has anyone pondered this before??
2007-12-22 20:07:58 · 16 answers · asked by cleatus!! the pig! 2 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Biology
Absolutely not. Living in communities and using our intellect has been a central part of human evolution and is a big reason why WE are still here and not any of the other hominid dead ends.
If you want to go down that road, our development of advanced agriculture is a bigger culprit, since it has allow many "weak" humans who would have dies of starvation to live.
The use of medicines, the development of a technical society, these are all part of the continuing, gradual evolution of the human race. We already see a change in the makeup of the human population compared to a couple of milennia ago. I think it would be shortsighted to say we might be laess able to survive if we were teleported back to 1000BC, because, frankly, we don't live in those conditions any more.
2007-12-23 02:59:18 · answer #1 · answered by Professor M 4 · 2⤊ 0⤋
I think that we don't have a complete understanding of our own evolution to begin with. I would say that is likely that what medicines and technologies we use probably do affect things, but so does our diet and exercise and sunlight/environment and acceptance of those who are different.
The human race is changing (you can go back and see that the average height of men was shorter in the past than the present - but lifespans have also changed). But there are too many pieces of the puzzle to see what exactly is going to cause changes in the future, and what could be called the natural order of things vs. interferance.
2007-12-23 04:14:49 · answer #2 · answered by Sparrow hates Yahoo Answers 2 · 1⤊ 1⤋
Better to say affect that interfere. Interference would imply that our evolution had a particular plan or goal. What modern medicine has done is change the nature of the environment we are competing within. Of course, should the trappings of civilization vanishmany of us would die. But without civilization, most of us would die anyway as we can't support billions via a hunter-gatherer society.
2007-12-23 04:51:26 · answer #3 · answered by maxdwolf 3 · 1⤊ 1⤋
Yes. I think you mean "medicine" in the sense of all our medical knowledge and treatment, not just in the sense of a pill or a dose of some kind of medicine. The medical field extends our lives when we might otherwise die. Natural selection is based on surviving individuals reproducing and passing on their traits. Lets consider a few cases from my own family.
One of my sons had pneumonia four times before he started school. In the days before antibiotics, he would probably not have survived, but now he's 30 years old and can pass on his genes (and possibly his susceptibility to pneumonia).
I had pulmonary emboli when I was 46 years old. I already had my three children by then, so my tendency toward pulmonary emboli would not have limited my ability to reproduce and pass on those genes.
My husband cannot see a thing without his glasses, but he gets along just fine with his glasses. Without glasses he might have had a fatal accident in his youth, and would not have survived long enough to have children. Then the genes for poor eyesight would not have been passed on and remained in the gene pool. I have excellent eyesight, so if eyesight is the survival criterion, then I get to survive.
The field of medicine has saved two of my three children. I'm not sure this is beneficial to the overall human gene pool, but it works for me. If we survive with damaged hearts and we pass on those genes, is that a good thing for the gene pool? Probably not. However, we impose different rules on humans than nature imposes on individuals of other species. For better or worse, that's how it is.
2007-12-23 04:55:37 · answer #4 · answered by ecolink 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
Yes, many have. Yes, humans forever changed their natural course of evolution when they began keeping people alive that would have died. Especially those that would have died before passing on their genes.
2007-12-23 08:43:31 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
What a great thought. I'm sure that it prevents some evolution, however nothing that you or I would live to see anyway.
In our society today, we tend to rely on the meds too much to treat things that were just overlooked long ago. When the cavemen couldn't sleep they probably just hit eachother over the head instead of depending on a med...and when they were depressed there was no pill for that...and when they couldn't get it up...well, you get the point.
Thanks for evoking such an intriguing thought.
2007-12-23 04:12:00 · answer #6 · answered by zimmiesgrl 5 · 1⤊ 2⤋
No. It is merely an outgrowth of our natural evolution. Wisdom forms an additional non-physical "intellectual DNA" that is passed down from one generation to the next, but this is all built upon the base of natural physical evolution.
2007-12-23 04:15:53 · answer #7 · answered by Trin 2 · 3⤊ 2⤋
good question. I think it would be impossible to prove one way or the other. I have myself wondered if (life saving)medicine affected 'natural selection' in humans.
2007-12-23 04:12:30 · answer #8 · answered by Mr. Know It All 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
YES. Especially now that they are researching to make humans immortal in the telomer-telomerase thingy...Search about it in the net..
2007-12-23 04:12:35 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
Wow good question, never thought about it before but I'm guessing it takes part in our evolution.
2007-12-23 04:10:58 · answer #10 · answered by Imperative 2 · 0⤊ 3⤋