Can we beat evolution?

Question

By beat evolution I mean, can humans select what we believe are desirable chracteristics and try to establish them preemptively, despite the fact that they run contrary to our current biology or adaptions.

Answer 1

In theory, it would be easy to apply the same breeding techniques we've used on animals for thousands of years to humans as well. The problem, is controlling all the humans involved...

One approach is to try and outright eliminate 'undesirable' genes from the gene pool. And certainly there have been vicious dictators who have commited one form of genocide or another toward this end and become infamous for it. A quieter version has been carried out in many countries for decades, where it can often be seen that one ethnic group is given operations by doctors that render them infertile more frequently than others. There have been many cases of gypises being sterilized by doctors who simply said, 'sign this agreement or you are going to die'. Of course these methods are considered monstrous by most people, and are abolished wherever they are publicised.

There are other approaches too. Some societies have taken the more peaceful approach of just isolating themselves into communities with 'desirable' genes and not permitting any undesirable people in. To my knowledge, none of these communities has lasted more than a generation or two (hardly enough to do much of anything), so the possibility of such a long-term project as overall improvement of the human species seems a long way off.

Either way the practice is sometimes referred to as eugenics, if you want to learn more about it. It's has many well-known proponents in spite of the bad reputation it has picked up from those who try to implement the darker means.

It has one other major problem other than long-term implementation - the question of what, exactly, is 'desirable'. You might think that a certain number of traits would be cut-and-dried, but this is not always so. If you have a society of only geniuses, who is going to do the boring and repetitive tasks? If you have a society only of the strong and energetic, will they be able to sit still long enough to study? Even if you choose something as superficial as beauty, it because clear that people have different standards of attractiveness and that they change dramatically through time.

Still, it's an interesing idea to consider, I think, and perhaps even one worth pursuing. Just because people have failed up until now, it doesn't mean that such endeavours MUST end in failure!

Answer 2

Theoretically, yes, we could given much more information on the human genome and its interactions than we have now. The big question is should we. Experimentation on "improving" the human species has been performed in the United States among other countries and most infamously by the Germans during the World War II era. There are so many interactions in the natural world that we can't be sure exactly what impact any given modification will have over the long run. So bioengineering, especially regarding humans, will no doubt be debated for decades to come.

Answer 3

sure we can - but maybe not in the positive trait selection you meant ;-)

look at me (and many others, actually a majority of the population): I wear glasses. Because my eyesight is poor. In pre-historic (or even historic) times, what would my odds of survival have been? Very low. Of bearing children? Even lower.

But in our modern society, all I have to do is wear glasses, and so I am free to work hard and also bear children, and in the process spread my genes of inferior eyesight.

So in that sense, civilisation has beat evolution ;-)

The same holds true for force, physical fitness, many other things I'm sure you can think of.

Even intelligence - most geniuses tend to have a hard time adjusting, and even if they do adjust, and find a job that is challenging enough for them, but even if they settle, they will rarely (if ever) bear as many children as much less smart, but much less worried, people. So, civilisation also beats the selection towards more intelligence.

So maybe as a species we have stopped evolving because we're preventing evolution from happening.


One final note on the "selection of desireable characteristics": the last visible guy who thought this was a good idea, and tried to apply it, was called Adolf Hitler - so just be a bit careful ok...

Answer 4

Natural selection has been used for centuries, and is most notable for producing the many varieties of dogs we see today. Selective breeding works best on animals. When you want to talk about selective breeding of humans, you run dangerously close to 'eugenics.' People like Adolph Hitler wanted to scuplt a master race in such a way.

It is not so much "beating evolution" as it would be narrowing the gene pool and removing "unacceptable" (mostly physical) traits.

The problem with any program of this kind is that some people would be labeled as inferior. The human body is a vastly complex interlinking of various systems, and it is quite remarkable we function as well as we do given the complexity of the systems, and the vast storehouse of data encoded in our DNA.

Eugenics is best left to the history books, and not the modern science lab.

"Nature has the advantage of having millions of years at her disposal. She has all the time in the world to correct the mistakes she makes, and you better believe she makes plenty"

Evolution, as is commonly understood, is a blind sequence of accidents that happened by change, from a proto-cell in a vat of primordial chemicals and onward to the biological diversity that we see in the world today. To ascribe the creation of such an array of lifeforms to a fumbling, pantheistic deity hardly seems credible, especially when science, real empirical science, has no direct evidence of millions of years, or the alleged evolutionary 'process' at all.

The age of the earth is determined by radiometric 'dating.' These methods do not directly measure time, but rather amounts of isotopes. (the most familar type, though unable to record dates in the millions of years, is carbon dating). By measuring the amount of a given isotope against a decay rate, a guess (estimate) of the amount of parent isotope is registered.

The date is derived by calculating (based on the half-life of the isotope) The amount of time it would have taken for the hypothetical amount of parent isotope to decay to the current amount of daughter isotope.

These methods can give wildly varying dates for the same layers of rock, and thus to the fossils contained in them.

Also, some fossils cross rock strata (polystrata fossils). Since the time difference between strata is alleged to be millions of years, these kind of fossils present a very complicated challenge in the asking of "how could a fossil survive millions of years of erosion, without showing extra wear on the exposed part, especially considering that that part could not have been hardened via fossilization yet.

Answer 5

In order to beat evolution we would have to at least be playing on the same playing field, and we can't even do that. Nature has the advantage of having millions of years at her disposal. She has all the time in the world to correct the mistakes she makes, and you better believe she makes plenty. But not nearly as many as man with his clumsy attempts at rearranging the world to his liking. And when WE make a mistake how long do we have to correct the error, assuming we could even discover the means? If man the species survives as the dominant life form for the same span as others before us perhaps he could correct a few. More likely he'll totally upset the balance of nature and bollix things up to the degree that he becomes extinct. I think I'd rather take my chances with Mother Nature. She may often be slow but her course is steady.

Answer 6

Sure, we do this all the time.

Say you have a really smart guy, but he is in a wheelchair because he has a hereditary disease. Natural Selection would leave him behind, wouldnt it? He'd be toast!

But in the modern world, if he is smart, we not only take care of him, we might even make him a hero. And if he has kids and passes on his disease, we now have a line of humans who have a new trait (the disease) but who survive because they live in a technological society where the disease can be managed and where his (presumably) genius kids would be highly valued.

Answer 7

I think there are more subtle qualities to this question than most answerers are considering. POsitive traits dont have to be stuff like runnig and jumping. Even somthing like encouraging women to join th e work force is an example of trying to change society. Changingour hbehaviors and putting pressure on certain traits is all it takes. It does not have to mean somthing like forced breeding.

Answer 8

I believe Hitler tried something like that...to create the "perfect" race.
It would take a global effort to selectively breed people generation after generation for the next few thousand years. In theory it could happen, practically it's a pipe dream.

Answer 9

but wouldnt the trait that makes us select desirable charateristics be evolution. By evolving to beings smart enough to choose the best characteristics, we've only just continued the process of evolution. So, by choosing the desirable charateristics, we're just staying on the track of evolving for the better

Answer 10

Of course. But you have to remember that whatever it is you choose has to be propagated through the species. It's not just selecting on individual, evolution works on a species.