Concerning the evolution of man... I just wondered if...?

Question

... we are on the brink of a new dawn?

Thinking about the film 2001 Space Odyssey, when the ape realises he can use a bone as a weapon (to get food & beat predators)...

... man has gone through that phase...

Will the next leap in our evolution be when man accepts he doesn't need weapons?

Thanks Clayton.

Harry61... very interesting answer. Thank you very much for the link. Scientists reported the earth had shifted on it's axis after the Indonesian tsunami...

Answer 1

I think your question is fascinating, but my recollection of the movie spurs me to ask (and answer) the question a little differently. I believe the bone at the beginning of the movie is indeed a weapon, but in a general sense is a more of a benign thing. It is a tool--no more, no less. The leap that happens in less than second in the movie, but in thousands of years of human development, is from a bone-club to a suspiciously bone-shaped spaceship. Club or spaceship, they're both technological devices--tools.

The gripping question that the movie asks is when will these technological innovations, these tools, move beyond the control of their creators and users. In the movie, the spaceship itself develops Artificial Intelligence and begins to control its passengers. This is chilling (and engaging) to watch and imagine.

Fortunately for humanity, evolution doesn't so much leap as it plods based on circumstances. I don't believe humanity will ever stop using tools, but I do hope for a day when tools will no longer be used for killing, but for sharing the plentiful resources the earth has to share.

Answer 2

Yes, I believe so. Your analogy is appropriate when comparing the bone to nuclear weapons. Relatively speaking in terms of the geological time scale, we are at those very crossroads of spiritual self-realization. Keep in mind that the monolith represented an Extraterrestrial influence in the ape's cognitive evolution. Has humankind experienced the same influence relative to the bone? According to Francis Crick from the Watson & Crick fame who discovered the DNA strand, he too believed that human DNA had been manipulated in the past to bring about modern man! Crick called his theory "Directed Panspermia." Today, science is entertaining this concept, without saying extraterrestrial, by calling it Intelligent Design. Until we each come to terms with our spiritual side, then maybe we won't need another monolith.

Answer 3

I don't think realizing we don't need weapons is nearly a big enough thing to count as the next step in human evolution. For one thing, there are already people who are total pacifists and would never touch weapons even to save their lives, yet they don't seem to be particularly more intelligent than anyone else. For another thing, in order to know we don't need weapons, everybody would have to realize it at the same time; so long as OTHER people are still fighting each other, it doesn't matter how much WE would like to be peaceful, we might still have to fight in order to protect innocent people.

However, the idea that we might soon develop enormously and become superintelligent and so on is much closer to reality. With advances in artificial intelligence and cybernetics, within the next 100 years or so it will probably become possible to attach devices to our brains to increase our mental capabilities, followed soon afterwards by replacing our entire bodies with machines that can make us far stronger and smarter than we are now. This change from biological to mechanical could constitute the next big step in human development (it doesn't make sense to call it evolution because the process is quite different). Also, maybe afterwards we will be able to all finally agree to stop fighting each other...but we'll see about that.

Answer 4

We may have gone through the "ape uses tool" phase but, in evolutionary terms we are still stone age hunter-gatherers, yet living in an ultra fast-moving modern society.

It flips my mind when I think about it. Can you imagine a human of 50,000 years ago coping with life in today's society? Makes you wonder how we would cope with life in the year 52,007!!!

God damn it! I wish time travel machines were real (like the one in the HG Wells novel). The whole concept sends my imagination into overdrive!

Answer 5

a million) you're speaking approximately fossilization, no longer evolution. 2) no one doubts that under specific situations, fossils can variety particularly on the instant. even nevertheless, the top effect is amazingly especially distinctive, the two in visual charm and what the fossil is definitely created from. 3) it is not by using fact something is a fossil that all of us comprehend it truly is tens of millions of years previous. We date the rock around the fossil by various approaches (no longer carbon 14, do no longer even initiate) all of which furnish an approximate variety of while that fossil shaped.

Answer 6

Going by the theory of evolution, species will only undergo changes that will aid its ability to produce viable offspring. So if putting down weapons increases the chances of producing healthy children, yes man will evolve to not use weapons. More realistically, though, humans will continue to use weapons to protect their families.

Answer 7

humans are the most voracious predator on earth, we take every natural resource we can make a commodity from, discard the good and use the crap bits. we take everything and give nothing back. but we are not responsible for earths climate change. we are but a second in the cosmos clock. the big difference is we have the intelligence to realize our own self worth, soon enough humans will be dust and a new species will thrive. i have called this new species "hasselhoffia"

Answer 8

Yes, the changing of the ages is close. There will be a separation of wheat from chaff, but that is not an insult. It will be a re-direction for each being to a more suitable evolutionary location. Yeah it sounds crackpot., but do the research.

Answer 9

The phrase, "evolution of man" suggests that evolution is something that man has to obtain which is distinct and separate from him/ ourselves. Yet spiritual study teaches us that the goal of man is already within his grasp and is achieved from within. Humans can only 'evolve' when the individual realises that their personal evolution is directly proportional to the evolution of the rest of mankind. Ignorance of this can only lead to devolution.

Answer 10

I can`t see that ever happening (unfortunately), because while ever there are tyrants and power crazed humans, we will always have to protect ourselves and continually show that "we are bigger/stronger than you", and therefore develop more advanced weaponry. Furthermore whilst the saying is "the word is mightier than the sword", I am afraid it is not in some cases.