What happens now that human population has outpaced biological natural
selection? Two leading scientists reveal how we became who we are - and
what we might become.
When you think of evolution, the picture that most likely comes to mind
is a straight-forward progression, the iconic illustration of a primate
morphing into a proud, upright human being. But in reality, random
events have played huge roles in determining the evolutionary histories
of everything from lions to lobsters to humans. However, random genetic
novelties are most likely to become fixed in small populations. It is
mathematically unlikely that this will happen in large ones.
With our enormous, close-packed, and seemingly inexorably expanding
population, humanity has fallen under the influence of the famous (or
infamous) "bell curve." Ian Tattersall and Rob DeSalle's revelatory new
book explores what the future of our species could hold, while
simultaneously revealing what we didn't become - and what we won't
become.
A cognitively unique species, and our actions fall on a bell curve as
well. Individual people may be saintly or evil; generous or grasping;
narrow-minded or visionary. But any attempt to characterize our species
must embrace all of its members and so all of these antitheses. It is
possible not just for the species, but for a single individual to be all
of these things - even in the same day. We all fall somewhere within the
giant hyperspace of the human condition that these curves describe.
The Accidental Homo Sapiens shows listeners that though humanity now
exists on this bell curve, we are far from a stagnant species.
Tattersall and DeSalle reveal how biological evolution in modern humans
has given way to a cultural dynamic that is unlike anything else the
Earth has ever witnessed, and that will keep life interesting - perhaps
sometimes too interesting - for as long as we exist on this planet.
