life and death--for the atheist ( Archived) (295)

bodleing: Maybe you need to read up a bit Max, the answers to your questions are readily available.

Why did man develop the large brain? Why did the other primates not do so? The answer, of course is in his particular environment, how well he matched it, and what the evolutionary alternatives were. His upright posture was both a blessing and a curse. He found himself standing upright on the ground. He could not outrun or out-fight his predators. It would take massive changes in his physical structure to improve the situation. Evolution usually works in an incremental fashion. Mutations occurred to his entire body and brain. Small changes to his body did bring about some physical changes. He developed stronger and better shaped eating tools. Still, his biggest problem was the predators, big fast cats and the men in the next tribe. Incremental physical changes did not help that problem one whit. Yet every time the brain grew incrementally (mutations that affected brain size), good things happened. He not only was able to handle his predator problem better, but his cultural life improved. With the free arms and hands to carry things and to handle weapons, his lot improved with each brain size increase.

Evolution, through the liberal application of death and hardship, had built a strong body and a sound mind by the time of the appearance of Homo sapiens sapiens. Both were designed for entirely different environments than experienced by man today. We live longer today for three reasons. One is our health care and diet. The second is that our bodies were constructed to last thirty years under brutally harsh conditions. Removal of those harsh conditions allows a longer life span. Third is our culture. We cheat evolution of the deaths that it needs to cleanse the gene pool. In the short run we will live longer. Eventually mutations will erase these benefits. Evolution seeks to have us hanging over the edge.

maxmate1:

I have the followin primary questions:

1. Why among all species only us, humans, evolved to this perfection and not other species? If evolution is change over time, given the same earth, why did older species not evolve smarter and better than us?

Who's to say that they are not still evolving? It's not something done within a generation, but over thousands of generations.
Would be rather ignorant to think that every living thing, had finished evolving.

Oh wait...

2. Why the last link of our evolution chain (Primates) stopped evolving and can still be seen where they are. Why only we "Humans" evolved?

See above

3. And for human evolution, why have we stopped evolving for the last 200,000 years, since Homosapiens came into being as per scoientific evidence? if evolution is a continusous cycle.

Same again

Would appreciate your comments.

maxmate1: Hi Bodeling...Thanks for your input. My question was aimed at a preceding secnario. The evolution chain of Humans. Your explanation is about after humans evolved into the biologocal shape (homosapiens) we are in today.

I have the followin primary questions:

1. Why among all species only us, humans, evolved to this perfection and not other species? If evolution is change over time, given the same earth, why did older species not evolve smarter and better than us?

2. Why the last link of our evolution chain (Primates) stopped evolving and can still be seen where they are. Why only we "Humans" evolved?

3. And for human evolution, why have we stopped evolving for the last 200,000 years, since Homosapiens came into being as per scoientific evidence? if evolution is a continusous cycle.

Would appreciate your comments.

EagleWoman: My post was addressed to both you and Pat. It was intended humourous and light hearted.

As I said I´m out of this thread till Mak comes back.

bodleing: There are answers within the link I posted, it's a lot of reading but worth the effort...

"Wise men, psychologists, philosophers and theologians have surmised and conjectured about the human over the centuries, and still do, but the truth about the human may be found only through factual knowledge. That factual knowledge lies in a process called evolution. The human is what evolution made him."

maxmate1: Your so called humor about my ability to anwer questions and the stance you assumed for all CSers is taken as "mocking" when a serious literary debate is going on. You could participate in the debate by all means though! So please stay with the topic.

And for fun, humor, there are many humor threads. Try the lie thread and make as much humor as you like about me, I won't mind at all. Now relax!

Time and place for humor is very important.

cynicalorange: Are you German?

maxmate1: Hi cynicalorange!

Any scientific evidence of human evolution since it evolved from primates to homosapiens? since the last 200,000 years, homosapiens as a species did not evolve in any other bioligical form/change etc, as it did from being primates to being human (the last evolution change known to us)

I asked why?