It just occurred to me that uhhh a lot of people have a really common and fundamental misconception about evolution.
You know the whole ‘survival of the fittest’ bit that always gets interpreted to mean ‘the strongest/bravest/smartest’
You see
that’s the wrong ‘fit’
The ‘fittest’ from the evolution PoV doesn’t mean ‘fit’ as in ‘good physical shape’. It’s fit as in ‘to fit’. Survival of the fittest doesn’t mean the strongest gets the crown, survival of the fittest means that the one who best fits the environment they’re in gets to survive. They’re ‘the most fitting’ aka fittest.
And I feel like if could maybe publicize this a little wider we could avoid so much bullshit from so many people including 99% of social darwinists (which btw, fuck social darwinists).
But being stronger and smarter increases one’s chances of survival in multiple environments across the board. Like a multitool for survival.
Natural selection can’t work as it was intended in the modern world though, because the environment is so completely artificial.
Congrats you’re exactly the kind of person this post was written for.
No being stronger and smarter does not automatically increase your chances for anything.
Case in point: tunicates. They start their life looking a whole lot like oceanic tadpoles and actually have a cerebral ganglion, meaning a proto-brain.
When as the larva matures it settles down, attaches to the ocean ground and *gets rid of its protobrain* and instead grows a proper digestive system. It literally does away with its brain in favour of eating. Because brains is expensive organs to keep and hey if you can make do without, why go through the effort?
And how long have tunicates been around? 500 million fucking years, at least that’s about the age of the oldest undisputed fossil, from the Maothianshan Shales in China. That’s pretty fucking successful for evolution.
Same for strength. That’s why you don’t see every predator out there being ripped af. or ever prey animal. Because strength is fucking expensive to have. All those muscles require upkeep. That requires energy. Energy you gotta take from somewhere. It might be much ‘cheaper’ to be well camouflaged, or poisonous, or pretend to be poisonous, or be speedy, or have keen senses that allow you to stop danger long before it gets to you.
There are so many evolutionary options that are not ‘muscles or brain’
And that’s just talking about the effects predation might have on a species. Because honestly? Environment is a factor. You can be a muscle loaded hulk, if you’re not insulated properly you’re going to freeze to death in the arctic cycle. You can be smart as fuck and dehydrate like a fish in the desert if you’re not build for it. There is no ‘universal’ adaption that works always, or even in most cases.
Or what about sexual selection? Look at male peacocks. Those huge, impressive tails are *awful* from a point of view of ‘does this make survival harder’ because yeah it fucking does, they’re showy and a drag. But the hens select for big showy tails because if a peacock actually lives to reproductive age despite the giant neon signs dragging after him? Then he probably makes babies with good survival chances.
And that’s just going after one specific influence each. The interplay is even more complex and there’s no reason why ‘strong’ or ‘smart’ would be the way to go. It’s not a multitool.
Or maybe it is because it makes it easy to pick out the tools among the humans who actually believe it though admittedly i am unsurprised that a school shooter rp blog would have opinions that stupid.
And while we’re on it… ‘modern world is too artificial’ have you fucking been outside in all your life? Or turned on the TV for a nature documentary? or looked out the goddamn window? There’s plenty of nature out there and evolution applies to it all the same it has since the inception of life. It still applies to humans (why hello there antibiotic resistance didn’t see you there) and don’t you fucking dare go the ‘but eugenics’ route. Don’t you fucking dare even think of going there because you will not enjoy my reply.
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