From: Emlyn O'regan (oregan.emlyn@healthsolve.com.au)
Date: Wed Jul 23 2003 - 21:10:39 MDT
> Damien wrote:
> >This is true by definition but uninformative without the
> fine grain detail.
> >The point I was trying to make, via a touch of whimsy, is that almost
> >nobody today has 20 kids although ... feasible to do so ...
> >*We don't maximize family size per generation* ...
>
Robin replied:
> I agree that we don't, and it seems that you agree this is a temporary
> evolutionary aberration due slow adaptation of DNA coded behavior.
Busting into the middle of other peoples' conversation...
"a temporary evolutionary aberration due slow adaptation of DNA coded
behavior."
Does anyone really think that our modern (last thousand years or so?)
behaviours are temporary aberations to which DNA will eventually catch up?
It seems clear to me that DNA for humans has done its dash. We're about to
start rewriting it to suit ourselves, afterall (until such time as we can
discard it altogether, I'll warrant). DNA as a mechanism of adaptation and
change, in humans, went obsolete somewhere around the time that general
intelligence popped up. For us these days, the dictates of the genome are an
important backdrop (as they proscribe all kinds of limitations/settings for
the phenotype), but natural selection is an historical curiosity, certainly
not a mechanism relevant to our current behaviour.
Belief systems, ideologies, ideas, these are driving our world now I think.
Not some quirky little quarternary tape machine.
Emlyn
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