Survival of not so fittest - Human interferance in Natural selection (Jan/30/2009 )

Human assisting in 'Survival of the fittest'


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YU82RS5elI&e

If they are not fittest then making them survive is not act against natural selection?

Pandas have one very usefull feature for their survival. They're so cute that they made humans to help them reproduce. Very clever, since humans nowadays rule the Earth

Do we really rule the earth?

Are humans, and everything we do, and everything we make, not part of the natural world?

Nabi on Jan 30 2009, 10:23 AM said:

One could argue that in the crudest sense, power over something is the ability to destroy it where and when one desires. With the advent of nuclear weapons, humanity could destroy the Earth. And thus by this definition we do rule it.

Of course, there are other definitions of what it means to rule a planet. If ruling meant being able to govern it, fix it and improve it... well humanity may no more rule the world as a 2 year old may rule a town.

oldman on Jan 30 2009, 02:48 PM said:

It depends on the definition of 'natural' that is in use. What humans do is produce things in quantity that are not normally found in a particular environment. Is a pride of lions floating in the middle of the Atlantic natural?

perneseblue on Jan 30 2009, 06:43 PM said:

But haven't we already made that very basic of all definitions- anything produced by man is artificial or man-made and not natural?

casandra on Jan 30 2009, 03:53 PM said:

I would agree. However people seem to make strange exceptions.

The "natural" distinction is bull. They are surviving by fitness - to human emotion.

Trof on Jan 31 2009, 02:24 AM said:

GeorgeWolff on Jan 31 2009, 09:47 AM said:

This is a form of symbiosis?

perneseblue on Jan 31 2009, 08:43 AM said:

In one sense it is the power to destroy but looking at the present age, there are groups that have power to destroy our habitat but we refuse/fight to accept that they rule. Taking evolution into consideration, is it right to say that the one who is most evolved (or who is fittest to survive) is the ruler?

Nabi on Jan 31 2009, 02:00 PM said:

What does it mean to be "most" evolved? Either a species is evolved in a certain environment, or it isn't. Even using the "fittest to survive" definition (and couldn't we open a can of worms over that definition?), I could argue that anywhere that H. sapiens occurs in numbers, Rattus spp are most evolved, and therefore rule. And let's not forget ants and cockroaches.

I think we need to consider many, many parameters to decide which organisms are the fittest. In our case, we seem to buck the "natural order" whatever that might be. We are not the fastest, or the strongest, yet we rule, in a pragmatic sense. We are generalists, not specialists, and perhaps that's why we have been so successful (consider the horse, whose legs have evolved to the point that their ancestral prehistoric pentadactyl hands and feet have become a single digit with the mother of all nails). Or maybe it's the combination of being adaptable and having an opposable thumb that has set us apart to become the dominant species (is that a more useful term than "the rulers", I wonder?). Being most evolved isn't necessarily the best thing if you aren't able to adapt to changing conditions...

As for the question of who is the ruler, I'm afraid it has less to do with the degree of evolution as the arsenal at one's disposal. Look at Dubya! If he was the peak of evolution, then evolution is in trouble! Don't mistake power for evolutionary status.

Heretical statement: In this year of Darwin worship, please try to avoid labelling everything Darwinian! I'm not sure old Charlie would be too happy at how his theories have been manipulated, and I don't just mean the actions of the neocons and religious right. In the context of this thread, there is also such a thing as politics.

Remember: we are dominant, not rulers. We do not control anything of any real consequence on the planet.


Rant over, I'm going home!