(January 22, 2015 at 4:22 am)robvalue Wrote: Yeah. I know what you mean. Personally I think that to say we are altering evolution is to assign some sort of natural goal or rules to evolution, that it's meant to only happen a certain way.Or giant meteors hitting us...
The way I look at it, evolution of life on earth is just a subset of everything that happens in the universe. So for something to "alter" evolution, from my point of view, would take something actually external to earth. Like aliens coming down and screwing around.
Quote:But in that way, evolution has changed only in as much as our sphere of interest was too narrow to take in the universal change.No, I think no one can deny you to be inclusive, the activities of the human mind might just be beyond the mechanisms that are usually assumed to be active in neodarwinian evolution.
Maybe science doesn't look at it that way, I'm not totally sure. Maybe I'm making totally pointless points, hehe.
Quote:I don't deny that humans appear to fuck with "evolution" like never before, but it depends on the precise meaning of the words to say whether this is true or not. And I guess you could take either stance. But to say we alter the evolution of other species say... is to just say that we altered what would have happened were we not here. Which is the same deal for any other form of life which inadvertently affects such evolution.
I agree, we are probably the only form of life capable of being aware of evolution happening.... my brain hurts. I hope I got my point across
Yes. And we do evolve further, no doubt. If we survive, (and assuming we don't mix things up on purpose using genetic engineering), in a million years or few we will nevertheless look at some quite different species of humans.
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition