future evolution of humanity

I have been looking around this forum for a little while but I couldn’t find a thread, which dealt with this topic specifically. So here we go.Humans have in the last century demonstrated, in an appalling way, a desire to change the phenotypic and social structure of civilisation. Nazi sterilisation of the mentally ill and American chemical castration, are but two examples. On the other side of the coin, people who wouldn’t otherwise be able to reproduce, can with the aid of modern medicine. Thus having an impact on our gene pool.So perhaps we can control the future evolution of humanity, even use genetic technologies, brave new world style. But, that’s not really what I want to talk about. More so, I wish to discuss living conditions and cultural effects.The huge population of humans, variety of living conditions and the ability to travel may be a large enough impediment to change for the next few hundred millennia. But what then? Is it dangerous to structure our societies in such a way that evolution is impeded?
Should we give it direction? Does it already have direction?If the susceptibility to religious beliefs is heritable will Catholics inherit the earth? How can the choice between evolution and YEC affect our ability to deal with the long-term future of humanity?Admin, if some of this has been discussed in other threads please advise.

That’s a really nice quote, who wrote it?It makes a good point, we have a very long way to go before any thing comes to fruition. However, I don’t think that because of this the idea is ludicrous.Another way of looking at this question is how things have changed around us. In quite reascent history organisms have evolved around us. Cockroaches (Periplaneta sp, Blattella sp. BLATODEA) have in the last few millennia moved into an entirely new habitat, that of our construct. Our gut bacteria are under pressure to change with our change in dietary intake (trend from methanogens to sulphur reducing bacteria). Body lice, head lice, dermal bacteria, internal parasites, disease causing organisms, and of course viruses, are all under pressure to evolve to ensure their persistence.I will now take a more naturalists approach. Our future is closely tied into the future of change we cause to the greater world and the organisms in it. From an evolutionary perspective we can be defined as a product of our past environment. What happens to our sense of belonging when that environment ceases to exist? I will be blunt. If we dismiss modern genetic science, ecology, and evolutionary theory in general. What tools are we left with to manage the ever decreasing natural habitats and the organisms which they contain. Does YEC have any interest in the long term future of the human race and the world we come from, or just the eternity after existence as we know it.[This message has been edited by Autocatalysis, 06-21-2003]

Interesting, in such a circumstance, humanity would undergo a speciation. I wonder which linage would be god’s children.

The inferred superiority over all other living things is probably the most distressing thing about YEC. Like the world was put here for them. How arrogant can you get? Unless we can change that point of view there wont be much world left. Accepting of evolution does have the effect of making one respect the other inhabitants of this planet. But to YEC it’s just detestable that we have anything in common with monkeys.

Generally speaking the larger the population the harder/longer it takes to drive genes to fixation. Additionally selection pressure has been lifted off many traits in some parts of the human population. Thus reducing the drive to fixation. On top of this people still live under a huge variety of conditions yet freely interbreed. Speciation is generally accepted to occur in geographic isolated populations. Which is why the whole space thing is interesting! I am sure that new alleles are spreading through the population, but slowly. So there is change, but I am sure that under the current set of conditions humanity won’t change much genetically in the next hundred thousand to a million years, or longer! Just my personal take.

I am confident to say that the general consensus in this thread concludes that there is insufficient reproductive isolation in the human population to drive speciation, now and in the foreseeable future. The question remains what selection pressure is there? And what direction are we being driven in. I think it might be advantageous here to make a distinction between artificial selection and natural selection, if at all possible. Specifically, humans have had their evolution shaped by cultural adaptations (artificial selection?). Our ability to speak is an example of a learnt behaviour effecting selection. There are examples of cultural evolution in other animals, mostly primates, but others as well. And what could be more cultural than religion? It was my hope to encourage some YEC into this discussion. But after 29 posts it seems there is no interest from such quarters.

Well what evidence do we have? We need to look at genetic transfer between populations in the modern era. I don’t know of any studies. Hmm a little research perhaps