Sounds pretty serious doesn't it? Well, maybe it is. I just wanted to get a few of my thoughts out, both on evolution and the supposed state of decline of the planet. Now, don't get all up in arms about the word 'supposed' in there. I am definitely for doing what we can to help the environment, but I am not sure that it's the end of days quite yet.
I believe that we evolved into what we are today. The various components of the biosphere exerted pressure on our ancestors; they had to defend themselves from predators, fight over resources, and compete for the best mates. That's what I believe. At some point, though, we ceased to genetically evolve. Now, instead, our technology and patterns of thought are forced to evolve to accommodate our changing surroundings. I will explain what I mean in the next few paragraphs; after that, anyone who thinks differently or the same can feel free to comment. Please, read the whole article before doing so, though. Also, keep in mind that much of it is conjecture. I haven't sourced anything because this is all my own rambling, based on a general sort of knowledge that I've built up over the years. It's liable to contain a few fallacies, and you are welcome to point them out.
Over time, we developed the ability to synthesize concepts in our mind. We used these concepts to build tools, start fires, and other things that the early human accomplished. With these tools we improved our ability to hunt and forage and find shelter. With fire, we cooked meat and kept warm and staved off predators. With the ability to think, we had gained an enormous evolutionary advantage over other animals. I would like to propose that, at this point, if you could narrow it down to a point, human thought began and, more importantly, began to evolve.
Thought continued to make our lives safer and more efficient. We began to realize that delegating tasks to different members of our social groups made the tasks essential to survival more efficient (though, this isn't actually a concept novel to human beings). People split up and began to specialize. Not very much at first... perhaps we first split into hunters, gatherers, and preparers of the food. Then the hunters split into hunters and trappers, and the food preparers became also the keepers of the shelter and starters of the fires, and bearers of water. We changed, adapted, realized more efficiency, discovered new ways to keep ourselves alive. All through thought. In some small way we were probably still evolving physically, as the tribes with the stronger arms managed to survive drought, but the main benefactor of the concept of evolution was the concept of thought. Ideas were tried, and those that failed were discarded. Those that worked were passed down through the generations, and improved upon.
The evolution of the idea of foraging gave us mining. The evolution of the idea of a fire gave us energy. The idea of sheltering ourselves from the elements gave us the idea of clothing, and the idea of protecting ourselves from animals and other humans with walls. The idea of separation of duties gave us trade gave us numbers gave us money gave us math gave us science... you get the idea, and it's not quite that that simple, but you can see how our progress became more about evolution of thought than physical evolution.
I am getting tired though. In subsequent posts, I would like to put forth my idea that physical evolution is all but nonexistent for human beings. I would also like to talk about why I think that, because of our move from physical evolution to evolution of thought, 'Mother Nature' has lost the ability to control or contain us. I might tie what I have been calling the evolution of thought to memetic theory as well. We'll see. It's my blog so I don't have to decide quite yet :).
