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-Short Attention Span Theater-
Humanity faces species split
2006-10-19
HUMANITY could evolve into two sub-species within 100,000 years as social divisions produce a genetic underclass. The mating preferences of the rich, highly educated and well-nourished could ultimately drive their separation into a genetically distinct group that no longer interbreeds with less fortunate human beings.

Oliver Curry, a research associate in the Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science of the London School of Economics, has speculated that privileged humans might over tens of thousands of years evolve into a "gracile" subspecies - tall, thin, symmetrical, intelligent and creative. The rest would be shorter and stockier, with asymmetric features and lower intelligence, he said.

Dr Curry's vision echoes that of author HG Wells in The Time Machine. Wells envisaged a race of frail, privileged beings, the Eloi, living in a ruined city and co-existing uneasily with ape-like Morlocks, descended from the downtrodden workers of today, who toil underground.
So, eating Elois is "co-existing uneasily" with them? Morlocks would then be some kind of post-apocalyptical muslims?
Dr Curry said the concept of race would be gone by the year 3000, after relationships between people with different skin colours had produced a "coffee colour" across all populations. With improvements in nutrition and medicine, people would routinely grow to 198cm and live to the age of 120, he said. Genetic modification, cosmetic surgery and sexual selection meant that people would tend to be better looking than today.

Otherwise, humans will look much as they do now, with one exception: Dr Curry also suggested that increased reliance on processed food would make chewing less important, possibly resulting in less developed jaws and shorter chins.
Just like Bashir Assad?
Ten thousand years from now, this effect could be compounded as human faces grow more juvenile in appearance. This effect - neotony -
Neotony, my old nemesis!
is known from domestic animals: dogs resemble young versions of wild relatives such as wolves.
BFD... anyway this is assuming current trends will go on long enough for those evolutions to occur... throw in a Grand Collapse/return to the Dark Ages, and it's a very alternate scenario... also, Mike "Beavis & Butthead" Judge has a different take on how current trends will lead Humanity.
Posted by:anonymous5089

#36  "HUMANITY could evolve into two sub-species within 100,000 years as social divisions produce a genetic underclass."

Uhhh, we already did. But there's only one subspecies - the "underclass" that worships the moon god, hates everybody who's not just like them, and wants to force everybody else to be just like them. They're called islamonutz leftists losers.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut   2006-10-19 23:10  

#35  even then the engineers bitched about their compensation, according to cave drawings

And couldn't be trusted to interface with the client. And drove the VP of engineering batty.

LOL
Posted by: lotp   2006-10-19 22:25  

#34  Hexagonal basaltic bldg foundations using materials that they should not have been able to even work - found on multiple Pacific islands.

Megalithic works using complex mathematics to arrange the stones tht traditional archaeologists and, especially, anthropologists, ay they did not have the intellectual understanding to undertake.

That's just two. There are countless others.

Our ancestors were not nearly as stupid as we might believe they were.


Posted by: FOTSGreg   2006-10-19 22:15  

#33  Very interesting, Zazz, I want to hear about the fragments found of other pre-10,000BC civilizations that are dismissed!
Posted by: anon1   2006-10-19 21:24  

#32  first major civil engineering structures built ~3,600BCE.


even then the engineers bitched about their compensation, according to cave drawings
Posted by: Frank G   2006-10-19 21:13  

#31  Have we evolved in the past, oh, 100,000 years? You bet we have.

Sure we have, but remarkably little when measured as a species - all the important bits, general physiology, general morphology, general cerebral capacity, and several more have all remained fairly consistent for most of that time.

These idiots are saying that we'll evolve into 2 separate species within the next 1 thousand years (upper and lower classes and skin color, for example).

I don't buy it. Evolution does not act that radically without a serious outside influence that forces it.

As to height, I already pointed out that that has been laid to better general nutrition and medical care.

Posted by: FOTSGreg   2006-10-19 20:54  

#30  zazz: I'll go back to reread Wells. I don't recall him memtioning the Guardians. If he did he described the 21st century to come.

Shipman: Where are you man? Golf season does not officially end (in Ohio) until the first snow and / or temps below 52* w/ windchill factor under 40*. Not with the guys I play with. The season starts up again under the same parameters.

You down south? You dog, you're spoiled.
Posted by: Mark Z   2006-10-19 20:08  

#29  Have we evolved in the past, oh, 100,000 years? You bet we have.

Ever hear of the Masai tribe in Kenya? They are renowned for their height and the fact that they drink their cattle's blood. Their height is several orders of magnitude of difference between them and their neighbors. It seems to me that their evolution was very quick. Same thing with the Tutsis and Hutus in Rwanda/Burundi with their distinct physical differences.

Here is what I have been trying to figure out for the last few decades: How the hell do you account for the amazing height growth in American men, especially black? Food? 'Parenting skills'? Evolution? Will?
Posted by: Brett   2006-10-19 19:16  

#28  Forgive me, but I heard this stupidity on Fox News last night.

Humans take a lot longer than 1 thousand years to change as radically as this so-called scientist is suggesting. We have seen radical increases in physical height within the last couple of centuries, but that has been largely laid down to improvements in medicine and nutrition - which doesn;t mean that further improvements will make us 9-ft tall tall and able to live to 500 over time. There are physical limits on human height and weight.

Now, to those who laugh at the idea that there may have been "pre-" historic civilizations that may have surpassed our own, it should be remembered that concrete rots, that buildings are designed for a lifetime of about 60 years, and that roadways are designed to last about 20 years.

In addition, the orthodoxy of human paleontology and anthropology, and orthodox archaeology, adamantly refuses to admit evidence - and hard evidence - that advanced pre-human or prehistoric human civilizations may have existed and flourished until sometime between 22-12 thousand years ago when the last ice age ended.

Mere mention of the possibility within mainstream circles of these sciences results in ridicule and condescension.

But humans as we know them today have been basically the same for - not the 100 thousand years that is commonly believed - but for more than 500 thousand years - and the human species and our ancestors are not 1.5-3 million years old, but far more like 5-10 million years old as scientific evidence continues to push back our anthropological ancestry.

It gives even more credence to ancient cycles such as those of the Egyptian Abyddos Kings which chronicle something on the order of 40 thousand years of Egyptian civilization and the tales from the Indian cycles.

Posted by: FOTSGreg   2006-10-19 18:47  

#27  Mark Z, Wells did mention Guardians. The had their visiting card there for those that were willing to learn. They, though, elected an off hands approach, indirect and somewhat darwinian in philosophy.

Well, we already have three species today. The other two are moonbats and muzzies, precursors of Eloi and Morlocks.
Posted by: zazz   2006-10-19 18:00  

#26  golf season

When is this golf season?
Posted by: Shipman   2006-10-19 16:55  

#25  Don't laugh: got a golfin' buddy with a rather keen interest in "archery". He's got 4 sons (God bless the Catholics) aged 4-12. Guy lives on 5 acres in SW Ohio.

Unbeknownst to their mother, his son's are being taught (directly & indirectly) "survival skills", not the least of which will be proficiency with the bow & arrow. My friend claims the war AFTER next will be fought with bow & arrow (a good supposition), so he wants his son's and grandchildren to be prepared. Despite that his golf hcp is 16 on a good day, he is a wise man. Certainly more astute with bow & arrow then with a 5 iron.

I find this comforting insofar as the Eloi (liberal humams) in due course will have need for a bulwark against the Morlock (muzzies). Even HG Wells neglected and failed to invision (or mention) a third race: Those who will be known as the Guardians, keepers of the flame of Western Civ, protectors of the weak and infirm (the Eloi), mortal enemy to the Morlock.

In many respects Wells WAS very much ahead of his time.

Late in the past golf season we boys were sitting in the bar when our waitress came to the table. Suffice it to say she was blessed with round hip and ample bosom. Someone at the table asked if she was married and she said, "No, but I'm engaged." (No one could tell, the rock on her finger was small) My response to her was "After you are married, please bred as often as possible".

I was later chided by my friends at the table for being so uncuth, but I made no apology (though I left a good tip). Only one person at the table understood where I was coming from: Yes, the good Catholic with the 5 acres in SW Ohio with the bow and arrow. The rest have their heads buried in the sand. We need to remind our young that by breding (when age appropriate and marital status appropriate) they show faith in their civilization (including their mom and dad) and that this is a good and healthy development.

(you know...I really should not sip cognac at this time of the day...I tend to become verbose and, therefor, ask for your indulgence)

Posted by: Mark Z   2006-10-19 16:43  

#24  Hot is hot regardless of wealth and Hotties throughout the world don't hang with the poor folk they come to Hollywood.

You mean the easy, breezy (the air enters one earhole and gets out by another) types. I see hotties all around me, and they don't seem to show any intention to leave for Hollyweird. In all walks of jobs and circumstances, here in the middle of a flyover country.
Posted by: zazz   2006-10-19 16:28  

#23  If there's a major cataclysm, the most adaptable will survive. That usually includes people who have had to work - and work hard - for a living. Too many "sophisticates" are like hothouse plants - once exposed to the vagarities of nature, they succumb.

Right on the mark, OP.
Posted by: zazz   2006-10-19 16:23  

#22  Grunter, you did not need any sarcasm tags, it was palpable. I, of course, replied in kind. (There was no fossilized dinosaur or a cat in the same condition, with a flea collar, found in Montana).

However, the part about edumacation, that, I insist, is veritable.
Posted by: zazz   2006-10-19 16:22  

#21  There is absolutely no direct link between IQ and social standing. Ben Franklin was born to a very poor family. Any family can produce either a genius or an idiot. While some IQ is hereditary, there's so many contributing factors that nothing can be taken for granted. This is all a bunch of mumbo-jumbo, and about worthless.

If there's a major cataclysm, the most adaptable will survive. That usually includes people who have had to work - and work hard - for a living. Too many "sophisticates" are like hothouse plants - once exposed to the vagarities of nature, they succumb.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2006-10-19 16:03  

#20  Perhaps this applies to parts of Europe but not to the US. Hot is hot regardless of wealth and Hotties throughout the world don't hang with the poor folk they come to Hollywood. And in the US wealth is a bit fluid where new millionaires vastly outnumber old money so an entrenched division just couldn't happen.
Posted by: rjschwarz   2006-10-19 15:59  

#19  When will I ever learn about sarcasm tags?
Posted by: Grunter   2006-10-19 15:56  

#18  I believe that the rich, highly educated and well-nourished have not been interbreeding with less fortunate human beings for some time now.
Posted by: kelly   2006-10-19 15:45  

#17  Grunter, you see, these kids nowadays, instead of learning proper paleolontology, are fed mumbo-jumbo (and very likely namby-pamby) by the edumacational system, and then they mistake a skeleton of a cat, bleached and fossilized because the creek nearby has a high content of salts and floods the area on a regular basis, for a dinosaur!
Posted by: zazz   2006-10-19 14:56  

#16  Yep and don't forget Alley Op and iPod. No one wants to talk about that one.
Posted by: Shipman   2006-10-19 14:45  

#15  Yeah Zazz... don't forget the fossil of a small Dinosaur found in Montana that was wearing a flea collar. Very tantalising.
Posted by: Grunter   2006-10-19 13:17  

#14  I for one welcome our new genetic overlords!
Posted by: DarthVader   2006-10-19 13:10  

#13  I like anomalous archeology and History, lotsa interesting stuff in those, but my simple knowledge of mainstream History has degraded so **much** since I dropped out of school that I prefer to keep them as vague hobbies just to remain functional.
Posted by: anonymous5089   2006-10-19 12:18  

#12  Civilisation: 10,000 years old

Sort of. Jericho's oldest layer seems to be 9,000 years old.

Recorded history: about 7,000 years old (a bit hazy on that but I think 4000BC was ancient mesopotamia)

Not much preserved >1,500 BCE. Ups and downs. Lot of stuff lost, and what remained, burned by accident or ill will at later times.
Mesopotamia (Shumer) ~ 3,800, with Ur established about 3,700 BCE and first major civil engineering structures built ~3,600BCE.

Possibly there were great technological human civilisations before 10,000 years ago but perhaps none of the evidence survived and we just don't know about them.

Fragments remain. But due to the theoretical considerations of prevailing dogma, the evidence is dismissed out of hand.
The remnants of people of the pre-10KBCE civ. likely left the earth. At some point, we'll meet again, in a direct fashion. Possible contacts during the whole period till recent times, but if that's the case, they did not go well. The cultural and intellectual disparity likely led to unacceptable patterns of "dialogue".

Ancient Egyptians invented batteries, they just didn't use them too much and subsequently people forgot.<.i>

Electricity was used mainly in temple's environment, or in large structural ingeneering (illumination and primitive electric motors). Also, ultra-sonic devices (mainly as lathe for stone works) are suspected. At ~ 1,500BCE, part of the technology was lost, and it did not survive after ~700BCE.

The romans had plumbing and aqueducts... the people forgot and became technologically dumb in the dark ages.

Harrappa and Mohenjo Daro--canalization, plumbing and toilets. All went to toilet for some reason between ~ 1,500BCE & ~1,200BCE, depending what chronology is used. Some mishap(s) burned the cities down, with a considerable temperature gradient that melted bricks into lumps. The same fate befell Khatushash, the capital of Hittites at about the same time, although the city civil engineering was not as developed as with its proto-Indian counterparts. But the large libraries located in all these places went in smoke as well.

There is a lot more, but I am a bit off topic, just responding to your points.

The fact is that our present reconstruction of history is mostly a farce. The numerous dark ages in the last 12Ky instituted states of amnesia and reflected in general madness that was reflected in prevalent religious systems. Islam is one of these. Its roots are in the same set of circumstances that endowed Mid Eastern Baal cults or Central American cults that indulged in human sacrifice. Islam is more modern, thus that aspect is transformed to somewhad obscured form.

Paradoxically, the origins of judeo-christian belief system originate from the same period, but all I can say is that Moses was one smart dude to transform the same set of circumstances in an entirely different philosophy, that was positive, than was usual for most of other peoples. Some luck involved, but still...
Posted by: zazz   2006-10-19 12:11  

#11  Arabs are already beginning to look more like camels.
Posted by: wxjames   2006-10-19 11:26  

#10  This species already exists here in Tennessee. They also have a genetic attraction the color orange.

LMAO! GO Orange
Posted by: RD   2006-10-19 10:52  

#9  
Not unless they outlaw alcohol and birth control.
Posted by: Master of Obvious   2006-10-19 10:50  

#8  the split started the very moment people decided mohammed was a prophet ..

the sub species reads the koran
Posted by: Chilet Crealet6299   2006-10-19 10:49  

#7  lol, Brer! And, here I thought they only existed in Alabama and have a genetic disposition toward Crimson & white and worship some "Bear."
Posted by: BA   2006-10-19 10:37  

#6  "less developed jaws and shorter chins."

This species already exists here in Tennessee. They also have a genetic attraction the color orange.
Posted by: BrerRabbit   2006-10-19 10:09  

#5  This makes a fatal assumption of ignoring natural selection. That is, that when two groups of similar creatures compete for the same space, the superior group will win out. However, it is up to the competition to determine what "superior" means. What this means for humanity is a bit more complex than the obvious.

First of all, several rules apply. Quality (in offspring) will generally win over quantity. Modernity (and adaptation) will generally win over primitivism. Stronger immune systems will generally (but not always) provide better protection than weaker ones.

At times, the advantage swings between adaptive generalism and specialization. Ironically, while mutation is generally not successful, a group with more genetic diversity including mutation is far more durable. Groups with parasites generally evolve faster than those without.

Lastly, we are learning to twist the rules with genetic manipulation. If this is used to increase our genetic diversity, even to the point of making humanity into several different species, then it will lead to success. If it is used to create homogeneity, it could lead to disaster.

However, several different human species will in itself create a competition, in which the entire Earth may not be enough space for the two species to coexist.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2006-10-19 10:02  

#4  Civilisation: 10,000 years old.

Recorded history: about 7,000 years old (a bit hazy on that but I think 4000BC was ancient mesopotamia)

Possibly there were great technological human civilisations before 10,000 years ago but perhaps none of the evidence survived and we just don't know about them.

Ancient Egyptians invented batteries, they just didn't use them too much and subsequently people forgot.

The romans had plumbing and aqueducts... the people forgot and became technologically dumb in the dark ages.

It's more than likely our civilisation will devolve at some point, possibly 1000 years from now... who knows? We will forget medicine and forget how to make plastic or how to make planes and guns.

We will go back to hitting each other with rocks and living in caves.

then someone will invent the wheel and away we go again.

Hopefully in the year 50,000AD some future archaeologist may find a time capsule someone might have made from really thick, tough plastic (something that won't biodegrade)and hopefully they will have had the forethought to put in a kind of modern-day rosetta stone with comics and pictograms to explain modern life.

And yes, horrible thought though it is, it's quite possible that in the year 2500AD the US, UK and Australia could be part of the global caliphate all worshipping Allan

The good news is, like all religions it can only last a few thousand years, 3 or 4 at the most before it devolves and dies.

Who knows in the year 10,000 we may worship dolphins! I love future prognosticating.
Posted by: anon1   2006-10-19 09:52  

#3  So, does this mean we'll ALL live in "Chocolate City" soon? Jeebus, I hope Mayor Nagin's descendants still aren't in charge. And, imagine the size of hurricanes in another 1,000 years, with all the global warming climate change hooey going on!
Posted by: BA   2006-10-19 09:49  

#2  a "coffee colour" across all populations.

Mocha Chocolata ya-ya!
Posted by: eLarson   2006-10-19 09:25  

#1  hilarious in line anonymous5089!
Posted by: jumping jehosaphat   2006-10-19 06:36  

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