George Orwell's Prelude on Politics Is The Mind Killer

I have found this most wonderful (if fairly lengthy) article, and thought you would enjoy having it brought to your attention.

It is so good, I think we should include it among the references in the "Politics is the Mind Killer" wiki page. But, before that, I submit it to you, and ask you: is there anything in this article that would warrant its exclusion from this site? I mean, besides the fact that it is about politics, and written by a notorious Social-democrat (And is that in itself grounds for exclusion?).

I have found this most wonderful (if fairly lengthy) article, and thought you would enjoy having it brought to your attention.

The input of evolution changed dramatically about when humans invented agriculture. The increase in quantity and reliability of food supply mean that biological selection pressures became much, much less powerful.

For a more recent example, consider the hemophiliac monarchs of the early 1900s. Hemophilia is genetic and does not enhance reproductive fitness. But the shear wealth of the monarchs (compared to nomadic pre-agriculture humans), meant that there wasn't a limit on the ability of those monarchs to reproduce. Hence, no selection pressure.

I'm saying that most of the relevant wealth increase that removed biological selection pressure (on morally relevant traits) was the agricultural revolution (~8000 B.C.E.)

Hence, no selection pressure.

Tell that to Charles II of Spain, there was still the pressure of not being infertile. Also the spread of hempohilia was a rapid change caused by a change in selection pressures on several families. Isn't this basically the same kind of change we see with vestigial organs? If for some reason flight wasn't as useful fitness wise for a type of bird living on an island and its wings started to deteriorate to the point of being useless, wouldn't we say flightless birds evolved on that island. Or say people on an island lost the ... (read more)

8[anonymous]14y

Why would you think that? If anything this should make evolution more powerful in shaping us. Humans are not just a species or a family of them, they where also an ecological neiche. A type of animal is stable or slowly changing in its form over millions or tens of millions of years (like say the crocodile), not because evolution can't cook up massive changes in a much shorter time span but because over those eons the sweet spot of the various trade offs for the animal living in that part of the ecosystem don't much change. Let us in this light review Fischer's fundamental theorem of natural selection: [...] In other words crocodiles also didn't have much variance after being pushed for so long towards that sweet spot. The advent of both agriculture and modern medicine have massively changed the evolutionary trade offs. In other words it has moved the sweet spot from under our feet or at least moved it from where we used to be moving towards to a completely different place in the fitness landscape. Thus theoretically one should see massive differentials between the fitness of various populations of humans and between individuals in those populations. And this precisely what we observe.

0[anonymous]14y

Yes, so the pressure of biological evolution isn't shaping our morality genetically, but the adaptations that our brain wants to execute are its direct and inescapable heritage. I fear we may have been talking past another for the last few posts, haven't we Tim?

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George Orwell's Prelude on Politics Is The Mind Killer

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George Orwell's Prelude on Politics Is The Mind Killer

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