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2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/sci/ - Science & Math

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2474991 No.2474991 [Reply] [Original]

If "Survival of the Fittest" would have been allowed to take place in human society (let the mentally handicapped people, etc. take care of themselves unaided from the government, and organizations) then the human race would be further advanced, in that we would be looking forward instead of looking back and dragging the weak.
What do you think about this? We'd have more funds, as well as more time for human advancement.
Discuss.

>> No.2475017

I think it's true, but most humans are too moral to think that's a right thing to do.

>> No.2475027
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2475027

>social darwinism

>> No.2475031

Also, how would you feel if you had an imperfection in you and you're sent off to fight on your own.
That seems VERY mean and depressing. We all have someone we know that's not perfect and it'd prob break your heart to have them basically killed.

>> No.2475039

>implying a barely significant percentage of the fertile population exerts an inordinate influence on our species' advancement
>implying money isn't a shared hallucination useful for tricking others into labor
>implying you're superior to a sack of shredded squirrel nuts

>> No.2475040

>then the human race would be further advanced
In what way exactly?

>> No.2475043

humans have been social for so long they can no longer survive long alone.

humans have evolved to need societies.

societies provide for those that cannot care for themselves, which is all humans.

humans vary in their contribution to society, both as individuals and ontogenically.

the worth of a contribution is an arbitrary, subjective judgment based on several often-false value systems.

deeming one human's contribution as worthless denies the value of diversity and pretends to forsee the needs of the future.

because a society cannot know what it will need in future, limiting its resources based on arbitrary and subjective value judgments that may or may not have current merit is about as short-sighted as any other form of nihilism that people as inidividuals are so often fond of.

>> No.2475048

>>2475040
Imagine people didn't smoke.
That's billions of dollars in health care that could be used for other things.

>> No.2475049

at the ver least it would raise the average iq a bit. At the very most it would raise the average iq a bit. Retards are useless and I agree that keeping them alive is just as retarded as they are, but realistically, its the non retarded stupid people that hold back society. Problem is they outnumber smart people significantly

>> No.2475050

Yeah cripples are such a fucking drag and contribute nothing to society because pretty much all labour is still entirely physical just look at useless vegetables like stephen hawking

>> No.2475054

>>2475048

And tons of tax money that Cigarette companies pay.

>> No.2475057

>>2475048
What do you think these second class citizens would do when they don't get health care/help?

>> No.2475060

>>2475049
>IQ = intelligence

>> No.2475063

>>2475048

If your country is anything like Britain, the taxes from cigarette sales more than make up for the cost of treating smoking-related illnesses.

>> No.2475066

>>2475049
doesn't matter where the median falls, the top 1% will always be outnumbered by the lower 99.

>> No.2475069

EUGENICS FTW
Fuck the weak, fuck the poor, fuck the stupid, if they cannot survive on an island for a week, they don't deserve to live.

>> No.2475071

>>2475069
>implying you could survive on an island for a week
>implying this has anything to do with contribution to science or other important human endeavors.

>> No.2475072

No doubt it does make sense to eliminate genetic weakness/disadvantage, however the problem is defining what is weak/wrong and what isn't.

This is extremely tricky because there is actually quite a fine line between genius and mentally retarded. A few of this will snare at that statement, but it's true, look at savants.

If we decide what is right/wrong without actually knowing we may not advance at all.

You may see the disadvantaged as mentally inferior, but that's a narrow view on intelligence. To claim superiority is extremely ignorant, they may not be up to our standards of thought in some areas, but that by no means makes them any worse universally.

>> No.2475074

>>2475050
You make a point. Stephen Hawking is very intelligent, and without the help of others he would be unable to sustain life.
But, riddle me this. What contributions has Stephen Hawking made on your day-to-day life? None. He has many logical, and plausable theories, but they don't actually contribute anything to society because they are just that, theories. He hasn't come up with a cure for cancer, or a method of solving world hunger, or anything else that is actually useful in modern society, other than reading material.

>> No.2475080

>>2475072

The better way is letting the environment do the job for us:
>Smokers
>People who drive recklessly
>People with poor diets

Etc
This way the dumb will die off

>> No.2475082

>>2475069
most highly intelligent people couldn't survive a week alone anymore either.

we simply don't learn those skills, unless our intelligence places us near the bottom of society, where we'll have to fend for ourselves sometimes. Redneck deer-hunters are pretty good at surviving, but make lousy doctors and inventors.

>> No.2475083

>>2475074
What have you contributed to society that isn't a post on the interbutts?

>> No.2475084

>then the human race would be further advanced
In an artificial direction which could spell doom and stagnation for the species. Variation is good.

Autists, paraplegics, savants, gays and other retards/deviants have saved our asses multiple times.

>> No.2475086

>>2475072
Not neccessarily, but if they can't support themselves, then what can they contribute to society?

>> No.2475093

>>2475086

It all depends on what one thinks is important.
One may think survival is the most important issue others will say it's happiness.

We cannot judge whether they are useful or not unless we agree on basic ethical grounds.

>> No.2475094

Social darwinism is just a misconception of natural selection. I think its main point is to imitate what is "natural" and that is the problem. See, everything people do is natural because it happens through the laws of nature and you can't in any way be "less natural" or "more natural".

>> No.2475099

>>2475086
No one can support himself alone. Hunter-gatherers who learn much about what they can eat, how to make tools, and other survival skills still must live in communities to survive.

>> No.2475100

OP, we've tried this before.

the result is that you and I both wouldn't be alive. 28 would be the average life-expectancy, and if some infection didn't kill you, I would.

>> No.2475102

>remove all paraplegics from society
>we don't get Stephen Hawking

Yeah, no.

>> No.2475107

Oh, you teenagers.

Genetic evolution is irrelevant now. The past 200 years? That sure as hell wasn't genetics. Cultural and technological evolution has hit a critical mass, and they progress at a pace many thousands of times faster than genetic evolution.

And once we start human genetic engineering? Genetic evolution by mutation and selection becomes irrelevant, forever.

>> No.2475108

>>2474991

Youre fucking evil if you think its morally right to just leave the helpless ones as if they were trash.. Steven Hawking is handicapped and hes contributed more than you ever will

>> No.2475124

Using mental persuasion to cause others to empathize and follow instructions of the meek and incapable IS SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST.

You suckers got played and will continue to be played.

>> No.2475122

there is already a thread about it, I will bump it

>> No.2475132

>>2475124
Using mental persuasion to cause others to reject society and opt out of the pacts that keep them alive IS SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST.

You, sucker, got played and will continue to be played.

>> No.2475134

>>2475107
Yeah, this. This thread is stupid and trolls.

>> No.2475151

One small step forward for humankind, one giant leap into the abyss for humanity.

>> No.2475157

>>2475132
Uh not at all. The only reason you can conceive language to say what you just did is because of societal discourse.

Society and the maintaining of social norms has been a relative constant of humanity and has caused humanity to maintain dominance over all other species for years and will continue to do so.

There is nothing that would cause one to assume it is "fittest" to reject that notion.

>> No.2475168

Why is there a need for human "advancement?" If everyone's happy, I consider that a better situation than one where we have great technological development and "weaker" people are being hunted to extinction.

>> No.2475171

>>2475157
>There is nothing that would cause one to assume it is "fittest" to reject that notion.

very astute of you. however my comment was a response to someone pretending to do just that.

>> No.2475187

We could start with you OP. Sociopaths and bigots damage civilization while the mentally disabled are simply not as productive as others.

>> No.2475193

>>2475171
Actually I was saying that society at large would persuade and cause empathy in individuals to make sure that societies are maintained and this thought process of those doing the persuasion is something that "fittest" animals would do.

The "sucker" was for the OP.

>> No.2475402

>>2475074
Just because he didn't discover anything immediately pragmatic, it doesn't mean it ever will be. Both Quantum Physics and Relativity were thought of in the same way at their time, but they now have very important technological applications.

Also, knowing more about the origins of the Universe would have a very significant cultural impact, and culture is a cornerstone of human progress.

In terms of OP's point in general. Survival of the Fittest is a misnomer, it's more Survival of the Species. We are social animals who evolved a tribal cultures and morals to support each other, so 'letting the weak die' would be completely at odds with this idea.

Also, as someone else in this thread mentioned, define 'fittest'.

>> No.2475413

>>2475193
my bad.

>> No.2475436
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2475436

I'll just leave this here.
Guess which half gets most of the welfare funds?

>> No.2475442

I recommend that you all watch the movie "Idiocracy". Search YouTube for a trailer if you haven't heard of it. It regards less intelligent humans reproducing more often, leaving the less intelligent to thrive while the intelligent become extinct.
This torrent downloaded for me in like 10 minutes: http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4493785/Idiocracy.LIMITED.DVDRip.XviD-DiAMOND

>> No.2475449

>>2475074
>they don't actually contribute anything to society because they are just that, theories

Just like knowing gravity, general relativity, etc., have never contributed anything, right?

Jesus christ you dumb fuck.

>> No.2475452

Survival of the fittest leads to anarchy, which leads to capitalism, which eventually leads to socialism.

So if you let survival of the fittest sit long enough in society it eventually leads to some degree of socialism anyway.

>> No.2475457

>>2475402
The survival of the species is dependent on the fittest and most adaptive links, you don't need the entire chain to survive for the species to survive.

>> No.2475462

>>2475452
And socialism leads to economic crashes.

>> No.2475465

>>2475039
>implying money isn't a shared hallucination useful for tricking others into labor
Zeitgeist retard detected.

>> No.2475479

>>2475452
Capitalism is much more akin to survival of the fittest than any kind of socialism. It depends on people actually taking the risks of investments and reaping the benefits. With socialism you just have some godly state somehow owning all the capital and pretending to know how to best allocate resources.

capitalist:atheist::socialist:theist

>> No.2475480
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2475480

>>2475462
nope
The problem is that if you follow the curve on the increase in the production of neccesities more and more people will end up being out of work. And if you let these people starve they will get pissed off and kill Mubarak.

The socialist idéal would be communism; where production has increased to the point that we hardly need any basic workers at all.
I assume that for the time being this is a futuristic fantasy, and that we'll always need some skills. But socialism doesn't need to crash. If you avoid corruption and a populace of dickweeds you end up with scandinavian socialism...which "kinda" works.
Picture related

>> No.2475484

>>2475457
Yes, but we're no longer at a point where survival is a big deal. What would be annoying is if some genius from a poor, low-IQ family were to discover something revolutionary in, say, Medicine, but we'd already destroyed that family before they had a chance to produce said genius child.

Sure, it's statistically unlikely, but we would be irresponsible to completely eradicate that chance.

>> No.2475502

>>2475480
LOL GDP per capita, who cares? Look at just GDP, that's your country's economic strength. Also those other indexes don't mean shit.

And regarding government intervention in economics, some copypasta:

The Great Depression created a widespread misconception that market economies are inherently unstable and must be managed by the government to avoid large macreconomic fluctuations, that is, business cycles. This view persists to this day despite the more than 40 years since Milton Friedman and Anna Jacobson Schwartz showed convincingly that the Federal Reserve’s monetary policies were largely to blame for the severity of the Great Depression. In 2002 Ben Bernanke (then a Federal Reserve governor, today the chairman of the Board of Governors) made this startling admission in a speech given in honor of Friedman’s 90th birthday: “I would like to say to Milton and Anna: Regarding the Great Depression, you’re right. We did it. We’re very sorry.”

>> No.2475506

>>2475484
It's more likely that another Hitler, Stalin or Mao would come out of that demographic so we should assess if that chance is worth that risk.

>> No.2475524

>>2475449
don't play with semantics fucktard. he was talking about hawkings theories specifically.

>> No.2475541

>>2475524
'Oh no, my idea that theories are useless, either from a physically fit person or a cripple, has been proved wrong. I best be calling shenanigans.'

>> No.2475551

>>2474991

I don't know about you but I never heard of a disabled person reproducing.

Also funny how you pinpoint negligible drag but completely ignore the mass corruption and inefficiency everywhere in our society.

And your assumption that our society has a predefined goal set by yourself who everybody everywhere agrees upon is none the less intriguing.

>> No.2475564

>>2475502
Just because something is predictably unstable, doesn't mean its stable.

Free market means money = power. Giving power to the rich is a moronic idea.

>> No.2475579

plutocrats, plutocrats everywhere

>> No.2475593

>>2475479

Perhaps so. But the ultimate goal is to advance technologically. If people keep fucking each other over the system becomes ultimately inefficient.

Competition is good provided everybody tries to make a better product rather than somehow sabotaging or stealing from his competitors. Unfortunately most competition now a days is the latter rather than the former.

>> No.2475607

Why do we treat retarded people so much differently than stupid people?

If their IQ is 69 or less, they are a precious gem who should be treated differently than everyone else because they are a victim of nature. We have huge government programs for caring for them and they are not expected to work or contribute like everyone else.

If their IQ is 70 or over, they are just stupid and given no special treatment; if they make mistakes, it's their fault.

Does 1 IQ point really merit so much difference in treatment?

>> No.2475624

A society where everyone had to look out for themselves, with no help from the government or social services would have less technological advancement. People would be far less likely to go into academia in a society without any safety support for if you lose your job or fall ill or whatever. The incentive would be to only do for a living whatever had the maximum security and was the most necessary.

Infact a "survivial of the fittest" society would stimulate the opposite of advancement. Humans advance best through cooperation.

>> No.2475629
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2475629

You're an idiot for thinking that you are able to recognize handicap without everyone around you agreeing on it. Some kinds of "disabilities" may have been seen as shamanic in earlier cultures. Now they're seen as "deadweight." The genetic issue hasn't changed, the people's idea of handicap has. Who's going to decide if being Jewish, black or a woman is a handicap? Or less obviously, those with poor eyesight or IBS or an inability to pass penis inspection?

Also, as is the case with many basement dwellers, you like to believe that you live in a world of hunting and gathering and survival and tigers and shit. lolno... The things that are dragging humanity down at this point have nothing to do with individuals.

Personally I think we should quit hiding them away in programs and housing communities and the such. This retarded guy was talking to people on the bus and they all just looked away like it was so unfortunate that their ambience was ruined. Well, he started talking to me, and it was a nice conversation, made nicer by how odd he was as a conversational partner. I don't believe that any conversation I would have had with the others on the bus would have been as nice. It would have been bullshit guarded small talk on the same tired topics. And I've worked with people who grew up with fully functioning minds but useless bodies. What kind of perspective do you think that results in? Do you think that cultural perspective divergent from the norm "drags humanity down"?

If I were more interested, I'd look up some statistics on adults who receive traumatic brain injury, and combine it with stats on development of other things that can cause cognitive impairment. Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it doesn't happen. They (including you, if you develop schizophrenia or aphasia or something) get routed away from "mainstream" society. Also fuck you.

>> No.2475637

>>2474991
I work at an elementary school. If natural selection was allowed to take it's toll completely, for example, all the type 1 diabetics would be dead. In the class I teach the best student is a type 1 diabetic. We would lose a lot without todays modern medicine.

Another great example is Stephen Hawking.

>> No.2475663

>>2474991
If you can learn to devalue one life, you can learn to devalue ALL life.

It's easy to say this unless you're on the wrong end of the stick, Anon. It's like someone I used to know that would tell you that Feudalism is a really great form of government. Naturally, she assumed she'd be one of the ruling nobles, not one of the serfs. Now imagine, OP, that while you have the will to live, you also have a crippling birth defect. How are YOU going to feel about being left out on your own to die, with no help whatsoever? Not so nice now, is it?

>> No.2475682

>>2475637
I hate to think that elementary school teachers browse 4chan

>> No.2475800

I don't understand why people think that a 'darwinian' society would be good or bad. I think that a 'darwinian' society is inescapable.

Problem is, when we think of evolution, we usually think of physical or biological traits that are advantegeous.

But I don't think there's anything 'unnatural' in 'artificiality'. that is, why is human behaviour, human choices, human concepts such as authority, economic power and politics to be considered anything any less natural as a stronger beak or a camouflaged skin?

In fact, we live under survival of the fittest. The fittest as in with the most political power, the economical power, the military power. We let prisoners live encarcerated if the community deems it best, we electrocute them when the community sees it fit. Another community overthrows the second's right to electrocute a prisoner if it wants so and has the political power to do so.

If we stretch the concept of 'fit to survival' to include such measures of power, then a world with disabled people being taken care of is consistent with a world of the fittest, since there is a comminity fit enough to impose such values.

>> No.2475828

>>2475800
If Darwin had said "survival of the muscular" instead of "survival of the fit" we wouldn't have this bullshit wordplay argument. If anything, people would be for muscular, athletic people >all of /sci/ gets their balls cut off.

Darwinian fitness, the only one relevant to evolution, is a technical term that does not mean what you seem to think it means.

>> No.2475861

if solely the most fit would be the ones "selected' in a population, then obviously they would all have similar traits, thereby reducing the frequency of heterozygote genes, thus leading to genetic uniformity which is not ideal for purging deleterious mutations, or fighting off parasites

so after a while what is regarded as fit will shift to another trait entirely, creating an oscillating continuum where the least frequent alleles in a population become more desirable

>> No.2475880

>>2475828
I don't think darwin meant what I said.

My point was to conjecture that if you establish an analogy or correspondence of genes to ideas and survival to political, economical and social ascension, then a darwinian society shouldn't be a concept so despicably interpreted.

Ideas do evolve through some sort of social selection and you'd have to -stretch- the concept of fitness (as I said before) to incorporate this conjectural construct

>> No.2478138

bump

>> No.2478165

>>2478138
sorry for bumping this pathetic thread.

>> No.2478170

oh sorry, i'll bump until it starts autosaging. this pathetic board needs moar eugenics.

>> No.2478182

no, because the genes we evolved for such actions is precisely the reason we were able to advance.

>> No.2478196

>>2478182
yea, but those genes won't vanish magically, we will still have them and advance but better.

>> No.2478205
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2478205

Human race would be less advanced, because without this quality we would be dead.
People wouldn't be survived if they wouldn't cooperate and we can't get really back from that. natural selection favours people that cooperate. Then there are these fucking handicapped people who can take advantage of our genes... FUCK

>> No.2478221

it's not a necessity. if your worried about funds or resources, prevent people from reproducing or over-consuming, but even then it isn't that essential. as resources become more scarce, demand for alternative energies will increase sharply, just hope there is enough fuel left to make the transition.

>> No.2478238

>>2478196
Gene therapy isn't terribly far away. They will vanish.

>> No.2478255

Darwin would slap the shit out of you simply for using the term "advanced" there is no progress bar in evolution, there is simply change relative to environment.

>> No.2478256

Survival of the fittest is already in place. It is ALWAYS in place.

Capacity to take advantage of society at large in order to ensure personal survival is an example of fitness.

All eugenics would do is start to support the traits that one person, or one faction, or one ideology or another has arbitrarily determined to be the best. Not survival of the fittest, merely husbandry.

>> No.2478273

Malthus.
Done already.
Not a new idea, go away.

>> No.2478275

>>2474991
The smart people are breeding and usually with other smart people. Our advancement is fine.

>> No.2478383

>>2475074
>What contributions has Stephen Hawking made on your day-to-day life? None. He has many logical, and plausable theories, but they don't actually contribute anything to society because they are just that, theories.

I promise you. In your perfect world you'll be the first ordered against the wall and shot.
Morons like you stop progress, not retards and cripples.