Re: evolution

From: Sabrina Marr (cocochanel@redshift.com)
Date: Sun 08 Dec 2002 - 18:14:21 GMT

  • Next message: Wade T.Smith: "Re: Toward a new US-World dialogue"

    Richard Dawkins (along with a great deal of scientists of random professions) suggests in both The Selfish Gene and Extended Phenotype that mate selection had most control over the direction of evolution once beings gained the ability to "chose." Genes for wanting a hairier mate, in primates perhaps, would've gotten you a mate that could survive better in cold temperatures, meaning he/she could have produced more offspring and carried your gene(s) - for choosing hair - in surplus amounts to the next generation. Theses genes would spread and soon all of the primates in a population are choosing mates with more hair... then a renegade gene for, say, a large mate, might get you a mate who eats more (since he/she would likely have more food intake and hunting ability than others) and so more offspring. Sexual selection like this played a big role in the rapid evolution of sexually reproducing species in the past (even accounting for preference in humans for women with specific hip-waist ratios and men with more impressive genitals) and in humans specifically, with our wonderful ability to imitate and make more real-time ("conscious") decisions, sexual selection, or as Lawrence puts it, "individual... planning and decision-making," made humans what we are today. Lawrence, I wouldn't be
    "surprised if some day..." the element of sexual preference by genes for gene selection is realized to have played a HUGE role in nearly every species on the planet's evolution, since it's already been stated and proven, basically beyond reasonable doubt. On a more memetic standpoint analogous to by-gene-for-gene selection, when we "choose" good habits or to be like someone we admire, or to defect from society and be outcasts, it's our memes choosing new memes to integrate to our personas. This selection gives us infinitely diverse memepools, since more than one meme at a time can choose more than one other meme, and thus gives us the eerie, wonderfully diverse society in which we thrive.

    Sabrina Marr

    ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lawrence DeBivort" <debivort@umd5.umd.edu> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Sent: Sunday, December 08, 2002 9:34 AM Subject: RE: evolution

    > Don't forget the simple matter of individually created vision, persuasion,
    > planning and decision-making. These introduce new elements into the
    > evolutionary process, and I would not be surprised if some day way in the
    > future, it is realized that these came to play a greater current role in
    > human evolution than the traditional 'natural' unconscious processes of
    > evolution, mutation and selection. For lack of a better term, I call
    these
    > new elements, and the way they are managed, evolutionary development, or
    > conscious evolution.
    >
    > Best regards,
    > Lawry
    >
    > > -----Original Message-----
    > > From: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk [mailto:fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk]On Behalf
    > > Of Wade T.Smith
    > > Sent: Sunday, December 08, 2002 10:48 AM
    > > To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > > Subject: Re: evolution
    > >
    > >
    > >
    > > On Sunday, December 8, 2002, at 10:02 AM, Grant Callaghan wrote:
    > >
    > > > we can see a short way through the darkness ahead using the headlights
    > > > of science and logic.
    > >
    > > Religion was needed (IMHO it ain't no more) when there was no light
    > > ahead, and the next step was just as unknown as the width and depth of
    > > the ocean.
    > >
    > > Not to say that science and logic cast that much illumination, but,
    > > since they are not divinations, it is real light, within reality's
    > > spectrum.
    > >
    > > - Wade
    > >
    > >
    > > ===============================================================
    > > This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
    > > Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
    > > For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
    > > see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
    > >
    >
    >
    >
    > ===============================================================
    > This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
    > Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
    > For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
    > see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
    >

    =============================================================== This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing) see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit

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