[Essay]

I'll try to say a bit more about the dogs later, but for now:

Boerseun said:

Anything and everything to do with humans are removed from the "natural" scheme of things - including "evolution" in the classical sense. And only because humans are the masters of their environment, not the other way around as it is for all other animals.

This may just be semantics, but maybe we have different definitions of evolution. I'm speaking of the change in the genome and I think you're talking about population dynamics--or maybe morphological expression. Oh, I've got it; you're confusing evolution with selection--or I'm confusing evolution with genetic change.

Your points seem to make more sense viewed from that perspective of phenotypic expression, and an individual's fight for survival--fitness. I'm looking more at change on the molecular, genotypic level, and species "fitness" when I say:

I think the very fact that a domesticated cow wouldn't survive a day in the wild is a statement that a lot of genetic change has occurred in that cow--and the same would be true for many of the new breeds of dogs!

Just because we're doing artificial selection doesn't mean that mutation rates decrease or that stability is "locked" into the genome.
The genes don't know if they're being artificially or naturally selected.
They continue to mutate and modify their relationship with their environment.

We still contain from one to three hundred point mutations (compared to our parents genes) regardless of whether we live as hard-working paleoliths or lazy suburbanites--and 10% of us also have microdeletions or duplications.
And we get those epigenetic changes also from our parents--and either amplify or attenuate those changes in our lives--and then pass those new modifications on to our children, for them to modify....

Shift Happens! ...Whether Selection Happens or Not!
The few parameters (of environmental influence on the genes) that we do control can not be expected to be the limiting factors on biological mechanisms of gene modification.
===

Ultimately I think we're losing a lot of robustness from the genomes as we domesticate ourselves and other species.

We're endangering the very mechanisms that stabilize our genes, because those no longer are needed to maintain strict limits of fitness. Faulty repair mechanism can be passed on because they aren't weeded out by selection anymore.

Developing a" lack of fitness" in a species (due to lack of "strict" selection) is still evolution in my book; it's genetic change.
It's common to equate evolution with only progress, or progressive development, or betterment--but I think that view is too narrow; any change should qualify--expressed or not. Building up a lot of hidden changes (due to lack of selection) doesn't mean that evolution has ended.
===

I probably could have said that a lot more simply, but do you see the difference I'm driving at--and does it make sense?

Evolution is all about change, stability, and robustness of the genome--not our preferences or judgements about what phenotype is better for today or tomorrow.

p.s. Maybe I should have just said that "artificial selection" is just a "different environment" as far as the genes are concerned. The genes will continue to adapt to the new environment.

[lemit]

Thanks, Boerseun, your explanation was a lot better than mine.

We need to remember that diversity in disciplines is like other diversities. Interrelationships do not erase differences. They simply recognize the differences between equals.

I forgot to mention that. Thanks for the clarification.

--lemit

[charles brough]

Essay said:

Evolution is all about change, stability, and robustness of the genome--not our preferences or judgements about what phenotype is better for today or tomorrow.

p.s. Maybe I should have just said that "artificial selection" is just a "different environment" as far as the genes are concerned. The genes will continue to adapt to the new environment.

In other words, you are saying that there is no such things as an "artificial environment." You are seeing evolution only from the gene's perspective, not ours. Could that be treasonous?

While on the subject, I ask you to enlighten me on the subject of epigenetic change. Since you get into the detail of the genetic subject, help me understand. I read that it is genetic-like change that peters out in a few generations. Is that what is happening now to the US public which is growing fat, seeing big increases in autuism, diabetes, knee discus degeneration, etc. Is it the Malthus triad that restores public health in each civilization as it collapses?

[charles brough]

Essay said:

I think you're talking about a snapshot in our evolutionary history that still encompasses a lot of change in our environment. We haven't even had a chance to begin adapting (biologically) yet, I'd think.[/I]

I don't think we need to. Our social evolution changes environments so often and so fast and in different places among different people that slow-spaced genetic evolution only results in negligable change that may well amount to nothing in a single millenium or two as for as the whole human race is concerned.

[charles brough]

lemit said:

We need to remember that diversity in disciplines is like other diversities. Interrelationships do not erase differences. They simply recognize the differences between equals.

. . . between equals? Oh how our secular civilization would or will fail when our doctrines fail! "All is equal," we say and to say otherwise is a "hate crime," "intolerance," even "anti-" whatever. Perhaps unfortunately, there really never is "equality" because it is impossible for any two things to be exactly equal. There is always differences and those differences are what everyone intuitively seeks out and, because they are different, takes subtle pride in not having them and, hence, being "superior," "better," or whatever. It is human nature (especially so in us more egotistical men) but because of our ideology, we hide it from each other as much as we can and certainly do hide it most effectively from ourselves. . .

[lemit]

I'm sorry. I shouldn't try to write at four in the morning.

What I was trying to convey was that both sociology and genetics are respectable disciplines. I'm sorry for the little linguistic detour.

Now, the point I'm trying to make is that when people are physically changed by their environment, either their physical environment or their social environment, the resulting change is still physical. Regardless of the cause, the effect is still biological. So, if "social evolution" refers to cause, I'm fine with that. If it refers to effect, I'll have to respectfully disagree.

--lemit

[Essay]

Boerseun said:

Removing selection from the equation effectively nullifies evolution.

Now I know it's unfair to quote you from a different thread...

Boerseun said:

What if we let our entire society work in shifts?

but this is an example of the sort of "social environment" that will influence evolution--influences that I think will continue to drive our genetic progression (or regression).
Circadian rhythms and all that....

[Boerseun]

Essay said:

but this is an example of the sort of "social environment" that will influence evolution--influences that I think will continue to drive our genetic progression (or regression).
Circadian rhythms and all that....

I don't mind the cross-thread quote.

As to the above, there is nothing in the idea of letting society work in shifts that will induce evolutionary selection to come into place. Evolutionary selection requires death to weed out the weaklings, bettering the odds for those with beneficial genes to procreate.

Humans can work this "shift-system" for the next million years, and as long as we have electric lights and all the other mod cons of human engineering that tames the night environment, not a single jot or title in the human genome will change (be selected for) in order for humans to better work or live at night.

There is simply no need for such a change, and no individual born with night sight (for instance) will have any advantage over a human who can simply flip a light switch.

Our mastery of our environment have effectively removed us from the set of animals subject to evolutionary adaptation to environmental change. We say "to hell with darkness" and invent a light bulb. Other species wait for millions of successive generations to evolve light-emitting organs or develop sonar. Humans can do what glow-worms and bats do without evolving specific genes. And anybody who is born with such random mutations have no advantage at all over individuals who only has to learn how to apply existing technology.

[CraigD]

Moontanman said:

A new human mutation? babies have been born with a mutation that causes them to have far more muscles than normal babies
…
Gene mutation makes baby super strong

Very neat find.

I remember thinking about this in early 1998, when I first read about the discovery and suppression of the myostatin gene by McPherron and colleagues in mice – the “mighty mice” experiments (Regulation of skeletal muscle mass in mice by a ne...[Nature. 1997] - PubMed Result, and lots of popular press – note that in 1997, myostatin was known as GDF-8), again when I saw a TV show that featured “bully whippets”, a “muscle doubling” mutation believed to occur rarely if ever in any dog breed but the whippet, and after seeing the 2005 movie version of Frank Millers “Sin City”, when asked afterwards if a super-strong human like the story’s character “Marv” could exist. I commented at the time that it might be that a myostatin gene mutant – a human version of the bully whippet – who was coincidentally physically large (myostatin suppression doesn’t make you taller or broader, only more muscular – in the case of whippets, it actually causes shorter legs) and athletic, might somewhat resemble the fictional Marv.

I strongly suspect this is the case, and recent increased reports of “superbabies” don’t indicate an increased rate of occurrence of the trait, but increased reporting as more clinicians and other people become aware of the condition.

Moontanman said:

I don't think this can be dismissed in that way, more than just this one kid is involved, they are superior to normal humans in strength and display the same intelligence and other physiological factors. From what I've gathered it has already spread with more than 100 babies born so far. It's classic case of a good mutation starting to spread into the population.

As mentioned above, I suspect that the myostatin gene mutation is many times more common than reported, and is not “new” or “spreading”.

The genetics of this kind of “muscle doubling” (as it is commonly termed, though the increase in number of muscle fibers and total muscle mass is increased by only approximately, not exactly, a factor of 2) are well understood. Mutated copies of the gene must be inherited from both parents, who each must have at least a single copy. Subsequently, if a child with 2 copies of the gene grew up and had a child with someone who also had 2 copies, their child would almost certainly inherit the trait (this is how McPherron and others bred a true-breeding “mighty mouse” population). If his or her mate had zero copies of the mutant gene, however, as most of the population does, their child would have only a single copy, and children of that child’s by another zero-copies mate, a 50/50 chance of having. So, unless people with the inhibited myostatin gene purposefully breed, the trait will usually disappear from their family line within a few generations. I suspect social factors, such as an increased likelihood of elite athletes having children with other elite athletes, increases the size of the single copy population, and the incidence of children with double copies of the mutant gene.

Having only a single copy of the gene results has a similar but slighter affect. For example, recent analysis of genetic testing of normal-appearing whippets shows that, as one would expect, many whippets have single copies, and that race dogs that do are more likely to be top performers. The mother of the born 2004 “Berlin superbaby” featured in the chinadaily article, who upon testing was found to have a single copy, is reported to be a former world-class pro athlete, specializing in the 100 m dash.

If the effects of having two copies of the gene in whippets are an indication of its effects on humans, this is likely a case of “less is better”. Although not dramatically less healthy than normal whippets, bully whippets are unable to run as fast or as far as normal for the breed, and look to me uncomfortable, having reduced flexibility and range of motion.

I think another significant survival disadvantage muscle-doubling incurs on humans is that, if my guess is correct, such people have such high average body density that they will sink in water so forcefully that they will be barely able to swim, a disability shared by many genetically normal non-human apes, such as chimpanzees.

[charles brough]

lemit said:

if "social evolution" refers to cause (of physical change), I'm fine with that. If it refers to (the) effect (of physical change), I'll have to respectfully disagree.--lemit

I agree with you. The natural selection process going on among ideological systems and the societies they bond does not change us genetically, but societies that are failing can end up with epigenetic change which tend to be restored later on by Malthusian conditions. And social evolution is not caused by any genetic/biological change.

[charles brough]

Boerseun said:

I don't mind the cross-thread quote.

As to the above, there is nothing in the idea of letting society work in shifts that will induce evolutionary selection to come into place. Evolutionary selection requires death to weed out the weaklings, bettering the odds for those with beneficial genes to procreate.

Humans can work this "shift-system" for the next million years, and as long as we have electric lights and all the other mod cons of human engineering that tames the night environment, not a single jot or title in the human genome will change (be selected for) in order for humans to better work or live at night.

There is simply no need for such a change, and no individual born with night sight (for instance) will have any advantage over a human who can simply flip a light switch.

Our mastery of our environment have effectively removed us from the set of animals subject to evolutionary adaptation to environmental change. We say "to hell with darkness" and invent a light bulb. Other species wait for millions of successive generations to evolve light-emitting organs or develop sonar. Humans can do what glow-worms and bats do without evolving specific genes. And anybody who is born with such random mutations have no advantage at all over individuals who only has to learn how to apply existing technology.

It is strange, however, that people don't seem to accept that. They seem to feel that biological evolution is the only way to account for all the change in the way we live during the last some 40,000 years. Perhaps the reason they insist on coming up with pathetic examples of current genetic evolution in us is because the idea that we are bound together in societies by ideological systems instead of "Truth" is disturbing. It means that our "True" beliefs are really not "true" and that in belief systems, it is survival of the fittest!
They come and go and in the very long term, it is the most accurate ones that survive.

[Essay]

charles brough said:

...coming up with pathetic examples of current genetic evolution in us...

...you expect to find examples of "evolution in us" within a few generations--like night vision? Well, I think we need to look more for metabolic and durability type of mutations, but....

Yes, I'm no expert in evolution, and I could use some help here...
...which is why this below is probably rambling a bit, but I think the general idea comes across.
[Also, nobody's yet fleshed out this aspect of evolution, but regarding one point that was mentioned: epigenetics can fade out--or become permanent--depending on the environment.]

But please, anyone who understands evolution better, please help out.
Am I attributing too much subtlety to the genetic mechanisms and the integrated, systemic nature of genomes?
===

The immune system; just think how we're changing that--witness the rise in allergies.
So many metabolic processes are coupled to circadian rhythyms--like the daily regeneration of rods in the eyes.
Nutritional signals to the genes are completely different from just a hundred years ago--for folks living within a 24 hours society.

But I see your point that if nothing "selects" or in some way decreases reproductive success, then it doesn't matter how we regress, devolve, or degenerate.

I think this is correct:
There are multiple, unstoppable mechanisms to generate and force variation into our genome.
Domestication allows this to proceed so that variation is outside the bounds that a wild environment would ordinarily limit by selection.
This can only go on for so long until the variation starts affecting overall fitness--witness domesticated crops and animals. That's why I brought up the example of wolves radiating to dogs.
In what way do you think we are different?

We do have the capability to change the environment so that those grossly varied crops and animals continue to survive--and we are very good at doing that for ourselves too, when needed. But eventually....
===

Here's what I'm trying to say, I think.

Sure, there is a "lull" in selection pressures (due to social organization), and during this "lull" rare advantageous mutations are not selected for.
...and of course you're assuming a continuing state of increasing domestication, I think? No pandemics, no meteors, no wars, or famines, cultural collapses--or climate shift to another glaciation?
...so therefore our evolution has ended, right? Sure, that makes sense.

But:

During this same "lull" a lot of deleterious mutation are not going to be deselected.
...and during this same time a lot of "neutral" mutations are going to build up.
That can only go on for so long before there is some sort of reorganization of genetic function and expression.

At some point--evolution will continue.

At most our biological evolution is lulling, not ending.

[CraigD]

Boerseun said:

As to the above, there is nothing in the idea of letting society work in shifts that will induce evolutionary selection to come into place. Evolutionary selection requires death to weed out the weaklings, bettering the odds for those with beneficial genes to procreate.

Problems with this “survival of the fittest” metaphor for natural selection include

• That what trait is or will be effectively “strong” or “weak” is hard to determine. For example:
  • Heritable diseases may provide critical resistance to future environmental or disease pathogens
    
  • Disable individuals may have a beneficial affect on society by filling peculiar social roles, or promoting beneficial social behaviors such as charity and compassion
  
  
• Because the smallest unit of that which can live to reproduce or die without reproducing is the individual organism, not individual heritable traits, beneficial traits may be culled and detrimental ones perpetuated because they are present in an individual with other survival-impacting traits
  
• Sometime the fit are just unlucky, and die, while the less fit are lucky, and survive

This is not to say “survival of the fittest” is not an apt and useful metaphor, only that it is an approximate, not an absolutely accurate, one.

Boerseun said:

Humans can work this "shift-system" for the next million years, and as long as we have electric lights and all the other mod cons of human engineering that tames the night environment, not a single jot or title in the human genome will change (be selected for) in order for humans to better work or live at night.

There is simply no need for such a change, and no individual born with night sight (for instance) will have any advantage over a human who can simply flip a light switch.

This claim presupposes that

• Electric lights and other night-vision aids actually have tamed the night environment
  
• Every possible enhancement of visual perception can be accomplished with better illumination, optical devices, image-enhancement software, etc.

While I’m transhumanist enough to imagine, and even wish for, a future in which artificial visual systems render our present fleshy, nervy orbs obsolete in every way, I realist enough to expect this may be a long time coming, or may never come.

Boerseun said:

Our mastery of our environment have effectively removed us from the set of animals subject to evolutionary adaptation to environmental change.

As with vision, this presupposes that our mastery of our environment is effectively absolute. Though I share the dream of this occurring, I don’t believe that it has, by a long shot, at present.

Though our tool use is of tremendous benefit to us – I’ll go so far as to believe they set us apart from other animals more than any other major collection of traits, as I don’t see dolphins or termites landing spaceships on Mars – artifice is not at present the best solution to every environmental challenge, and in some situations, is actually a detriment. For example, labor-saving devices are a major cause of physical under-exercise and obesity, a major factor leading to untimely death. Dwellings and conveyances limit our contact with the dirtiest parts of our environment, which appears to cause immune system malformation resulting in potentially fertility and life-threatening disorders.

Boerseun said:

And anybody who is born with such random mutations have no advantage at all over individuals who only has to learn how to apply existing technology.

A point: evolution is not due entirely or even mostly to the acquisition of random genetic mutation, but in the large to acquiring old genes in different combinations via ordinary sexual reproduction.

Again, I agree, tools help, tremendously. However, purely biological advantages are also advantageous. All the present-day technology in the world is not enough to give selective advantage to a person with many heritable biological disabilities over a more biologically fit person – especially if the disabilities and fitness are related to fertility.

Boerseun said:

Our mastery of our environment have effectively removed us from the set of animals subject to evolutionary adaptation to environmental change. We say "to hell with darkness" and invent a light bulb. Other species wait for millions of successive generations to evolve light-emitting organs or develop sonar. Humans can do what glow-worms and bats do without evolving specific genes. And anybody who is born with such random mutations have no advantage at all over individuals who only has to learn how to apply existing technology.

charles brough said:

It is strange, however, that people don't seem to accept that. They seem to feel that biological evolution is the only way to account for all the change in the way we live during the last some 40,000 years. Perhaps the reason they insist on coming up with pathetic examples of current genetic evolution in us is because the idea that we are bound together in societies by ideological systems instead of "Truth" is disturbing.

Another explanation for why people don’t accept that our mastery of our environment has removed us from the set of animals subject to evolutionary adaptation to environmental change is related to their perception of cause.

Most people, I think, agree that human planning, tool use, and other technology has and is affording us tremendous advantages we would not have if we lived much like other animals. However, our ability to think, communicate, and build appears to me and, I think, many others, to have been caused by biological evolution, rather than our biological evolution having been caused by it. The truth of how much of our continuing success is due to our social abilities and artifice, vs. how much is due to our biology, vs. how much is due to luck, is, I think, moot (in the old sense of the word).

[charles brough]

CraigD said:

Most people, I think, agree that human planning, tool use, and other technology has and is affording us tremendous advantages we would not have if we lived much like other animals. However, our ability to think, communicate, and build appears to me and, I think, many others, to have been caused by biological evolution, rather than our biological evolution having been caused by it. The truth of how much of our continuing success is due to our social abilities and artifice, vs. how much is due to our biology, vs. how much is due to luck, is, I think, moot (in the old sense of the word).

The advantages we have over the other primates are the product of evolution, but evolution does not account for the changes in the way we live going back some 40,000 years. History involves the rise and fall of societies and their civilizations, something that changes as our biology stays the same. The natural selection that accounts for this amazing progress on a being that has not significantly changed, has caused all that change. Ideological-system based societies compete with each other and the one with the ideological system the most advanced replacing older ones which have been outgrown. This is just a general description of a complicated process of social evolution which explains our grrowing cultural heritage and how we have managed to populate and take over the planet even without any important slow-paced biological evolution.

charles
the Atheistic Science Institute - home page   

[Galapagos]

charles brough said:

WOW! That was a block of academic overload! The writer says brain evolution is going on, but how can any of us tell why or how or question in any way what his academeese unclearly states?

The authors of the article have actually been quite busy popularizing their findings lately, perhaps these articles will help you understand their work better.
Here is a summary on the blog of one of the authors, John Hawks:

Quote

Why human evolution accelerated | john hawks weblog
[...]
One day a couple of years ago, Greg Cochran and I were talking about brain evolution. You have to understand, this is long before we knew about any of these genome scans -- they hadn't come out yet. One of the main mysteries of human brain evolution is why it happened apparently gradually for such a long period of time. It is one of the best cases of evolutionary gradualism. But this is a problem, because directional selection would have too be too weak to take such a long time. Now, we know that brain size is constrained in two directions -- larger brains cost more energy to maintain, but smaller brains come with some functional disadvantages. So this creates a situation where new variants that satisfy both constraints -- costing little energy, or making great improvements in brain function -- must be very rare. It should be mutation-limited.

I remember very well, that at precisely the same moment, we both realized -- "Hey, maybe this great increase in human population size made a difference!" Because as we'll see later, the pattern of change in brain size really changed when populations started to get really big.[...]

Here is an article from SEED with some more of the authors discussing their work and its implications:

Quote

How We Evolve SEEDMAGAZINE.COM
When the previous generation of life scientists was coming up through the academy, there was a widespread assumption, not always articulated by professors, that human evolution had all but stopped. It had certainly shaped our prehuman ancestors — Australopithecus, Paranthropus, and the rest of the ape-men and man-apes in our bushy lineage — but once Homo sapiens developed agriculture and language, it was thought, we stopped changing. It was as though, having achieved its aim by the seventh day, evolution rested. “That was the stereotype that I learned,” says population geneticist and anthropologist Henry Harpending. “We showed up 45,000 years ago and haven’t changed since then.”

The idea makes a rough-and-ready kind of sense. Natural selection derives its power to transform from the survival of some and the demise of others, and from differential reproductive success. But we nurse our sick back to health, and mating is no longer a privilege that males beat each other senseless to secure. As a result, even the less fit get to pass on their genes. Promiscuity and sperm competition have given way to spiritual love; the fittest and the unfit are treated as equals, and equally flourish. With the advent of culture and our fine sensibilities, the assumption was, natural selection went by the board.

Here is one more recent article from the LA Times featuring two of the authors, Henry Harpending and Gregory Cochran:

Quote

Jewish legacy inscribed on genes? - Los Angeles Times
Ashkenazi Jews have a higher rate of some deadly genetic diseases -- and of high IQs. Scientists Gregory Cochran and Henry Harpending say that's no coincidence.

If anyone is curious about the views of Harpending and Cochran, they recently wrote "The 10,000 Year Explosion", which is more of their own interpretations and speculations based on their research.


Besides the above, it is silly to claim that our biological evolution has ended. By a minimalist definition of evolution, genetic change is happening in human populations; they are evolving. In fact, given that a lot of selection pressures our ancestors faced have been lifted, more random mutations that would normally be purged by selection are persisting and spreading, which means more variation, not less, ergo more evolution. Also, some random deleterious mutations are of course being selected out of the population as they occur.

Also, anywhere where child mortality is high(ie the 3rd world), there is still room for selection to potentially act. AIDS and malaria resistance are the obvious recent examples, and there are places in Africa where child mortality exceeds 25%, often times caused by similar diseases(typhoid, cholera, AIDS etc). If differential survival occurs before reproductive age, then there is opportunity for selection.