What demands brought about human intelligence? (dinosaur, Kingdom, evolution, anthropology)

[Sola'lor]

Originally Posted by methylatedghosts

Two things:

Who says we're going? We're probably just going to evolve further and branch off due to pressures like overpopulation and global climate changes.

secondly, I don't think evolution is purposless.

I think the way things are going we will become an increasingly weak species. I don't mean to sound heartless but, all our modern medicine allows those with weaker genetics to survive and reproduce. Thus as future generations come along we will grow less genetically healthy.

I can only imagine where this will take us as a species.

[methylatedghosts]

Oh, sure, but sooner or later the direction we're going right now will mean that global climate changes and the way we live will mean we will evolve further. But I don't think we'll get weaker and weaker. I understand what you mean, but I think that instead we'd be leveling off. On a plateau so to speak.

[Francine]

Originally Posted by methylatedghosts

Oh, sure, but sooner or later the direction we're going right now will mean that global climate changes and the way we live will mean we will evolve further. But I don't think we'll get weaker and weaker. I understand what you mean, but I think that instead we'd be leveling off. On a plateau so to speak.

Long ago man stopped being at the mercy of his environment like other animals, and put the environment at the mercy of him. Since we can live in Antarctica or the Moon, we will even create technological solutions to adapt to the same climate change we are creating. Human evolution has stopped, for all practical purposes.

[Seyorni]

Since genetically linked problem like nearsightednes, asthma, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, &c. no longer confer a reproductive disadvantage, they are no longer being weeded out of our gene pool and can be expected to become more common.

[Seyorni]

Originally Posted by rojse

Yes it does. In the tropics, there are many dangers from predators, too. Those that were more intelligent would be able to come up with new ways to defeat these dangers, as well as hunting meat and so forth.

Yet until hominids migrated out of Africa they were little more than another ape. The chimps, baboons &c that stayed are essentially the same animals they were tow or three million years ago.

[credance]

We always hear that man evolved from apes. Is that because some of us look so much like one? Some cultures teach that there are those among us that descended from apes, donkeys, and cockroaches.

[Seyorni]

We hear that man evolved from apes because this image was used in early Christian anti-Darwinism propaganda programs, and it stuck. It never was part of Darwinism.
Darwinism and Neodarwinism held that there were three separate taxa of large primates: Hominids/humans, Pongids/apes and Simians/monkeys, each evolving separately. Hominids were no more pongids than felines were canines, despite an outward resemblance.
Anti-evolutionists successfully quashed this fact for a century.

Recent genetic advances, however, have established that hominids are, in fact, pongids, so taxonomists now consider humans just another family of great-apes. Not evolved from, but de facto.

[Sunstone]

I figure we owe our intelligence to several factors, rather than to any one factor. Intelligence gave us several reproductive advantages.

[stephenw]

Originally Posted by Sunstone

I figure we owe our intelligence to several factors, rather than to any one factor. Intelligence gave us several reproductive advantages.

Especially the ability to lie.