamash, who will repay him with favor. Do good things, be kind all your days.

3K years is a blink but a significant change is expected by 2100. By the turn of the next century, the recessive gene associated with "blonde headedness" is expected to fade from existence. As the decades tick on we'll see less and less of the "fair haired."

yes, but no one will notice as bleach sales sky rocket

What always interests me with these sorta discussions is how much of society seems to actually be an emergent property of our biology. For example, agriculture indepedently arose at least nine times all over the world. Writing was invented at least three times. Other innovations, such as the establishment of societal distinctions, borders, trade, specialisation, and states, seems to have independently arose wherever humans reached certain population sizes, either through rich hunter gathering resources or through agriculture. However humans in our "natural" state, as we evolved on the African plains, did not have any of those things. So how is it that these developments where so consistently independently arrived at, all over the world, if we where never built to do them in the first place?

What always interests me with these sorta discussions is how much of society seems to actually be an emergent property of our biology. For example, agriculture indepedently arose at least nine times all over the world. Writing was invented at least three times. Other innovations, such as the establishment of societal distinctions, borders, trade, specialisation, and states, seems to have independently arose wherever humans reached certain population sizes, either through rich hunter gathering resources or through agriculture. However humans in our "natural" state, as we evolved on the African plains, did not have any of those things. So how is it that these developments where so consistently independently arrived at, all over the world, if we where never built to do them in the first place?

necessity brought change, or so the story goes

mainly because of diet, not genetics

this is not true as a blanket statement. while nurture contributes, it is not the end of the argument. Given that many of us are descended from the northern europeans, we in fact have 'tall genes' or at least 'taller genes'. the romans thought of the gauls and northern tribes as giants, the same ones who eventually invaded britain.

it also helps that they radiated all over the place, raping and pillaging. i'm probably tall because my short little great-great-great-
great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-
great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-
great-great-grandfather was raped by an amazon.

mainly because of diet, not genetics

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=evolution

Still evolution, it was (and is) a gradual change in our physiology. Just like peoples feet are getting bigger (at a greater rate than they are growing in height).

necessity brought change, or so the story goes

but why is writing necessary? or even agriculture? they're certainly useful once we have them, but why would a group put the effort into developing them in the first place? People could perfectly happily exist gathering food from wild plants or through hunting; and infact continue to do so in many parts of the world. But why is it that certain conditions, repeatedly, seemed to have caused people to abandon this evolved and natural lifestyle for something completely different? I'm not saying there's any easy or definate answer, it's just an interesting question is all... It's almost as if society is an accident our species keeps slipping into without ever meaning to :p

*takes radiation bath*

Well, I'm still evolving. And the urge to leap bulls is stonger than ever!

It is interesting that humans in different parts of the world have indepently developed many of the same systems; but it is not quite as strange as you seem to perceive it as being. I speculate that the fact that the human brain has not changed physiologically, or at least to any significant degree, for the past 100,000 years which would lead to humans, regardless of their location, to responding to their circumstances in similar ways; though of course culture plays a large role in this as well. Necessity of course contributed to change but can certainly not be considered the primary stimulus for the development of things such as writing (the "natives" of Peru had well developed civilizations lasting thousands of years but never developed writing), art, and agriculture (though we obviously live easier lives than hunter gatherers, the lives of early agriculturalists were far more strenous and shorter than those of their nomadic ancestors) can not be so easily explained. We were never "built" to do anything, our existence is incidental and all of our traits are merely the products of natural selection.

The question of why humans developed agriculture has still not been answered and is the subject of much debate and speculation among anthropologists. There was no logical reason for it to occur since it diminished the quality of life for those who adapted it. The situations did not occur identically among different people; for example in the old world sedentism preceded agriculture whereas in the new world agriculture preceded sedentism, and though both the "natives" of North America and the natives of Europe developed agriculture they never developed states (the concept was introduced to the Europeans by the descendents of the Mesopotamians). There are people, including some of my friends, who do believe that society (everything beginning with the adoption of agriculture) is a horrible mistake and that we should return to our hunter gatherer roots.

The question of why humans developed agriculture has still not been answered and is the subject of much debate and speculation among anthropologists. There was no logical reason for it to occur since it diminished the quality of life for those who adapted it.

???

why in the world would quality of life be dimished by having a solid home and an assured diet? it's not like they wouldn't have had meat at all, they just didn't have to depend on chasing the wildebeast.

granted though, you're right in that it might be cool to get back to chasing the wildebeast... run freeeeeeee!

Truth is we can't evolve anymore. Evolution is about death, that is death of an individual before it can reproduce. It is driven by mutation and this kind of death. Without this kind of death, mutations abound, but the environment does not select the fittest; there is no adaption. How many people do you know nowadays that die before passing on their genes? This means that on average the stock degenerates (as negative mutations are more common), while conditions allow for every individual to reproduce. The good news is that the original good genes that allowed us to build this beneficial environment in the first place don't disapear; they just sit there in the gene stock, dispersed (perhaps even ressesively) among various individuals. Its there they will sit untill there is a major die off again. If humanity is to progress more it won't be because of evolution (we have taken away all the tools) it will be through our technology.

What always interests me with these sorta discussions is how much of society seems to actually be an emergent property of our biology. For example, agriculture indepedently arose at least nine times all over the world. Writing was invented at least three times. Other innovations, such as the establishment of societal distinctions, borders, trade, specialisation, and states, seems to have independently arose wherever humans reached certain population sizes, either through rich hunter gathering resources or through agriculture. However humans in our "natural" state, as we evolved on the African plains, did not have any of those things. So how is it that these developments where so consistently independently arrived at, all over the world, if we where never built to do them in the first place?

Indeed what I find strange is not that writing, agriculture, etc were discovered separately, but that they were discovered separately at about the same time. Nothing for 50,000+ years and then suddenly 3-4 independent civilizations 7-6 thousand years ago. Oh and truth is the African plains we evolved on were mostly turned to dessert by the time civilisation came along, but there are later independent civilisations in sub-sahara Africa.

*tongue firmly in cheek, but truth all the same*

First, farming was invented Uncle Jeb and Uncle Bob because they were hunter gatherers who discovered the recipe for beer and wanted to harvest barley on a scale that could not be done with just wild barley gathering. After they started to starve because the wild herds would wander off while they stayed with their fields during the dry seasons, they discovered that they had nothing to eat besides lots of beer and raw barley so they invented a way to eat the barley, today we call this invention of necessity, bread.

Over the seasons the brothers learned to build fences and pens to try and capture some of the herd during the wet season while they were plentiful so they could keep the animals and have meat even during the dry season when the rest of the herd had wandered off.

Farming became specialized, such as, Uncle Jeb might grow the barley and keep the sheep and Uncle Bob would grow the wheat and keep the cattle, they would occasionally send their supplies specialty beers to each other for variety and bragging rights. But they noticed that Uncle Ziggy (the lazy brother who didn’t want to bother growing or making any beer himself), would try to intercept their supply trains to each other by the method of secretly bribing the labor who carried the supplies between farms, to drop a few bags of grain and amphora of beer on the road and allow a sheep or two and a cow to wander loose (by accident of course) as they traveled between farms, to be picked up by Lazy Uncle Ziggy who waited in the bushes.

So, Uncle Jeb and Uncle Bob devised a method of clay figurine symbols to represent each bag of grain that they would send to each other and a different token for each animal that would be assigned to the supply train and another type of token for each amphora of beer that was sent in the supply train, this way the receiving brother would know if anything was missing when it arrived. Then to keep the labor foreman in charge of the train from simply throwing these clay figurines away, they would be baked inside a clay ball called a bullae. Before long, the two brothers were asked by the labor foreman to stamp the oblong or spherical clay bullae ‘envelopes’ (if you will), with the tokens inside it so that he could see what was inside them without breaking them open during the trip, so that he could ensure that if anything showed up missing he could find it during the trip.

Quickly thereafter, Uncle Jeb and Uncle Bob realized that the marks impressed into the surface of the bullae itself , which allowed the foreman to count number of tokens inside, was itself sufficient and they didn’t need to send tokens back and forth anymore but only use them as pre-formed stamps, thus marking the appearance of both the first numerical system, alphabet and printing press. Uncle Ziggy would not be able to steal the supplies without the receiving end of the supply train knowing about it.

And of course, this all came about because we all love beer and we like different types of meat and we all have a lazy brother that wants to mooch off of our hard work instead of doing anything himself. Thus, this story has been repeated countless times throughout human history :p

The bull-leaping fresco ("Toreador fresco") at Knossos. Restored panel, one of a series. Probably Late Minoan II, c. 1450, must therefore be, three thousand four hundred and fifty six years older than the photograph below it.

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Bull_Fighting.jpg

Fascinating that they have been ‘dancing with bulls’ for as long as we’ve had recorded versions of civilization itself (for all practicable rationales anyway).

Have we progressed. Are humans today essentially better or more advanced than we were three thousand (plus) years ago? Do we live the same lives, do we feel the same pains? Are we entertained and irritated in the same ways?

I’ll argue that we have stayed the same, we have not progressed, not one iota. Society and communities have progressed and changed, but the individuals have stayed the same.Given that humans have existed for less than a blink of the universe's eye, I think you're being a bit premature in your criticism.

Kind of like saying, "You know, our baby has been around for a whole 6 months, and it's still doing pretty much the exact same stuff...it eats, it poops, it sleeps, it cries. I don't think this kid is really going anywhere."

Evolution is based on a need to replace grooming that takes place amongst other animals. Hence, the development of language. Evolution, if anything, is based on the need for colaboration based on self-interest, as a means of advancement in society. Humanity is based on social relations at its very core. It evolves with accord to these. To stop evolving we would have to stop communicating altogether. That said, evolution isn't necessarily positive.

Given that humans have existed for less than a blink of the universe's eye, I think you're being a bit premature in your criticism.

Kind of like saying, "You know, our baby has been around for a whole 6 months, and it's still doing pretty much the exact same stuff...it eats, it poops, it sleeps, it cries. I don't think this kid is really going anywhere."


Sure, a six month old can whoop an infant, it's doubled it's size and is moving around and started eating food instead of just milk (or formula), it’s growth rate is astronomical compared to other periods of a human’s lifespan.

HOWEVER, just because your analogy didn’t actually make the point you wanted it to, I get it. I understand what you are saying. The OP wasn't really trying to discredit or attack or even discuss anything about the grand theory of 'evolution' or anything like that, it was intended to bring an examining eye onto humanity itself, as individuals, and how it seems that we are still 'us' regardless of the environment we are born into. The world changes but we stay the same, for all practicable purposes that can be discerned since the dawn of civilization anyway.

Have we progressed. Are humans today essentially better or more advanced than we were three thousand (plus) years ago? Do we live the same lives, do we feel the same pains? Are we entertained and irritated in the same ways?
Evolution is largely glacial in its progress. I suspect that there are a few people who have evolved to the point where their reptilian midbrain no longer has as much control over their emotions, but they are few and far between so far.

So to answer your questions: Yes, yes, yes and yes ... essentially.

Truth is we can't evolve anymore. Evolution is about death, that is death of an individual before it can reproduce.

What you are describing is Natural selection. And selection could just as easily (and accurately) be described as the survival and reproduction of individuals that possess adaptive traits.


It is driven by mutation and this kind of death. Without this kind of death, mutations abound, but the environment does not select the fittest; there is no adaption.

Evolution is the product of selection. Evolution occurs regardless of what type of selection occurs.


How many people do you know nowadays that die before passing on their genes?

Hundreds of millions of human beings die without biologically reproducing. In America alone, it is believed that approximately 20-25% of individuals will never have biological children of their own. Some estimates go as high as 40%.


This means that on average the stock degenerates (as negative mutations are more common), while conditions allow for every individual to reproduce.

The "stock" does not "degenerate" in biological terms. Rather, we have simply changed the selection criterion. Selection still occurs.


The good news is that the original good genes that allowed us to build this beneficial environment in the first place don't disapear; they just sit there in the gene stock, dispersed (perhaps even ressesively) among various individuals. Its there they will sit untill there is a major die off again.

We define what we believe are "good genes" versus "bad genes." These terms are meaningless to the objective reality.

Additionally, there is absolutely no reason to believe that a "major die-off" would "improve" the genetic "stock" of the human race. Indeed, if we returned to the days of high mortality and limited medical care then our most brilliant living human (Stephen Hawking) would not exist. Many of the greatest minds in human history would have died in infancy due to now-treatable medical conditions. Many of the greatest minds in human history would have died in childbirth.

The romanticizing of "jungle-law evolution" occurs only in those who do not understand how selection and evolution work.


If humanity is to progress more it won't be because of evolution (we have taken away all the tools) it will be through our technology.
It is supremely arrogant (and incorrect) to believe that human beings have any ability to stop evolution. We don't. We can impact selection to a certain extent, but that does not in any way "take away all the tools" of evolution. Far from it.

Now, whether or not human progress will be defined by our technology is really a matter of opinion, since you have to first define what you believe constitutes "progress." But, regardless of that progress, human evolution will continue, as will evolution of all living systems on this planet.

3K years is a blink but a significant change is expected by 2100. By the turn of the next century, the recessive gene associated with "blonde headedness" is expected to fade from existence. As the decades tick on we'll see less and less of the "fair haired."
For some reason, I find this highly unlikely.

Sure, a six month old can whoop an infant, it's doubled it's size and is moving around and started eating food instead of just milk (or formula), it’s growth rate is astronomical compared to other periods of a human’s lifespan.
Dude, I don't know what six-month-olds you're hanging around with, but the ones I've seen are pretty much like beanbags with mouths. And if you're interested in growth rate, the newborn has the six-month-old beat by a long shot. Hell, the older kid is even starting to lose some of the extremely beneficial reflexes that the earlier infant has!

Plus, newborns look like aliens, but six-month-olds look like babies. Face it, aliens are cooler than babies.

Dude, I don't know what six-month-olds you're hanging around with, but the ones I've seen are pretty much like beanbags with mouths. And if you're interested in growth rate, the newborn has the six-month-old beat by a long shot. Hell, the older kid is even starting to lose some of the extremely beneficial reflexes that the earlier infant has!

Plus, newborns look like aliens, but six-month-olds look like babies. Face it, aliens are cooler than babies.


Oh I can do the math...

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Baby_Fight.jpg

That should settle it.

:p :D

Have we progressed. Are humans today essentially better or more advanced than we were three thousand (plus) years ago? Do we live the same lives, do we feel the same pains? Are we entertained and irritated in the same ways?

I’ll argue that we have stayed the same, we have not progressed, not one iota. Society and communities have progressed and changed, but the individuals have stayed the same.

I agree, we're basically the same genetically as we were 3000 years ago. Our lives are very different now because of advances in technology, we live longer because of medical advances, we live better because of farming and agriculture to ensure a steady food supply. As you say, society and communities have progressed and evolved from cave dwellings where everyone knew each other to huge cities buzzing with activity, where you're lucky if you're on first name terms with your next door neighbour. But my mannerisms in todays society would pretty much be the same as they would have been if I had been born 3000 years ago...

Yes, of course we have advanced/improved/changed. Want me to tell you why I think that?

Edit: I'll be online later.

???

why in the world would quality of life be dimished by having a solid home and an assured diet? it's not like they wouldn't have had meat at all, they just didn't have to depend on chasing the wildebeast.

Most hunter-gatherers just chase the wildebeast for a day or two, get two or three to eat, then spend the rest of the week having sex and waking up late.

In agricultural societies you have to wake up early every day and do some farming the whole day, you're in a constant worry that the crops will fail for some reason and you still have to chase animals away from your plants. By the end of the day you're too tired to have sex.

That's why the beer theory has become so popular lately, as the good enough reason to take up farming.

It is strange, though, that these things happened almost simultaneously in three or four distant places, while during the previous 100,000 years humans hadn't cared one way or the other. This has lead to some speculation on whether a subtle but important change in the brain took place. Or maybe it was aliens.

...
That's why the beer theory has become so popular lately, as the good enough reason to take up farming.

EXACTLY right.

...It is strange, though, that these things happened almost simultaneously in three or four distant places, while during the previous 100,000 years humans hadn't cared one way or the other. This has lead to some speculation on whether a subtle but important change in the brain took place. Or maybe it was aliens.

It is perhaps proof that Benjamin Franklin was brilliant with divine insight when he said:

Beer; proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

God gave humankind the first recipe for beer ;)

Is there nothing new under the Sun?

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Sumerian_Marriage.jpg
Sumerian clay plaque of sacred marriage, 2000 B.C.

As for us—let me make love with you by moonlight!
Let me loosen your combs on the holy and luxuriant couch.
May you pass a sweet day there with me in voluptuous pleasure.
~ end of a Sumerian Love Poem


Nope, it looks like nothing has changed in several thousand years.

...

The only thing you got going for you is The Cities.

Of course we haven't progressed. We're human, we remain human through it all. It's more devolution than otherwise.

We've gotten taller over the years.
My bio teacher told me that as a species grows taller (genetically) they're actually approaching extinction- is this right?

My bio teacher told me that as a species grows taller (genetically) they're actually approaching extinction- is this right?

Give me one example and I'll tell ya.

My bio teacher told me that as a species grows taller (genetically) they're actually approaching extinction- is this right?

From a historical standpoint, I don't think so. After all, the height of humans can be directly linked to the changes in diet and exposure to disease; humans were taller in the pre-agricultural period, got shorter in the Bronze Age, got taller again during the Dark Ages, shorter again during the Midle and Industrial Ages, and have been getting taller again.

It's diet and quality of life that affect height most of all.

Sumerian clay plaque of sacred marriage, 2000 B.C.
Lolz ancient Sum3ri4n pr0n XD
Sorry, I just couldn't resist typing that.

The only thing you got going for you is The Cities.

Of course we haven't progressed. We're human, we remain human through it all. It's more devolution than otherwise.


Your post reads as if you're angry... I'm entirely at a loss to understand what you could possibly be upset about.

I agree in that I don’t think we have changed as individuals either, and that is my entire point for this thread, to encourage the evaluation of the human condition from an individual’s point of view and to try and provide a ‘window’ of review for those of us that think “we are so much more than anyone that has come before us” or some such a thing.

All I’m trying to do is find and share the wealth of human experiences that have come before us and remind us how little we actually learn in school about ‘where we come from.’

Again, I’m at a loss to understand what you could be angry about, and you are about the third person in this thread to do so. Is it the word ‘evolved’ in the title that is causing the problem here? Perhaps I should change it to something else. But it’s technically the right word, perhaps “Has Humanity ‘changed’ or ‘grown’ at all? What say you?

The President is putting a stop to human/animal hybrids (so he says in the sotu) so i don't think we will be evolving much anytime soon...though i was looking forward to being the first centaur....

The President is putting a stop to human/animal hybrids (so he says in the sotu) so i don't think we will be evolving much anytime soon...though i was looking forward to being the first centaur....

:)

Maybe they'll let you get a part in the next Narnia movie. ;)

The President is putting a stop to human/animal hybrids (so he says in the sotu) so i don't think we will be evolving much anytime soon...though i was looking forward to being the first centaur....

I'd rather be a satyr, myself. They had more "fun" than centaurs.

The only thing you got going for you is The Cities.

Of course we haven't progressed. We're human, we remain human through it all. It's more devolution than otherwise.

I've never been particularly impressed with the devolution that survivalists like to talk about, as there doesn't seem to be much evidence for it. While we clearly are still evolving (our jaws have gotten significantly smaller over the last thousand years, for instance, and our brain case has significantly increased in size), I would hardly argue that a larger pre-frontal cortex and needing to get your wisdom teeth removed more often represents a decline in the species.

mainly because of diet, not genetics

But genetics have made us more well suited to our diets. People from Europe and Asia (including the middle east) have far less incidence of lactose intolerance than most peoples of African or Native American origin (let's, for the sake of argument, extend the definition of "origin" to post out-of-Africa periods).

I've never been particularly impressed with the devolution that survivalists like to talk about, as there doesn't seem to be much evidence for it. While we clearly are still evolving (our jaws have gotten significantly smaller over the last thousand years, for instance, and our brain case has significantly increased in size), I would hardly argue that a larger pre-frontal cortex and needing to get your wisdom teeth removed more often represents a decline in the species.

The problem with the logic of a devolution theory is that evolution doesn't go in a particular direction. Whether a change caused by evolution is good or bad to an outside observer doesn't mean that the species is evolving backwards. If we're evolving the need to get our wisdom teeth removed, we're also evolving the means by which to remove them. Well, that's sloppy use of the word evolve. We live in an environment where the need to have wisdom teeth removed by being forcefully torn from your jaw is not a disadvantage, because we can arange to have that done in a relativly harmless fashion. In fact, it could be argued that because we're able to keep the need for wisdom tooth removal from becoming a disadvantage then we're evolving the need for wisdom tooth removal in response.

It's a bit like that Acacia tree with the ant infestation. Most breeds of Acacia tree have deadly poisons in them. One species encountered a species of ant that was resistent to its poison and began to infest it. The tree then lost its ability to generate poisons because the ants would harrass anything short of a lumberjack that tried to hurt the tree. They even kill all other plants within a radius of the tree. The tree didn't devolve to a non-poisonous variety. It was more to the tree's advantage to dispense with the organicly expensive process of growing poisons and just grow branches, leaves, and roots as quickly as possible to outproduce other trees, and feed its ant protectors.

The President is putting a stop to human/animal hybrids (so he says in the sotu) so i don't think we will be evolving much anytime soon...though i was looking forward to being the first centaur....

Yeah. 'bout time. Maybe next year he'll put a stop to time travel and dragon poaching. Well, probably not the dragon poaching. Endangered species have never been a high priority for him.

My bio teacher told me that as a species grows taller (genetically) they're actually approaching extinction- is this right?

No. It happens on occaison, but it's too simplistic to be taken as a rule. Even a rule of thumb.

As species specialize they become less able to respond to environmental pressures. Take ratsfor example.

Rats could survive the absence of pretty much anything. They can gnaw open nuts. Scavange animal corpses. Dig for grubs. Raid nests for eggs, and even some birds. Forage for fruits and vegetables. They don't hunt bugs as well as an ant-eater. Hunt birds as well as a cat. Crack nuts as well as a parrot. Or dig for vegetables as well as a pig. But when those resources become scarce a rat just eats something else. Any of those other animals just go hungry.

Getting tall is a kind of specialization. If the environment changes so that it's no longer an advantage, then it might lead to extinction, or evolution to shorter progeny, depending on the circumstances. A rat on a deserted island that specialized in being big enough to chase seagulls out of their nests might go extinct if someone brought cats to the island and those rats weren't small enough to hide or strong enough to fight.

Specialization in action:

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Cubicle_Offices.jpg

Cubicle offices, then and now.

Specialization in action:

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Cubicle_Offices.jpg

Cubicle offices, then and now.

Iron Age Bill Lumbergh...

The Advice of an Akkadian Father to His Son, c. 2200 BCE

Give food to eat, beer to drink, grant what is requested, provide for and treat with honor. At this one's god takes pleasure. It is pleasing to Shamash, who will repay him with favor. Do good things, be kind all your days.
Sounds like solid advice to me.

is devolution a real concept? or did someone interpret The Far Side too literally?

is devolution a real concept? or did someone interpret The Far Side too literally?

I think some people like to talk about it like it’s a real threat, but there's little of no point in researching it for the reasons already expressed elsewhere in this thread. I myself do not put any weight into the idea, but the Planned Parenthood founder, Margaret Sanger, for example believed that humanity was/is allowing the unworthy genes of the low intelligence and the unsalvageable etc., to disproportionately pollute the gene pool of the human race and that we should put an end to it one way or the other, and she spoke about it openly when she developed the Planned Parenthood organization in the early twentieth century.

Another example of "Same-oh same-oh"

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/daughters_room.jpg

Is there nothing new under the Sun?

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Sumerian_Marriage.jpg
Sumerian clay plaque of sacred marriage, 2000 B.C.

As for us—let me make love with you by moonlight!
Let me loosen your combs on the holy and luxuriant couch.
May you pass a sweet day there with me in voluptuous pleasure.
~ end of a Sumerian Love Poem


Nope, it looks like nothing has changed in several thousand years.
Speak for yourself. My willy is far bigger than that Sumerian chap.
signed Demented 'Carthorse' Hamster

Faces have been blocked to protect the reveler's identities

http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Keg_Party.jpg

What Mrs. Clinton would think of this thread if she was reading it.
http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/0.jpg


OMGoodness, she must be sooo pissed that someone took that shot and put it on the internet.

What Mrs. Clinton would think of this thread if she was reading it.
http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/0.jpg


OMGoodness, she must be sooo pissed that someone took that shot and put it on the internet.


that is the funniest thing ive seen today.

one thing that has been noticed is that 100,000 years ago mankind developed a mutation that has since spread to 60% of the total human population (note this is in all areas its not that 60% of the races of the world has them its 60% of the people (on average) will have this mutation)

since this mutation occured there has been the development of civilisation (basicly this gene happened at the same time as most of the developments that make us modern man happened)

though as yet its not sure if the gene had anythign to do with this.

that is the funniest thing ive seen today.

and the scariest.

Someone tell me thats not from a suppository comercial.

Ook? Ook ook ook! Ook ook, ook ook ook. Ook! Ook ook ook, ook ook ook. Ook ook; ook ook ook.

Ook,

Ook ook.

one thing that has been noticed is that 100,000 years ago mankind developed a mutation that has since spread to 60% of the total human population (note this is in all areas its not that 60% of the races of the world has them its 60% of the people (on average) will have this mutation)

since this mutation occured there has been the development of civilisation (basicly this gene happened at the same time as most of the developments that make us modern man happened)

though as yet its not sure if the gene had anythign to do with this.

So its common to all humanity, rather than any given ethnic group? Your info is kinda sparse, how about some more, or a link? i'l like to read about this.

dont you mean same-old?

dont you mean same-old?

Yes, but "same-oh same-oh" sounds better.

3,000 years in geologic time is absolutely nothing; that's 0.00000066% of the age of the Earth. It took billions of years for life to emerge from the oceans, and well over 400 million more to get to our present day forms.

Even the whole of human existence is only 4 million years...and the change over that time is dramatic if we look at it on a proper scale.

Are humans today essentially better or more advanced than we were three thousand (plus) years ago? Do we live the same lives, do we feel the same pains? Are we entertained and irritated in the same ways?

I’ll argue that we have stayed the same, we have not progressed, not one iota. Society and communities have progressed and changed, but the individuals have stayed the same.

I don't know aout better or more advanced, but it is clear that there are evolved differences. the funniest example concerns (as it often does) beer.

Back at Uni I share a flat with a guy from Hong Kong who was of Asian descent. I am a Caucasian. So anywho, we went the pub one day with some of my friends. After one pint of piss-weak lager, Tom (the Asian guy) was on his back.

Coupla years later and I'm into martial arts. i now start coming into contact with people from asia and British people of asian descent more and more often. That's when i really notice that people of an asian background can't tolerate alcohol as well as caucasians.

I then stumbled across a documentary by Robert Wintson (famous biologist type here in Blighty (UK)). He reports that many hundreds of years ago the drinking water was filthy. If you drank it, you died. So you had one of two options. Turn it into wine or beer. Or, turn it into tea. Chinese/Japanese/Asian socities went for the tea option. My degenerate ancestors went for the booze :D with the result that they all started dying of cirrhosis of the liver and such things. Those that were left after the water and the booze had killed the rest had an genetic tolerance of alcohol. Over time that strengthened and strengthened until Britain turned into the nation of lager louts that it is today, whereas the vast majority of Asians can't tolerate alcohol.

Interesting aside: an evolutionary 'advantage' can be lost when it is no longer an advantage. I met a girl (caucasian) a few years ago who absolutely could not tolerate alcohol. She was wasted after a glass of wine (cheap date) *cackles evilly*. Anywho, in our society, the water is safe and there is not now (and has not needed to be for many years) any need to boil or brew the water into something else. So those that would have been weeded out by the filthy water and dirty alcohol can continue to survive.

With that note, i'm going to the fridge to get a beer ;)

Is there nothing new under the Sun?

http://img383.imageshack.us/img383/5095/sumerianmarriage1pl.jpg
Sumerian clay plaque of sacred marriage, 2000 B.C.

As for us—let me make love with you by moonlight!
Let me loosen your combs on the holy and luxuriant couch.
May you pass a sweet day there with me in voluptuous pleasure.
~ end of a Sumerian Love Poem


Nope, it looks like nothing has changed in several thousand years.

I think a change from 3 boobs to 2 boobs is a form of evolution.

I think a change from 3 boobs to 2 boobs is a form of evolution.

Your red circle on our far right, her left, is called a shoulder.

Well whadiya know....guess it's the future (http://www.themakeupgallery.info/image/weird/breasts/recall2a.jpg) where women evolve into having 3 boobs.

Well whadiya know....guess it's the future where women evolve into having 3 boobs.

Oh no, the past has got sci-fi beat several times over again.

May I introduce you to an ancient fertility goddess, Artemis. Enough milk to feed the world, or so the story goes.


http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f293/DubyaGoat/Artemis_goddess.jpg

.. the romans thought of the gauls and northern tribes as giants, the same ones who eventually invaded britain.


I am not wholly convinced by this. The evidence for that seems to come from a line in Ceaser's Gallic War, about the celts mocking the Romans for their shorter stature - which I can't be bothered to look up right now.

On the other hand, the Legion after the Marius reforms, seems to have had a minimum height requirement of around 5'10", though that was disregarded in the later empire as manpower declined. Interestingly enough 5'10" was the height requirement for the Grenadier Guards in the 1980s (I think it might be down to 5'8) now), the tallest regiment in the british army.

It's my feeling that ceaser emphasized the small height difference between the italic peoples and the celts in order to bolster his reputation as a general &c. I don't find the image of a bunch of 5'2" legionaries swarming over northern Europe convincing in light of other evidence.

3K years is a blink but a significant change is expected by 2100. By the turn of the next century, the recessive gene associated with "blonde headedness" is expected to fade from existence. As the decades tick on we'll see less and less of the "fair haired."

YAY! :D

That can only be a good thing. Dark hair is ever so much more attractive.

...
It's my feeling that ceaser emphasized the small height difference between the italic peoples and the celts in order to bolster his reputation as a general &c. I don't find the image of a bunch of 5'2" legionaries swarming over northern Europe convincing in light of other evidence.

I wonder at the idea, the possibility if you will, that a formation of soldiers holding a shield wall high, layers deep like a phalanx, and striking below the shield wall at the knees and ankles of their attacking enemy with their short gladius swords up front and the javelins and spears from behind and over the shield wall, wouldn't actually benefit from being shorter than their enemy soldiers.

I think they might. Of course, Julius would still brag about it afterwards. :)

I wonder at the idea, the possibility if you will, that a formation of soldiers holding a shield wall high, layers deep like a phalanx, and striking below the shield wall at the knees and ankles of their attacking enemy with their short gladius swords up front and the javelins and spears from behind and over the shield wall, wouldn't actually benefit from being shorter than their enemy soldiers.

I think they might. Of course, Julius would still brag about it afterwards. :)

That's an interesting thought. But legions didn't typically fight in phalanx formation.

What you are describing is Natural selection. And selection could just as easily (and accurately) be described as the survival and reproduction of individuals that possess adaptive traits.


Evolution is the product of selection. Evolution occurs regardless of what type of selection occurs.


Hundreds of millions of human beings die without biologically reproducing. In America alone, it is believed that approximately 20-25% of individuals will never have biological children of their own. Some estimates go as high as 40%.


The "stock" does not "degenerate" in biological terms. Rather, we have simply changed the selection criterion. Selection still occurs.


We define what we believe are "good genes" versus "bad genes." These terms are meaningless to the objective reality.

Additionally, there is absolutely no reason to believe that a "major die-off" would "improve" the genetic "stock" of the human race. Indeed, if we returned to the days of high mortality and limited medical care then our most brilliant living human (Stephen Hawking) would not exist. Many of the greatest minds in human history would have died in infancy due to now-treatable medical conditions. Many of the greatest minds in human history would have died in childbirth.

The romanticizing of "jungle-law evolution" occurs only in those who do not understand how selection and evolution work.


It is supremely arrogant (and incorrect) to believe that human beings have any ability to stop evolution. We don't. We can impact selection to a certain extent, but that does not in any way "take away all the tools" of evolution. Far from it.

Now, whether or not human progress will be defined by our technology is really a matter of opinion, since you have to first define what you believe constitutes "progress." But, regardless of that progress, human evolution will continue, as will evolution of all living systems on this planet.

Pray tell, what selection is still at work, and as to those 40% of adults that don't reproduce what does it have to do with the viability of their genes? Genes ARE related to objective reality; a good gene is an adaption to an environmental cue, a bad gene has no purpose whatsoever. Your right about the greatest geniuses possibly not making the cut before, but I'm still right, take a look at humanity and the common intellect, genius has not been selected for (it is less common then retardation). I'm saying if there is no natural selection there is no evolution, your right death does not have to be the selector, but given that we don't practise eugenics, tell me exactly what is doing the selection? Anyone who wants to pass on their genes in modern times DOES. As for the major die off bit, if their are bad specimens, they die when the shit hits the fan, thats simply a fact, this does not improve the survivors but the average quality of the stock improves as theyare the only ones left standing. As for it being arrogant to think humans can stop evolution, your the one that is romanticizing it, I posit it is a completely neutral process. Anyhow, tag your it explain what "selection" occurs in modern first world society that has any signifigant impact on the manefestation of particular genes?