7 ms·

Are you saying evolution prefers a social caste system? And that our destiny is to become more stratified?

by bigallen 3y ago

colonelpopcorn 3y ago
Sexual selection certainly does. Eggs being expensive and sperm being cheap kind of make winners necessary.
- Thorrez 3y ago
  The vast majority of people aren't buying or selling eggs and sperm. So I doubt the price of eggs and sperm are creating an economic divide.
  - tenebrisalietum 3y ago
    It is possible for the words "Expensive" and "cheap" to mean or refer to actions other than buying or selling.
    - Thorrez 3y ago
      Then what are we talking about? I'm confused. Are we talking about the physical cost to produce eggs and sperm? I don't think that's that high. Also, a woman already has all her eggs at the time she's born. Are we talking about the physical cost to maintain eggs and sperm? I don't think that's that high. Are we talking bout the physical cost of pregnancy? If so, it doesn't make sense to say eggs and sperm. colonelpopcorn should have said pregnancy.
    - konschubert 3y ago
      It’s still bullshit. Yes, it takes 9 months to grow a baby and it’s a health toll and a health risk. Fair. But unless you’re planning to abandon your kids, most of the investment comes in the years after and this responsibility is equally on both father and mother.
      - jimbob45 3y ago
        But unless you’re planning to abandon your kids, most of the investment comes in the years after and this responsibility is equally on both father and mother. One of the players in this game can freely walk away with no negative consequences. The other player is biologically attuned to lose their mind until they reunite with their child. Also, one player can have children up until 30-50, depending on how well they roll. The other player can have children until the moment they die. One player will have 3-5 years of extremely negative health effects starting with conception. The other player can fulfill their obligation in their sleep and never think about it again.
        konschubert 3y ago
        Most fathers stay with their kids. Something about your tone weirds me out, sorry. EDIT: I think part of of it is: You seem to suggest that a father’s love and responsibility for their child is just an unnatural delusion. Even that it’s a bad thing somehow. My narrow response to that is what I hinted at above: Fathers love their children no less than mothers love their children. My broader response is: Trying to be moral, and sometimes failing at it, is better than never trying and thus always failing. Some people decided that they will just always do what’s best for themselves. Such people like to claim that anyone who tries to be moral is always a lying hypocrite and thus worse than the absolute asshole. Because there is one sin that the absolute asshole can never be accused of: hypocrisy. These people are hard to counter, because anything that is said will be labelled as hypocrisy. The truth is that many, many people in this world sometimes do things because they are right, not because they benefit themselves.
giantg2 3y ago
From an economics and intelligence standpoint it's basically inevitable due to globalization and automation. The US has shifted to high skill tertiary economy. This leaves less opportunities for lower skilled individuals. These lower skilled individuals don't have nearly the same earning power and thus have fewer choices (location, housing, schools, etc) and will naturally end up as a higher percentage in the lower cost choices. In some ways it's also how the work has moved vs the people. Entire regions like Appalachia have seen industries die and have left almost nothing to properly replace them.
- riskable 3y ago
  > The US has shifted to high skill tertiary economy. I don't think this has anything to do with it. The physical class divides have been around since the beginning of the United States. If anything, it's a symptom of capitalism where those with greater wealth use it to segregate themselves from poorer folks. In effect, capitalism takes advantage of human nature and as a side effect that same human nature self-segregates based on how "nice" any given area is. You want rich folks to mingle with middle class folks? Make the middle class area the nicest place and don't let the rich completely "take it over" (aka gentrification). The way the modern world is becoming though we're self-segregating more and more though so I don't think it's realistic to expect any sort of top-down planning or policies to force mingling. Upper middle class people don't even go to the grocery store anymore and thus, don't end up mingling with lower middle class people. Maybe we should promote more "mixing hobbies" where people physically need to show up and interact with each other? Subsidize board game shops, paintball, indoor rock climbing, and similar? Might help humanity a little bit.
  - yesbut77 3y ago
    Yes, but consider that people of higher SES do not want to mix with people of middle and low SES. And part of that is because they are not fun to be around! People of low SES tend to be meaner, more anti-social in their behaviors like littering, not maintaining their environment, more likely to commit crime, less family formation, etc. Access to well behaved people is not a human right.
asow92 3y ago
> Are you saying evolution prefers a social caste system? Probably, otherwise the natural occurrence of social castes wouldn't require intervention policies. > And that our destiny is to become more stratified? Not necessarily, although consider the possibility that integration may be artificially enforced and unstable without constant intervention.
- shadowgovt 3y ago
  It's a little irrelevant what evolution "prefers." We have multiple examples of what has been called "dangerous evolutionary baggage": behaviors that were sensible in the past but in the present, rapidly-changing world actually hinder optimal outcomes for people. Two examples are ingroup-outgroup bias in a densely-connected world where the decisions of someone halfway around the planet can impact your day and scarcity / hoarding behaviors in a world with more than enough stuff in several categories to satisfy every human being more than they could possibly ever consume.
  - asow92 3y ago
    So you agree with the resolution that evolution prefers a social caste system then?
    - shadowgovt 3y ago
      I have no idea. My point is it's irrelevant for modern humans. As a social construct: caste could be useful for specialization. But I sort of fail to see the point of making the specialization birth-based (observation seems to indicate that people's interests and skills, particularly in technology spaces which dominate the human condition now, are randomized / environment based more than bred. Give me an interested kid who wants to be a programmer, and I can teach them how to program regardless of who their parents were). Whether there's some natural selective pressure to encourage caste is irrelevant in the modern human condition. Probably better to optimize for letting people have experiences and finding what fits them best under the theory that people do the best work / live the best lives if they're doing what they're into.

Are you saying evolution prefers a social caste system? And that our destiny is to become more stratified?

colonelpopcorn 3y ago

Sexual selection certainly does. Eggs being expensive and sperm being cheap kind of make winners necessary.

Thorrez 3y ago
The vast majority of people aren't buying or selling eggs and sperm. So I doubt the price of eggs and sperm are creating an economic divide.
- tenebrisalietum 3y ago
  It is possible for the words "Expensive" and "cheap" to mean or refer to actions other than buying or selling.
  - Thorrez 3y ago
    Then what are we talking about? I'm confused. Are we talking about the physical cost to produce eggs and sperm? I don't think that's that high. Also, a woman already has all her eggs at the time she's born. Are we talking about the physical cost to maintain eggs and sperm? I don't think that's that high. Are we talking bout the physical cost of pregnancy? If so, it doesn't make sense to say eggs and sperm. colonelpopcorn should have said pregnancy.
  - konschubert 3y ago
    It’s still bullshit. Yes, it takes 9 months to grow a baby and it’s a health toll and a health risk. Fair. But unless you’re planning to abandon your kids, most of the investment comes in the years after and this responsibility is equally on both father and mother.
    - jimbob45 3y ago
      But unless you’re planning to abandon your kids, most of the investment comes in the years after and this responsibility is equally on both father and mother. One of the players in this game can freely walk away with no negative consequences. The other player is biologically attuned to lose their mind until they reunite with their child. Also, one player can have children up until 30-50, depending on how well they roll. The other player can have children until the moment they die. One player will have 3-5 years of extremely negative health effects starting with conception. The other player can fulfill their obligation in their sleep and never think about it again.
      - konschubert 3y ago
        Most fathers stay with their kids. Something about your tone weirds me out, sorry. EDIT: I think part of of it is: You seem to suggest that a father’s love and responsibility for their child is just an unnatural delusion. Even that it’s a bad thing somehow. My narrow response to that is what I hinted at above: Fathers love their children no less than mothers love their children. My broader response is: Trying to be moral, and sometimes failing at it, is better than never trying and thus always failing. Some people decided that they will just always do what’s best for themselves. Such people like to claim that anyone who tries to be moral is always a lying hypocrite and thus worse than the absolute asshole. Because there is one sin that the absolute asshole can never be accused of: hypocrisy. These people are hard to counter, because anything that is said will be labelled as hypocrisy. The truth is that many, many people in this world sometimes do things because they are right, not because they benefit themselves.

giantg2 3y ago

From an economics and intelligence standpoint it's basically inevitable due to globalization and automation. The US has shifted to high skill tertiary economy. This leaves less opportunities for lower skilled individuals. These lower skilled individuals don't have nearly the same earning power and thus have fewer choices (location, housing, schools, etc) and will naturally end up as a higher percentage in the lower cost choices. In some ways it's also how the work has moved vs the people. Entire regions like Appalachia have seen industries die and have left almost nothing to properly replace them.

riskable 3y ago
> The US has shifted to high skill tertiary economy. I don't think this has anything to do with it. The physical class divides have been around since the beginning of the United States. If anything, it's a symptom of capitalism where those with greater wealth use it to segregate themselves from poorer folks. In effect, capitalism takes advantage of human nature and as a side effect that same human nature self-segregates based on how "nice" any given area is. You want rich folks to mingle with middle class folks? Make the middle class area the nicest place and don't let the rich completely "take it over" (aka gentrification). The way the modern world is becoming though we're self-segregating more and more though so I don't think it's realistic to expect any sort of top-down planning or policies to force mingling. Upper middle class people don't even go to the grocery store anymore and thus, don't end up mingling with lower middle class people. Maybe we should promote more "mixing hobbies" where people physically need to show up and interact with each other? Subsidize board game shops, paintball, indoor rock climbing, and similar? Might help humanity a little bit.
- yesbut77 3y ago
  Yes, but consider that people of higher SES do not want to mix with people of middle and low SES. And part of that is because they are not fun to be around! People of low SES tend to be meaner, more anti-social in their behaviors like littering, not maintaining their environment, more likely to commit crime, less family formation, etc. Access to well behaved people is not a human right.

asow92 3y ago

> Are you saying evolution prefers a social caste system? Probably, otherwise the natural occurrence of social castes wouldn't require intervention policies. > And that our destiny is to become more stratified? Not necessarily, although consider the possibility that integration may be artificially enforced and unstable without constant intervention.

shadowgovt 3y ago
It's a little irrelevant what evolution "prefers." We have multiple examples of what has been called "dangerous evolutionary baggage": behaviors that were sensible in the past but in the present, rapidly-changing world actually hinder optimal outcomes for people. Two examples are ingroup-outgroup bias in a densely-connected world where the decisions of someone halfway around the planet can impact your day and scarcity / hoarding behaviors in a world with more than enough stuff in several categories to satisfy every human being more than they could possibly ever consume.
- asow92 3y ago
  So you agree with the resolution that evolution prefers a social caste system then?
  - shadowgovt 3y ago
    I have no idea. My point is it's irrelevant for modern humans. As a social construct: caste could be useful for specialization. But I sort of fail to see the point of making the specialization birth-based (observation seems to indicate that people's interests and skills, particularly in technology spaces which dominate the human condition now, are randomized / environment based more than bred. Give me an interested kid who wants to be a programmer, and I can teach them how to program regardless of who their parents were). Whether there's some natural selective pressure to encourage caste is irrelevant in the modern human condition. Probably better to optimize for letting people have experiences and finding what fits them best under the theory that people do the best work / live the best lives if they're doing what they're into.