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Topic: James Watson fired (Read 7039 times) |
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
  
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Re:James Watson fired
« Reply #15 on: 2007-11-15 13:03:07 » |
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Quote from: Hermit on 2007-11-15 11:52:42
In support of the idea that we continue to evolve, many years ago my father, one of the most observant people I know, observed that rich men have pretty daughters. While I have met a few exceptions, and the ability to spend money to disguise imperfections clearly doesn't hurt, the observation seems to hold up on a global basis.
The reason he gave was that rich men not only attracted, but could also afford to select for, the most attractive women from the pack. And clearly did. Simultaneously, as businesses tended to go towards male offspring (still do), having a bevy of pretty daughters does not dilute wealth, but in fact acts as an enabler of family ties which tends to increase wealth.
Kind Regards
Hermit
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[Blunderov] The malls of the Northern suburbs in Johannesburg contain plenty of evidence in support of this theory. The prevalence of beauty goes way beyond mere grooming and expensive clothing. IMO.
best Regards
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Walter Watts
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Just when I thought I was out-they pull me back in
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Re:James Watson fired
« Reply #16 on: 2007-11-15 15:03:32 » |
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Quote from: Blunderov on 2007-11-15 06:48:19
[Blunderov] Seems that James Watson may be more a victim of the dreaded truthiness than anything else; this quote from the appended article jumps off the page :"People, including me, would rather believe that significant human biological evolution stopped between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago, before the races diverged, which would ensure that racial and ethnic groups are biologically equivalent,".
What if it isn't true? Apparently this is a question which dare not speak its name
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/mg18925421.300-are-we-still-evolving.html
Are we still evolving?
11 March 2006
NewScientist.com news service
Kate Douglas
"Are humans still evolving?
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I often wonder that myself.
In areas we wouldn't even perceive as evolutionary I assume we are, on longer scales, still evolving.
But what about the "happy accidents" of evolution.
Say, for instance, a mutation occurred that placed a functioning eye right smack dab in the middle of the BACK of our skulls.
What would modern man do with that?
Would it ever be allowed to confer an advantage, or would we, in all our wisdom, have the surgeon hack it off and call it a day.
Granted that's not a very good example, as such a mutation would only confer on a SINGLE organism only the slightest opportunity for advantage, and that advantage would be quite fleeting as it wouldn't be incorporated into the germ line in organisms that reproduced sexually.
But allow for a moment this same mutation occurring, for some environmental reason say, on multiple phenotypes of the same species.
Sexual reproduction would then indeed allow the opportunistic chance at exaptaption of this odd mutation.
It's not hard imagining the advantages conferred on variants with an extra functioning eye in the back of their head.
If, alas, we could keep the damn surgeons from cutting them out and sewing the hole up.
Which, I might add, was an impediment to evolution our forebears didn't have to worry about.
All this bringing us through recursive feedback to the original question--------> "Are humans still evolving?"
Maybe not at the same RATE as our distant relatives.
Walter
Feedback si vous plait       
PS--Please, pay no attention to the emoticons. I have a form of Tourette's syndrome that afflicts only computer users.
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Walter Watts
Tulsa Network Solutions, Inc.
No one gets to see the Wizard! Not nobody! Not no how!
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