Intelligence Design – natural selection and technology

Starting from a no-fun that more people have died from selfies than shark attacks this year as a anecdotal case for interaction between natural selection and technology.  It’s too far a shot, since anyone may well ponder that shark killing were never a key driver of human selection to begin with.

Having sex, tho, have always been a key driver.  And looking good to potential mates does have a play in this.  In this light the selfie-selection link start being not so naive.  Even then, selfie is too short a fling to make an impact in the big picture.  As a further analogy, though, it is arguable that selfie is the current mode of a mediated relation that has for a long time being around in human kind reproduction.

If we consider the big impact some fundamental technological innovations such as tool making, language, and culture have had in human survival and reproduction abilities, then the evidence turns around; it is very hard to deny technology has not been one of the key drivers of evolution even before homo sapiens.

A few short, recent articles on this discuss Is Technology Unnatural—Or Is It ‘What Makes Us Human’? makign the point that technology is part of us.  Looking forward, A Genomics Revolution: Evolution by Natural Selection to Evolution by Intelligent Direction points to the fact that if in the role of technology in human evolution was rather passive, genomics can shift that into a very active designing.  But then if Science Says the Internet Is Turning Us into Shallow Thinkers, what sort of evolution would technology-driven world lead us to?