Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
In 1859 Charles Robert Darwin published "On the Origin of Species". Which contained the
most compelling evidence to ever support the theory of evolution. Since then Darwin's theory
has been widely accepted within the scientific community. If Darwin is to be believed, it
took the human race 6 million years to evolve from chimpanzees to modern day *** sapiens.
But will human's ever evolve again? Or has the human race reached its physical and mental
peak? Let's find out.
Many skeptics argue that humans have reached their evolutionary peak. Because evolution
is about a species adapting itself to its environment. But humans have learnt to adapt
the environment to us. For example, instead of the body having to adapt to living in a
cold climate we instead build a house around us and install heating. And there you go,
instant warmth, with no further evolution needed.
Thousands of years ago humans evolved to run faster and see further away in the distance
to aid us when hunting animals. But now we buy our food from the shop, and we don't need
to run anywhere because we have cars. We also don't need to see long distances because we
spend all day staring at computer screens. So based on this, the rules of evolution state
that humans have no further need to evolve and therefore will never evolve again.
There's also the issue of modern medicine. As wonderful as it is, it does prohibit evolution.
Before modern medicine the weak would die out and only the strongest and fittest would
pass on their genes to the next generation. However today, weak individuals who previously
wouldn't have survived a disease or an injury, now survive, thanks to modern medicine. The
downside to this is that their weak genes get passed on, just as much as those with
strong genes. This essentially makes the theory of "survival of the fittest" null and void
in the modern day.
But all that sounds awfully boring! Some leading anthropologists entertain another school of
thought which is far more titillating. They believe that there are ways we can, and will
evolve in the modern world, and the results will be quite shocking. And it's not just
speculation, there is hard proof that humans are still evolving. A study by the evolutionary
biology team at Yale university revealed that due to the size and shape of their ovaries,
shorter and slightly plumper women tend to have more children than their taller, skinny
counterparts. This is an example of evolution happening right under our noses.
Many scientists agree that if we do evolve in the near future the first thing that will
change will be the size of our brains. The biggest evolutionary changes have come from
the brain, such as abstract thinking which led us to new inventions, and of course language.
So it makes sense that in our modern world where information rules, the brain will be
the next thing to evolve.
But can our brains, physically, get any larger? Well the biggest factor that has limited human
brain size up until now has been the birthing process. Baby's heads must be able to fit
through the birth canal, which has stopped their brains from growing any larger in the
womb. But with the massive rise in Caesarian sections in recent years, this could all be
about to change. Today, over 50% of babies in China are delivered via C-section. And
of course a C-section means no more limits on the size a babies head can grow. Some anthropologists
believe this growing C-section trend could give way to babies being born with increasingly
larger brains and heads in the future. Some theorise that in a few generations down the
line, humans could have huge heads and scrawny bodies, just like aliens in science fiction
films.
But what about our physical appearance? Surely there's no further need for humans to evolve
any more in this respect? Well there isn't a need in terms of survival, but scientists
think in the future we will evolve to look different nevertheless. This is because, more
so than ever before, males are choosing their *** partners based on looks and intelligence
levels as opposed to their ability to produce healthy offspring. Therefore, more attractive
and more intelligent females will get more chances to reproduce and pass on their genes.
The consequence of this is that the human race will ultimately evolve to be smarter
and well, generally more pleasant to look at. This type of selection based on attractiveness,
does of course happen with both genders, but research has shown it's considerably more
prominent amongst males.
This is a newly emerging evolutionary phenomenon which scientists refer to as "artificial selection"
as opposed to "natural selection". Because it's no longer mother nature and our environment
that chooses how we evolve, it's now humans themselves who are deciding which genes get
passed on and which don't.
But natural selection isn't dead just yet. Our environment still poses a massive risk
to us. As the population of the human race increases and we become a more globalised
community, traveling back and forth to every corner of the planet. We are spreading pathogens
easier and quicker than ever before. Biologists predict that were going to get a lot more
virus epidemics in the coming years and huge chunks of the population with weak immune
systems and poor access to modern healthcare will be killed off. The result of this is
that humans will evolve to have stronger immune systems naturally and become less dependant
on medicine and the global life expectancy will rise. But changes such as this will take
thousands of years before we really start to notice the difference.
So yes, humans are still only in their infancy when it comes to evolution. There's a lot
more weird and wacky mutations to come in the future. But there's one thing you can
guarantee, the human race a million years from now will look remarkably different and
function in completely different ways than they do today.