How much further can humans evolve?

[Zeraki]

humans have evolved from neanderthals

We didn't evolve from neanderthals. They were actually a completely different species, that went extinct.

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

In this thread:

A lot of people who mistakenly think evolution is about becoming faster, stronger, smarter, taller, or any number of specific traits that have nothing to do with Darwinism... with zero posts talking about the ONE thing evolution is about:

Adaptation.

Are humans becoming better adapted to their environment? Constantly, though both mate selection, as well as through other factors.

Humans will continue to evolve so long as humans have differences and exist in an environment. To claim otherwise is to fail at knowing what evolution is, and thus, have zero stake in the discussion.

Except that's where you are wrong. Adaptation isn't the cause of evolution at all. We don't adapt to our surroundings. Our genome changes through mutations and those with the favourable mutations live on in their niche and the others die off. We don't adapt to our niches, instead those who are lucky to get the best genes for survival live while the others die off. That's what natural selection is.

In a way you are correct. Nothing consciously adapts to its surroundings, which what you seem to be getting at, because nothing can consciously manipulate its own genome in order to do so. However, you are not correct about adaption not being a part of evolution, and ironically it is the result of you have described, although I don't think your description is quite right when it comes to the terms used. I would suggest replacing 'mutation' with 'variation', as it is more encompassing than mutations, as it takes into account switches, deletions, etcetera. I would also say 'luck' is a poor word to use when it comes to an gene's survival, although I can't say it doesn't factor into things. Instead, it is whether or not that gene is a desirable trait, for example a deer with slightly longer legs than other deer will be able to outrun predators, or perhaps more importantly, other deer. As a result the deer survives. If the deer survives to pass on this gene, then it's a successful gene.
As for adaptions, they are the result of these successful genes being passed down through the generations.

 

[Alphavillain]

Humans can evolve a hell of a lot more. In the mind, I mean, not all this "wouldn't an extra head be cool?" shit. Learning to accept each other, not to rely on religion and superstition: that's what is important evolution-wise, in my opinion.

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

But who know what the future holds for the human race? At one point we needed tails, now we don't. If there is a nuclear war and the world is transformed into a rocky wasteland that is easier for us to climb around on all fours. We would teach our children how to do that. And they would teach theirs. And with each new generation we would have adapted more and more to moving on all fours (for sake of example). This new way of moving could eventually alter our spines, and shoulder blades to compensate for the strains of four limbed movement. That is evolution.

Bipedal motion is far more advantageous over just about every sort of terrain, just saying. Quadrupeds are designed for speed and have restricted biomes in which they can survive/thrive, bipeds are designed for stamina, endurance, and long period of movements and thusly can move as the weather/climes dictate it necessary.

^This right here.

Traits are only carried on if they are advantageous, and for us, a quadrapedal gait is far from that. There are many more reasons than the ones mentioned in the above post. Firstly, our arms and legs are too long and close together to be anything other than clumsy. Secondly, the our hips and shoulders are not adapted to sustain weight whilst in a quadrapedal stance, hence why push-up are rather difficult to do for any kind of sustained period of time. Thirdly, the difference in length between our arms and legs create huge amounts of stress in our spine and the muscles in our back and neck.
Those were just a few that I could think of off the top of my head.

Plus, passing on a trait through teaching it to the next generation is not evolution. It's culture.

 

[gabe12301]

Apes probably thought that their form was the furthest that they would ever go. Now look at them.

We could evolve to grow wings, have 4 legs, develop psychic powers. We will always keep evolving.

The problem with this would be that very few people would want to have sex with anyone with 4 (2 of which will be malformed) legs, and wings would start out as unsightly deformations. The key part of evolution is being a desirable mate so you can spread your mutations. Animals wouldn't care how something looks. We do and humans tend to want 2 legs and no developing wing lumps. and I don't know about psychic powers because those are likely impossible.



plus animals only really evolve as much as they need to live in their environment. otherwise we would have weird super lethal abominations everywhere.

 

[Venats]

In a way you are correct. Nothing consciously adapts to its surroundings, which what you seem to be getting at, because nothing can consciously manipulate its own genome in order to do so.

Just curiosity here and no real scientific thought (again, I am not a biologist): If medial science evolved enough could we not force (ie. stimulate controlled change on the DNA/RNA) evolution on a life form without a need for reproduction? Didn't the bubonic plague do just that back in the day, causing widespread mutations in its survivors that were 'immediately' in effect.

Aren't there also lifeforms (I'm talking microscopic) that, while not consciously changing their genome, can fall into certain states of stasis/hybernation during which their bodies slowly change to fit their climes?

 

[M920CAIN]

This is just a thought which came to me the other day. I was looking out the window of the bus and realised how far humanity has come since the early days. Scientific and technological advancements have compensated for nearly all our shortcomings. Cars, heavy machinery, computers, medical achievements, have allowed us to become lords of the planet.
Then a thought struck me; have we taken ourselves outside of evolution? Wild animals have predation, harsh weather conditions, foraging or hunting for food, sickness, and a myriad other worries, but for humans, dangerous animals can be repelled or destroyed, houses (and in extreme cases, bunkers) protect us from the weather, or food is easier to access than ever, and we have a greater understanding of diseases and inherent frailties and how to compensate for them than ever before. So I wonder, do humans have ANY remaining evolutionary pressures, in the First World climate at least, and if so what traits would they select for?

Well to counter all you said I'll add this: people still die of famin (hunting for food as you call I guess)... of course not in developed countries, but it's truth none the less, wild animals still pose threats in some regions of the world... houses protect us, but they're not impenetrable & animals build shelters too, and not all people live in prime conditions that equates to medium or high standard quality of life, we can cure some diseases, but shit still happens, we may be the lords of the planet in our heads, but nature & the Earth itself is the lord of us, we can bend nature, but we can't force it to do our biding... think of all the calamities that have happened if nothing else, of course some are considered to be man caused by pollution or whatever... but that adds to the fact that we are actually lords of nothing. We don't control things. We like to think that we do, and to some effect we manage, but there's a long way to go for humanity & I'm not speaking only technological uprising. Growth as a species & cultural enhancements are important, technology has brought us out of the middle ages as a history teacher once said this about mass production & so on, but before that there was a little period named renaissance. Think of the average human being for example: is he evolved? I stress "average"... evolution is pretty complicated because it envolves many factors, tech included of course, but only one factor of a bigger equation.

 

[k-ossuburb]

We're still evolving every day, you might not notice it because it's a slow process but it is happening. Evolution doesn't really have a direction, if things slowly became like they were when the Earth still had a high oxygen environment then some of us will develop ways to cope with it and the ones that don't will die, some species might go back to how they used to be, like dragonflies and millipedes, which will increase in size because they'll have enough oxygen to sustain a larger body.

 

[spartandude]

Essentially, you are correct, we have eliminated natural selection, and so evolution is unlikely to happen.

Correct.

Other folks have stated the popular science fiction convention that we will evolve into useless blobs with big brains that rely completely on technology.

If you could make a case that a blob like that has both more sex appeal and better child rearing skills, then I'd concede that future is likely. Otherwise, I think it's safe to assume that future is merely part of the social criticism made by science fiction authors.

Wrong.

Evolution is not the same as Natural Selection. They are closely linked but not the same. Natural selection is if your not suited to your environment you dont pass on your genes (or are less likely to). Evolution on the other hand is just caused by mutations affecting a speciesn for good or for worse
If you think about it Evolution wasnt really needed to begin with yet still happens. assuming life started off as single celled microbs, then how does joining together with others ultimately help? If you (the single cell) die then yh the others may continue but you still died so evolution didnt help that mauch but it still happened.
Anyway what i mean by that is that evolution just happens due to mutation which WILL happen almost every single time you reproduce so humanity WILL evolve, some changes may help others wont but it is still evolution which WILL happen.

 

[Yopaz]

apparently we are getting taller. Thats evolution right?

That's more of a combination of improved dietary habits and breeding (being tall is attractive), but it is a bit connected to evolution.

Well if technology continues to advance we may evolve with it, our bodies depending on them more and more each generation. Until eventually we would literally die without them. Though on a shorter term eventually we will most likely evolve into just one race, rather than many different races. With the ease of travel and not needing the specific racial attributes that people of different parts of the world evolved to have, we will all end up combining into one universal.

That's a very big misconception right there. With the technology improving at a steady phase we wont evolve to adapt to the technology. evolution takes a whole lot of time. We're not able to adapt genetically to technology because we need several generations without a change in technology. So far the only thing that's changing is that we have less muscles than those who lived 100 years ago because we need them less. This is also connected with the fact that we don't gain as much so it's not genetically decided yet. Humans are also one race as it is. There's not enough difference between the genetic material and capabilities of someone from Africa and someone from Europe to call them different races. If you look at the DNA from a cocker spaniel and compare that to a Bulldog there's less DNA in common there than there is between humans and a chimpanzees. They also discovered when doing a global gene mapping project that almost all the introns of every kind of people are the same, so only the exons make our DNA different. There is of course genetic diseases in these introns that some don't have, and different kinds of genes, but we're more or less identical on a genetic level, thus there are no races. Also we wont all look the same until all of us live in the exact same place.
I could go into endless details on why we look slightly different, but I will spare you and everyone else for that.

How is having blue eyes a genetic defect

It's (as fair as we know) a couple mutated genes in the part that decides eye colour that doesn't produce the pigments needed for brown eyes. It's not less worthy in any way, but it's a genetic defect in the way that there's a gene not functioning properly.


OT: I don't think we will evolve all that much unless there's some massive changes on earth. We will most likely lose the last pieces of the bone indicating we once had a tail in maybe 10-30 generations. From my point I can't see anything else that will have to change in order to preserve energy

 

[Jak23]

None, because macroevolution is false.

 

[Eireronin]

Giant Floating telekinetic super brains

 

[Maeta]

Humans won't neccessarily evolve to be more complicated. The thing is, evolution doesn't mean that a species will develop new, exciting and awesome things, say cats gaining opposable thumbs, it means a change so that the species will be more able to cope with the conditions that they face. Say if all the sea level change predictors are off, and we wind up living in Kevin Costner's Waterworld: we'd wind up evolving back to being simpler aquatic creatures due to lack of land, and the levels of boredom that would be fatal to a complex brain. If a severe climatic effect hits, then that would cause untold evolution, whereas continuing as is would lead to subtler differences, but either way, evolution isn't ever really done with life until life is done. However, if there is a drastic change, then I guess that the species will be considered different, and so that species will no longer exist in order to evolve and GRAGH! I think I broke...

 

[Joseph Alexander]

The human evolution is done, I think, at least the significant parts of it. Evolution (as I understand it) happens out of need (and can, as such, not be a selective process), and since we've firmly established ourselves at the very top of the food chain and developed technology to help us overcome our inbuilt limitations, the need has ceased, and therefore so has the evolutionary process.
Who knows, maybe in a few thousand years our bodies will wise up and ditch unnecessary components like the little toe or the appendix, but other than that, yeah, no more change.

That said, if we could select the direction of further (hypothetical) evolutionary process, I'd opt for an extra set of arms and the ability to levitate. (Too bad it wouldn't do me any good, since the fruits of evolution are only yielded to subsequent generations.)

no it hasn't and frankly we are about to change what evolution means in the coming decades.
in the future we will be able to CHOOSE our evolution and augmentation.
we will cease to be homo sapiens.
the only possible point where evolution would "end"(more likely slowing to the point of centuries between generations) is when we reach a point similar to the protoss from SC, the dreanei for WC or the ancients of SG, where our life cycles span indeterminate and don't self terminate.
effectively we become immortal, then yes our evolution will slow to the point that it seems to stop.
and we cease to be bound by the "laws" of the universe as we see them today.
and after that? we will likely end up moving to the point the protoss are at, becoming beings based on pure energy.

 

[Loop Stricken]

We could always evolve into a higher state of being...I wouldn't mind becoming a floating glowing mass, speaking to people through telepathy.

I would. I'd miss my wang.
but, in all seriousness give me Adam Jensen's genetic affinity for tech and load me up with those robot pieces. That's enough evolution for my short lifetime.

 

[The Lost Big Boss]

Evolution is just mutations in the replication of the DNA from parents. Depending on natural selection, the good ones get passed on through the generations, while the not as effective ones get lost in time. So as we last longer, we will have situations where mutations get passed down and spread. Lets not forget the possibility of human forced evolution that may be possible, depending on the ethics of it all.

*Note I could be completely wrong, and I blame that on the fact the last time I thought of any of this was two years ago in my bio class.
**Is it DNA or RNA? Is RNA the blueprint of the DNA, that proteins follow the RNA to make the DNA, and in the process is where the mutations happen?

 

[Venats]

no it hasn't and frankly we are about to change what evolution means in the coming decades.
in the future we will be able to CHOOSE our evolution and augmentation.
we will cease to be homo sapiens.
the only possible point where evolution would "end"(more likely slowing to the point of centuries between generations) is when we reach a point similar to the protoss from SC, the dreanei for WC or the ancients of SG, where our life cycles span indeterminate and don't self terminate.
effectively we become immortal, then yes our evolution will slow to the point that it seems to stop.
and we cease to be bound by the "laws" of the universe as we see them today.
and after that? we will likely end up moving to the point the protoss are at, becoming beings based on pure energy.

I think you've lost some connection with reality to the ideas of science fiction.

 

[trollax]

lets do some human augmentation

 

[Sonicron]

The human evolution is done, I think, at least the significant parts of it. Evolution (as I understand it) happens out of need (and can, as such, not be a selective process), and since we've firmly established ourselves at the very top of the food chain and developed technology to help us overcome our inbuilt limitations, the need has ceased, and therefore so has the evolutionary process.
Who knows, maybe in a few thousand years our bodies will wise up and ditch unnecessary components like the little toe or the appendix, but other than that, yeah, no more change.

That said, if we could select the direction of further (hypothetical) evolutionary process, I'd opt for an extra set of arms and the ability to levitate. (Too bad it wouldn't do me any good, since the fruits of evolution are only yielded to subsequent generations.)

no it hasn't and frankly we are about to change what evolution means in the coming decades.
in the future we will be able to CHOOSE our evolution and augmentation.
we will cease to be homo sapiens.
the only possible point where evolution would "end"(more likely slowing to the point of centuries between generations) is when we reach a point similar to the protoss from SC, the dreanei for WC or the ancients of SG, where our life cycles span indeterminate and don't self terminate.
effectively we become immortal, then yes our evolution will slow to the point that it seems to stop.
and we cease to be bound by the "laws" of the universe as we see them today.
and after that? we will likely end up moving to the point the protoss are at, becoming beings based on pure energy.

You're talking about biological alteration through means of technology. I actually do believe that is coming - maybe not right now, but certainly a few decades down the line. Who knows, maybe that will officially be classified as a form of human evolution.

However, for the purpose of your argument you quoted me out of context. What I meant was biological evolution as documented in the past, which was never ever ever a matter of personal choice; I was also correct in saying that it's only triggered by prolonged external threats or other needs set by the environment, and the way things are now, we as a species have no need of biological change (and as such it doesn't happen).

 

[Jacob Haggarty]

When did i ever say that we will dictate who lives and dies? I said that we are taking control of our environment, not that we have harnessed the power of god, or whatever it is youre thinking of. Yes, things die. Thats the raw essence of nature. But we wouldnt last HALF as long as we do without the help of medical attention and various pharmeceuticals.

I am not talking about the power of god; I am talking about only the biological system on Earth that contains trillions of units and possibilities (if I wanted to invoke the power of 'God', I'd point out that we (and all life with it) can be wiped clean off this Earth at any moment by the black hole at the center of our galaxy). We are taking control of our broader, day to day environment but we are also losing control of parts of the bacterial and viral level because of our over use (an attempt to control) of pharmaceuticals. We have created and are continuing to create more and more diverse bacterial strains each of which are becoming more and more resistant to our medicines. Its an arms race, if you want to call it that, between pharma and bacteria... and its quickly becoming a question of which will kill us first. (Because, as you'll notice, pharmaceuticals are become all the more double-edged as they become more potent to fight the ever more potent diseases we ourselves have created.)

We are also losing control of our macro environment... unless you think that we're not changing it faster than even we can adapt.

And this is the point im trying to get across: its because of our control of the environment that has an impact on our evolution. We change the environment, not the other way around. We no longer NEED to hunt, our food is provided for us. We no longer NEED to have children, it has become a choice.

Do you see what im saying? Im sorry if you got the wrong idea, i didnt mean that we had complete control over nature, just a lot of control over our environment.

I would argue that with each step we take to controlling one aspect of our lives/environment, we are losing control of another. People are obsessive with making their own lives better but tend to be blind to future and its repercussions.

We have created a great society, sure, and its has eliminated many of our past needs but its hardly done all that you say it has: We still need to have children (in fact, an average female needs to have 2.1 children in her life time to maintain the human population at a static number! The reason people can make choices about it one way or the other now is because many third world countries and older cultures still have many, many kids per female.), in changing our environment we will inevitably have to change to whatever it is we end up causing (so, in a way we force ourselves to change), and so on.

I wasn't really arguing about overall control, I just think you overestimate what we've done but maybe I'm underestimating it.

I agrue not so. Admittedly, i did overlook the idea behind MRSA and various other super-bugs, and how thats a problem to us, but you can surely see that, at least in the short to mid term, the way we have utilised medicinal drugs is a symbol of our influence of nature? Drugs can cure a person who would die without them, now, tell me that that isnt going against the very fundementals of the idea of natural selection.

I will concede however drugs as we know them are becoming far more risky affairs, with some drawbacks that actually seem WORSE than some of the symptoms.

As for our control of the environment, im talking species wise, not just in the familly. We will never lose control of a particular area just by focusing on a different one, the idea is a little strange. It would be like learning to cook better, but at the same time losing the control of your blader. Whatever advances we make in one particular aspect of our lives, be it sanitation or comfort of whatnot, they arent going to disapear when we start looking at others.

Lastly, the number at which you say women must have 2 and whatever children to maintain, is too high as it is. Look at other organisms in our environment (discounting bacteria). A lot of them have EXTREMELY low populations in comparison to ours. We have over populated a planet that can house plenty. The mind boggles at how we do this... that is until you consider our grasp on the environment, changing things for us so that older people survive longer, and so that conditions for birthing are greatly improved as well. Also, why would some family in africa having seven children influence my choice as to having children of my own or not? They need to have more children because of the much more hostile conditions they face. We face no such problem (coupled with the fact that we aren't exactly about to become extinct any time soon), which gives us a lot more choice in the matter. Ordinarily, in nature, producing offspring would be the very meaning of life, in order to ensure the contiued survival of our species... but now, survival is almost garunteed, because any problems presented can be overcome without having to first adapt.

Think (if you know of it) the childrens story about bears in the woods ("if you go down to the woods today..." no?)

"we cant go round it, might as well go through it." except it's more "We CAN go round it, so im sure as hell not going through it."