Atheism and Natural Selection

[LARA]

I have really been thinking about the atheist discussion we've been having about suicide.  Really thinking a lot.  Most of us seem to give the individual the freedom to commit suicide as opposed to the religious folks who say it's unethical.  (Just as a quick read)

If atheism has a genetic component then it kind of works against us population-wise, you know?  And even if not, then religion usually is passed down in families. I mean really, if we take the stance that it's okay to commit suicide, then do we atheists have a more likely chance of doing so and a less likely chance of surviving to reproduce?

And are our abortion views more liberal as well?  Does this stance result in fewer atheists, too?

We know that churches don't give the scientific truth to their congregations, but the philosophy they feed them could help increase their population.  So is it any wonder that they outnumber us?

Is the growth of atheism also related to the growth of modern life and the ability to see a single child to adulthood more easily?  Now that we have better scientific knowledge and medicine, smaller families can provide better opportunities for their kids.  Does modern life actually begin to select for atheist morality as opposed to religious morality as an ever-increasing population becomes a detriment to the human species as a whole rather than a benefit?

[SteveS]

Hey LARA, I don't know if this rambling reply is any kind of answer, but your post triggered all sorts of thoughts in my brain.  Apologies up front if some of this is disjointed.

I say human consciousness is a puzzling thing.  Although we can understand the forces and processes that made us the way we are, we can de-couple our thinking.  I can calmly contemplate how I came to be the way I am, without necessarily being subject to those same factors through an application of conscious will.  In other words, evolution was not a conscious design - we didn't choose to evolve, or choose how to evolve - it just happened.  Understanding how and why it happened I never-the-less have the ability to choose how to act and what to do regardless of how I came to be me.

A good example is sexual impulse.  I can understand why I experience so much sexual motivation - it directly led to the reproduction and survival of my ancestors from whence I came to be.  This doesn't mean I have to be a slave to my sexual impulses --- I don't have to chase after everyone wearing a skirt.  I can just say "silly evolutionary past pushing me to reproduce" and happily ignore it.  And, I don't have to feel shame or self-hatred or relationship-doubt for having sexual thoughts or impulses because I understand where they're coming from and why they are happening.

So - I can understand that like-minded people committing suicide would undermine the idea of large groups of like-minded people surviving, but I can choose to do so anyway.  I can understand that an abortion by an atheist mother would lead to one less probable atheist in the world, but not care because there are other things I value more highly than the number of atheists in the world.

The contrary is the religious thinking that says we should never commit suicide or have abortions - we are even commanded by god to "be fruitful and multiply".  And what happens when we inevitably approach resource starvation?  Just keep on keepin' on and have faith that god will provide for us.  

But this approach ignores the reality of what nature and science have taught us - life will become a struggle to survive (this is the "Natural Selection" part of your topic).  Some humans will live but many will die - either through happenstance or violent conflict.  This has occurred, and does occur, all the time in the "natural world".  Our ability to understand and behave rationally should prevent us from entering into a situation were arbitrary and capricious circumstances lead to wide-spread suffering (or so I would hope  :wink:  ).  But it only works if we make it work.  If we don't choose how to curb population, then nature will enforce the curb - and it's not going to be nice, fair, humane, or even very tolerable.  It's going to suck big time.

In the end, I doubt there is a direct genetic component to faith and/or atheism.  I think there is very probably a genetic component to behavior - how much a person acts on reason/logical deduction and how much a person acts on emotion - and these factors could conceivably predispose a person to faith or atheism - but I don't think it's a direct link.  And I think it's clear that there is a major environmental factor - not all (or even most?) of our behavior is determined by genetics - much (or most?) of it is learned.  "Passed down in families", as you say - I agree.

About the growth of atheism, I agree that the relative number of atheists in the human population seems to be increasing.  Whether this is because more and more people are really atheists, or because the social situation makes it safer to declare yourself to be an atheist rather than pretend to be a theist when you really aren't, remains unclear to me.

Cheers for the thought-provoking topic!

[LARA]

I really enjoyed the reply and your statement that "evolution just happens" made me think of another topic.  I think in some ways the idea that evolution just happens is misleading. Any creature making a mate choice is making a conscious decision that affects the unconscious process of evolution.  Though there isn't a creator external to evolution, there is internally and it's power lies in the mate choices of the participants. Their choices are the intelligence (sometimes) in evolution that we (meaning all of us sentient beings, not just those in this forum) sometimes mistake for an outside force.  The fact that you're not going to go after anything in a skirt is a case in point.  You aren't wasting time and energy on designing just any kind of kids, instead you'll pick a mate based on real qualities you actually want to pass on.

I also think we give less credit to animals than is due in this area.  Mate choice and selection is a huge deal in many species.  They don't just run into each other happenstance and spill gametes.  They court, play and fight.  There is more to evolution than just environmental pressures, there is psychology, intelligence and strategy.  We, living things design ourselves, bit by bit, choice by choice, slowly over time.

[McQ]

LARA, I'm not sure, and he can clarify this for himself, but I believe that Steve, was speaking to the process of evolution "just happening". The fact is that natural selection occurs and is not dictated by competition, or specific and deliberate thought, regardless of the species.

We humans (and all life) participate in the evolutionary process, but it is not guided by our decisions or actions. DNA sequencing and the fact that DNA mutates is what drives the process. We simply get to go along for the ride.

[SteveS]

Hi LARA, thanks for the words.  McQ did a good job of summarizing my opinion.

The condition you are describing is what a biologist would, I think, term "sexual selection" which is a form of natural selection.

The fact that human beings have become aware of genetics could influence our sexual selection behavior --- we could choose mates based on genetics.  In fact, this was the point of eugenics.  A directed attempt to improve our own genetic qualities through selective breading.

I understand that the word "eugenics" carries a whole lot of emotional baggage, almost all of it negative, but in principle it seems like an interesting idea.  The negative part would be an authoritarian structure (like a state) restricting people from reproducing.  A more tolerable situation would be people choosing, of their own free will, to only reproduce with others that have certain characteristics.  They're doing this already anyhow!

In my particular situation I can honestly say that I didn't give genetics a single thought when choosing my wife --- the choice was primarily emotional.  So, I didn't, in point of fact, choose a mate with qualities that I wanted to pass on.  I choose one that I loved and could live with, and who loved me back and felt that she could live with me.  The only thing this really means is that she sure does exhibit good taste!  :wink:

[LARA]

<b>SteveS </b>, Yes, I am specifically referring to sexual selection.  Mate choice affects evolution.  It is a choice and offspring can turn out one way or another based on the results of that choice. <b> McQ</b> DNA sequencing doesn't effect evolution, it's a process by which biologists actually cut apart DNA to elucidate the base pair order.  Is that what you meant?  I'm guessing that's a typo?  DNA mutations do drive the process of evolution, but in higher animals with sexes, it's the recombination of chromosomes that helps bring new combinations of genes into the game, if you will allow me the term.  And so does sexual selection.  And that involves choice.  Our contribution to the process may be terribly minimal, or unconscious, but it's still there.  So maybe I assumed too much about your mate choice, <b>SteveS</b>, so my apologies for that assumption.

[SteveS]

So maybe I assumed too much about your mate choice, SteveS, so my apologies for that assumption.

 No apologies required, I took no offense what-so-ever.  My only point is that I did not consciously consider genetic makeup, and I doubt a great many people do.  I'm sure some do, and I think it could be a wise choice, I just don't think that's normally how relationships play out.  My only consideration here is that while mates are selected for specific reasons, I don't think many animals (even many humans - namely religious ones that reject the theory of evolution) are specifically making choices to guide the process.  They're level of involvement is, as McQ stated, "participatory" (as I see it, anyway).

All right, I'm totally forgetting what I was trying to say here.  I think I might have read more into some of your statements then I should have.  Looking at it afresh, I completely agree with this:

Mate choice and selection is a huge deal in many species. They don't just run into each other happenstance and spill gametes. They court, play and fight. There is more to evolution than just environmental pressures, there is psychology, intelligence and strategy. We, living things design ourselves, bit by bit, choice by choice, slowly over time.

Indubitably.  I just don't think there is a conscious awareness within these animals that they are designing themselves, or that they are "guiding" evolution.  Hell, a shocking number of human beings don't even believe it to be true, let alone feel they are consciously guiding the process.  Perhaps your intention was not to ascribe awareness to the process, in which case just bear with me, this is the thought that somehow stuck in my head.

All I'm really saying is that the effect of animal's mate selection definitely has an impact on the species characteristics, but I doubt that this is the intent of their choices.  And no living thing actually "chose" a beneficial mutation - it just happened.  I could imagine the beneficiary being sexually desirable, leading to an increase in this trait and enhanced "survivability" of the species,  or on the other hand being sexually ostracized (rejected due to an unusual appearance or behavior) that leads to the failure of what would otherwise have been a trait with survival advantage.

This is an interesting discussion - what do you think about this latest blurb?  

Cheers,
Steve

[Bella]

I don't think that Atheism has anything to do with genetics or natural selection. I don't think that there's any "Atheist gene".. after all, I am the only Atheist in my family. I've always considered religion as a means to control society. So yea, religion might say that committing suicide will send you directly to hell (do not pass go, do not collect $200)... same thing for abortion. But, have you ever seen that movie, Idiocracy? Lol. All of the stupid non-condom-wearing idiots continued to breed (and thus mooch off of welfare and overpopulate the earth) and all of the smart people became extinct because they wanted to be properly prepared before bringing a child into the world.

I don't think we're outnumbered because of natural selection. I think we're outnumbered because human nature is generally to follow like sheep (e.g., all of those studies on social deviance).

[LARA]

<b>SteveS</b> I don't think that most creatures are aware of the evolutionary process, either, or even that they are producing offspring at all.  The choice I'm referring to is one of a quality I will refer to, very scientifically of course, as "hotness"  and it doesn't have to do with picking survival qualities at all, as you pointed out, although health and "hotness"  are often linked.  The environment selects species destructively solely on fitness, but sexual selection can result in an artistic process over time, as aesthetics seems to flow through nature and strangely, or perhaps not strangely at all in the light of evolutionary relationships, an orchid that is beautiful to a wasp is usually also beautiful to a human, as is a peacock tail, or the mating colors of a darter.  
In this way, it seems that evolution has more akin to an emergence principle, where small simple rules and choices add up to a complex, patterned phenomenon over long periods of time.  So the mate choice may only be a tiny contribution on an individual level, but over time it all adds up to what appears to be a designed process.  And it is in that sense, designed by the trillions of participants themselves over the eons, though granted not always intelligently.

<b>Bella</b>  I don't think atheism is carried on a single gene, either, even eye color doesn't just break down to the simple two gene, dominant and recessive Punit square problem we were shown in basic genetics.  If there is any genetic component (try to test that hypothesis!) it's probably more like a tendency towards a personality trait of independent thinking rather than a specific base pair located on the short arm of the 15th chromosome that screams to you "You will be an ATHEIST!!!!"

And yes  I have seen "Idiocracy"  and I thought it was a funny premise, as long as premises like it aren't taken too seriously, because there's always that nasty prospect of some evil asshole trying to start a eugenics movement back up.

[SteveS]

Hey LARA - I agree entirely with your first paragraph.  It is interesting to think about.  In particular, I wanted to pull out a few thoughts:

The environment selects species destructively solely on fitness, but sexual selection can result in an artistic process over time, as aesthetics seems to flow through nature and strangely, or perhaps not strangely at all in the light of evolutionary relationships, an orchid that is beautiful to a wasp is usually also beautiful to a human, as is a peacock tail, or the mating colors of a darter.
In this way, it seems that evolution has more akin to an emergence principle, where small simple rules and choices add up to a complex, patterned phenomenon over long periods of time. So the mate choice may only be a tiny contribution on an individual level, but over time it all adds up to what appears to be a designed process. And it is in that sense, designed by the trillions of participants themselves over the eons, though granted not always intelligently.

Yes - and kudos, this was well expressed.  I like this thought a lot.

There are some common themes that run through our common descent - like the number 5 in terms of body parts (1 head, 4 limbs - arms or legs).  A dog, when looking at me to play off my behavior, seems instinctively to look at my face.  Children, even young, seem to "key off" the dog's face.  It is interesting to see the similarities, and to see the apparent understanding of (or at least reliance on) the similarities.