Do you think humans could survive natural selection if we weren't intelligent?

[Xannari Ferrows]

One could argue we aren't intelligent; Just that we have the capacity.

[Kerbart]

Evolution pushes species to as "as far as they need to go, but not further"

We're not born with the physique of Mr. Universe because the amount of energy required for that would most certainly wipe out the species when food resources are low. More precisely: those genetic branches that did produce overly strong bodies died out when food resources were low.

As a result, Homo Sapiens ended up with a body that was fit for (minimal) survival provided the brains worked. Take the brains out* and it's unlikely the species would survive as there was no need for mother nature to let us survive on expensive muscles and agility alone.

*not literally, you dummy!

[Scotius]

I do not think we would make it, aside from a very small number, mainly because humans in their physical form are not particularly fast or strong compared to other animals. We don't have sharp teeth or razor claws, we have our intelligence, but when you take that away we are all but gone

Actually, not many animals can keep pace with a fit human. Take a marathon for example - name animal species able to run 40 kilometers at a steady pace, and not die of exhaustion before reaching the end. Horses could do it, barely. Camels too. Out of dangerous carnivores, only dogs\wolves have comparable endurance to humans. Some anthropologists even think that early humanoids led scavenger lifes. Identifying probable carrion localisations by observing gathering vultures, then running there, stealing as much meat they could grab and carry away using their dexterous, grabby hands before lions or hyena packs arrived. And if predators did beat them to the prize...well, there always were roots, insects and lizards to keep our ancestors alive until next occasion to grab some meat arrived.

[PB666]

Do you think a lion could survive if it wasn't an apex predator.

Could a whale survive if it could not hold its breath.

Could a bird survive if it could not flap its wings.

Could a fish survive if its fins had the consistency of lead bricks.

Could a microbe survive if it weighed 60 tons.

Could a elephant survive it if weighed an once.

Could a snake survive if it could only eat microbiotes.

Could a chameleon survive if looked like a biohazard sticker.

Is any ape relatively unintelligent?

[Darnok]

Do not underestimate humans. They are very resilient when pushed, if only just for the fact that they are too stubborn to realize the odds are stacked against them. I would argue that the latter is our greatest trait. We, as a species, simply refuse to understand some things should not or cannot be done, and therefore we do the impossible. Homo sapiens, homo impossibile.

Too many movies from Hollywood

Look at worlds economy, every democratic country has debt, poor people accepted their "fate", rich doesn't care about future of the world, people allow to rule and create law to incompetent "liders"... and now out of nowhere they would learn how to create society that would survive hunger, lack of resources and hard labor?

If now our intelligence is failing right now... because we can't create society model that would work on our current civilization level... then maybe we are "made" for labor work only or we developed our society standards in wrong way.

[PB666]

Evolution pushes species to as "as far as they need to go, but not further"

Evolution can not (or very rarely and under limited circumstances) anticipate itself, the change is fed into the system via a process of uncorrected errors which can be modified by recombination, evolution selects those that are capable to survive and reproduce. It is competition that does the pushing, both inter-specifically and intra-specifically, and social benefits of intelligence and communication have largely revolutionized the game, and we are just better than most species at it.

[sgt_flyer]

Well, one hypothesis of human brain & body evolution is that it 'grew' in order to enhance our hand coordination, for the purpose of precision throwing and clubbing things (so basically, grasp a stone to throw it, grasp a piece of wood to club things with) - alongside bipedal locomotion to free our hands. Soo, for sure, without these basic things, we would be screwed with those things, we should still be able to live another day (and afterwards, those with the 'best' mutations for survival of the current conditions tend to live longer, and have more chances to transmit those traits to their progeny. So we would end up with bodies that will be more and more adapted.

Here's an article on the hypothesis of how the hand evolution shaped the rest of our bodies http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1571064/pdf/joa0202-0165.pdf

[Darnok]

Do you think a lion could survive if it wasn't an apex predator.

Could a whale survive if it could not hold its breath.

Could a bird survive if it could not flap its wings.

Could a fish survive if its fins had the consistency of lead bricks.

Could a microbe survive if it weighed 60 tons.

Could a elephant survive it if weighed an once.

Could a snake survive if it could only eat microbiotes.

Could a chameleon survive if looked like a biohazard sticker.

Is any ape relatively unintelligent?

Those are wrong and not fair...

- I think you confused cause and result in here, but yes lions can survive even if bigger and stronger predator take their place

- how deep is plankton?

- there is lots of birds that doesn't fly, so my guess most of birds would survive

...

Could any animal survive on random planet from our solar system? Those examples are like that

[Moon Goddess]

The problem with this question is we wouldn't BE physically human without our intelligence. And vis versa.

Why do we have big heads? to hold big brains, well without the brain we'd have smaller heads, and with smaller heads we'd be able to fit down the birth canal fully formed, able to walk at birth like other animals. If we were born fully formed then we wouldn't need a social structure to take care of babies, if we didn't need the social structure, we wouldn't need ot be intelligent and if we didn't need the social structure we'd not need a month adapted to talking, so we'd have a mouth that could bite and attack.

Our intelligence is the driving reason why we look like, without intelligence we wouldn't have these bodies.

[Mazon Del]

I'm only on page 2 of this thread at the time of posting this, just for references sake.

I would like to point out that human babies generally speaking do not pass any of our tests for self awareness until somewhere around 2 years of age. An example, they do not understand that their reflection is in fact, them.

[Kryten]

The answer to the question in the OP is simply; yes, if given the right environment. Selection pressures are a function of the environment, not an independent thing.

[WinkAllKerb'']

One could argue we aren't intelligent; Just that we have the capacity.

hahahahahaha, in the same spirit:

"thinkin' about intelligence is the best way to realize humanity is the dumbest species overall around the planet" xDr

[Ralathon]

Too many movies from Hollywood

Look at worlds economy, every democratic country has debt, poor people accepted their "fate", rich doesn't care about future of the world, people allow to rule and create law to incompetent "liders"... and now out of nowhere they would learn how to create society that would survive hunger, lack of resources and hard labor?

If now our intelligence is failing right now... because we can't create society model that would work on our current civilization level... then maybe we are "made" for labor work only or we developed our society standards in wrong way.

Erm dude, we are discussing this subject by sending 1's and 0's over an worldwide information network of billions of computers. Each of these computers is trillions of times more advanced than anything designed by any other species in the history of the planet. Our technological networks allow us to live like gods compared to other species.

It is kinda hard to argue that humans are not intelligent. The problems you're summing up are a result of greed, conflicts of interrests, lack of resources and other things that wouldn't change even if we were a thousand times smarter.

[Rakaydos]

Our evolutionary line is specialized in endurance and heat management, with secondary specializations in visual tracking (that is, inteligence), and swimming, (unlike dogs we can swim UNDER water) and a vestigial climbing capability from when we were still in the trees.

In short, we were social pack hunters that literally chased things to death, over savannah, over rivers, and through the trees. We were slenderman, we were the zombie apocalipse. We didnt fight lions, tigrrs or bears, because they would eat us... but we could follow an antelope herd for DAYS until they died of heat exaustion.

[lukethecoder64]

Short answer: No

Long answer: Because I don't believe in natural selection. Why? Show me one fossil (or other valid remnant) that demonstrates natural selection - where an animal is in the process of evolving into another animal and/or developing new systems.

Don't want to derail the thread here. That's just my Two cents.

Luke

[Rakaydos]

Short answer: No

Long answer: Because I don't believe in natural selection. Why? Show me one fossil (or other valid remnant) that demonstrates natural selection - where an animal is in the process of evolving into another animal and/or developing new systems.

Don't want to derail the thread here. That's just my Two cents.

Luke

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transitional_fossil

[Kryten]

Long answer: Because I don't believe in natural selection.

Do you believe in genetic mutations, that can have (even if infrequently) positive effects?

[theend3r]

Short answer: No

Long answer: Because I don't believe in natural selection. Why? Show me one fossil (or other valid remnant) that demonstrates natural selection - where an animal is in the process of evolving into another animal and/or developing new systems.

Don't want to derail the thread here. That's just my Two cents.

Luke

Those two cents are of Zimbabwean Dollar, right? Anyway the answer to your question is: dogs.

Humans are also becoming taller and the structure of our skulls is changing.

[windows_x_seven]

Don't want to derail the thread here.

Guys, let's not derail this, shall we. If he doesn't understand evolution as a fact, respect it. It's his choice.

(Although I don't know why you would answer a question that is based on evolution saying that you think it's not real)

If you want to attempt convincing him, try doing it over PMs.

Let's get back to the original question.

Edited August 22, 2015 by windows_x_seven

[lukethecoder64]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transitional_fossil

All of these fossils are not in the process of changing - all their systems are developed and they could survive just fine.

Do you believe in genetic mutations, that can have (even if infrequently) positive effects?

I believe that genes can mutate and that these mutations can spread throughout the species, but that does not make them a new species, and that they are the same for the most part

the answer to your question is: dogs.

Humans are also becoming taller and the structure of our skulls is changing.

Dogs are diverse (e.g. they can be 10-100lbs), but they are 99.999% the same "under the hood", like humans.

As for the Humans are getting taller claim, could I have the source? Anyway we are still the same species but we are still the same under the hood.

This is my last post about this in this thread. If you want to discuss this further PM me and I will make a new thread.

Luke

[magnemoe]

The question is in effect, "could a tropical monkey thrive at the South Pole?"

It needs to be grossly more specific. How dumb do you have to be to not be able to make any tools since Great Apes make some tools? What survival stories are there of modern humans with bad intellectual deficits surviving on islands, or otherwise in the wild?

Imagine an incredibly unethical experiment: take some people with IQs below... 60? 50? Lower? And drop them in the wilderness, "Naked and Afraid" style. Come back in a few years. Are any alive?

Think the intelligence level here would be same as gorillas and chimpanzees, dumber does not make sense with the body plan

A bit unfair, humans has an small mouth and or bit is not very strong, this is because the brain takes up most of the head leaving lite room for jaw muscles

On the other hand we are way better natural tool users than apes because of our thumbs

[WinkAllKerb'']

I think bacteria (and alike) are dumb and non intelligent because they can't leave without us human .. oh they can ? my bad ...

[Kerbart]

Evolution can not (or very rarely and under limited circumstances) anticipate itself, the change is fed into the system via a process of uncorrected errors which can be modified by recombination, evolution selects those that are capable to survive and reproduce. It is competition that does the pushing, both inter-specifically and intra-specifically, and social benefits of intelligence and communication have largely revolutionized the game, and we are just better than most species at it.

Conveniently leaving out the paragraph that shows exactly that I know what I'm talking about:

More precisely: those genetic branches that did produce overly strong bodies died out when food resources were low.

.

[magnemoe]

You can leave intelligence, just get rid of all our technology and most people would be useless, very angry, very hungry and very useless.

Take away both technology and intelligence and we also die, because our bodies are not prepared for wild live... no medicines, no claws or furs, we would become free food for most of large predators. We wouldn't be able even to eat raw meat, so we would have to be herbivorous and spend most of our day time on gathering and eating, also no hunting means no furs from herbivorous animals, most people would die after first winter.

Technology is the human world. we are more than 10 times the number of people than before industrialization. 1000 times more humans than before farming.

How skilled we are is pretty irrelevant. make everybody expert level 18th century farmers and remove all modern technology, 9/10 would die anyway as its to many people and the cities is to large.

[Lukaszenko]

All of these fossils are not in the process of changing - all their systems are developed and they could survive just fine.

Wait...so, you're asking for a fossil of an animal that cannot survive?

You're not going to find it. I suggest you learn about the theory of evolution (or anything, really) before you try to poke holes in it, otherwise you're going to run into some confused looks.

Anyway, no I don't think humans could survive without intelligence. Pretty much everything about a human is designed so that it can use its intelligence. They're slow, they're inefficient, they're naked, they require a lot of energy, they have weak jaws...everything is made to that we can create and manipulate tools. Without intelligence, we wouldn't be able to cook food and feed ourselves. Maaaaybe a couple lucky humans born in some tropical beach with unlimited fruits and nuts would survive to procreate, but not the many many generations it would require for them to change into something useful.