Is Humanity Evolving?

After all we’re just animals too

What’s the next step?

I have a lot of faith in Nature, in the ability of the life force to “find a way”, as attorney Malcolm (played by Jeff Goldblum) noted in Jurassic Park. There is an animating force in life that is always striving for more life. Evolution proves time and time again that when species come up against severe challenges they can make extraordinary adaptations in order to survive and thrive. The evolutionary force is ever-present, ever- active.

I think it’s useful to sluff off some of the pervasive human arrogance and remember that we too are a species, a type of animal, a part of the creative life force. This means that we too are being acted upon by evolutionary forces. In nature, evolution usually doesn’t happen without pressure. A species, or population of species, runs into challenges, conditions in its habitat or food source shifts, and its survival is imperiled. In response, the organisms begin to adapt, to shift behaviors and/or physical characteristics.

Humanity is now under pressure and many, many of us sense it. It is the angst and unsettledness of knowing that we are undermining the health of our planet, that many of our familiar systems are failing, etc. It’s possible this pressure may be instigating the evolutionary impulse in our species.  

I’ve been thinking about some of the current developments in our species that may actually be evolutionary adaptations to the predicament we are facing. Some of this may be controversial and I welcome comments and debate.

Possible Human Evolutionary Responses:

1)    Population growth is slowing significantly

It is clear that the massive number of humans and how much we collectively consume and pollute is wreaking havoc on nature – wiping out species, depleting water supplies, and destabilizing the climate and weather systems. Exponential population growth was the result of technological breakthroughs that greatly reduced infant mortality and greatly increased the ability to grow food at industrial scale.

As a result of those developments human growth rate reached a whopping 2.1 percent during the 1960s. That is an exponential rate of growth that was resulting in hundreds of millions of additional humans every year. Since then, however, the growth rate has fallen steeply to just over one percent per year. In 2021 the rate was approximately 0.9 percent and this year it is on pace for 0.84 percent. The primary reason for the reduced growth rate is a precipitous decline in births. As more and more women gain access to education and birth control, and the health care and nutrition that allows more of their children to survive, they have fewer babies.

Now, we are still adding a lot of new people to an already overpopulated world -- approximately 82 million, with 140 new babies and 58 million deaths. But overall, the growth is slowing and is expected to level off by the end of the century somewhere around 10.8 billion according to United Nations predictions that do not attempt to factor in potential mass die-off events like pandemics, catastrophic natural disasters, large-scale war, etc.  

2)    Gender-fluidity

This one is tied to the above population observation. What if the upsurge in gender fluidity we are seeing is an evolutionary response for humans to build core social relationships without adding to the population? In wild nature, one of the primary deadly events is a population overshoot that outstrips the resources required for the species to survive. When this happens, many, many species automatically begin having fewer offspring until balance is restored. Humans are deeply social animals, and love is an essential component of a fulfilled human life. I can tell you from my own personal experience having chosen not to have children, love is essential to feeling fulfilled, but for many procreating isn’t.

3)    Getting beyond tribalism

In the earliest phase of human existence, tribalism worked. Physically, we were a relatively vulnerable species. We weren’t nearly as fast as other predators and due to our large heads, our offspring were particularly vulnerable and needed prolonged care and protection. Just for comparison, a female horse can run at nearly full speed even in the final weeks of pregnancy and a new-born foal can run at speed within a few hours. Our collective survival required a team effort. Moreover, the rest of nature and the world seemed impossibly large and inexhaustible.

Now however, there are nearly eight billion humans and it is very clear that Earth’s land, water, and fellow species are not inexhaustible. On top of that our technology has outstripped our wisdom with the development of weapons of mass destruction and mass environmental extraction and depletion. Tribalism is literally killing us and our planetary life-support systems.

There is growing awareness that our world is interconnected and increased efforts to address problems through global cooperation. The United Nations is one example, as are the efforts of wealthier nations to assist allied countries that are facing war or natural disasters and extreme weather-related events. Even as a I write, at the COP27 climate talks, wealthier, polluter nations are for the first time, considering providing funding to less-wealthy nations that are being hammered by the disastrous impacts of climate change already unleashed. Another aspect of the move beyond tribalism and extreme nationalism is the Global Citizens movement and related Earth Charter.

What if humanity, at this very time, is moving through a branching process that is giving rise to a new sub-species? Now, I know this is likely to make some of you want to scream at me, but just consider for a moment. Many species go through subspeciation. Subspecies are still able to reproduce with other subspecies but they have unique physical characteristics. A synonym for subspecies is raciation. We tend to think about evolution as a shift in physical traits and characteristics – over time giraffes grew long necks, humans adapted to walk upright, different populations of humans in different parts of the world evolved different general shades of skin color, etc. But what if we are undergoing an evolution in consciousness? What if something in our species recognizes that tribalism, given the completely unprecedented modern world conditions, is actually dangerous to our survival and what is needed is a collaborative, rather than combative approach? What if some humans are genuinely able to feel a kinship, a concern for other nationalities, even other species, and some genuinely are not?

I know this line of thinking is fraught with room for intellectual elitism given that most of us would put ourselves in the evolving or more advanced subspecies. But this is not a time for shying away from challenging lines of inquiry. What if at the level of evolution of consciousness, it isn’t just about an inherited gene pool and physical adaptation over time, but actually an adaptation in thinking and relating that can happen in a split second? Life always seeks more life so maybe there is a superorganism component to humanity that senses, given the pressures we are now facing, that an evolutionary step is essential.

Certainly, I can’t prove that the developments noted above are signs of species-wide evolution, but I think it should be obvious that our species, like all species, is under the influence of the forces of evolution. Climate change itself is evidence that the entire biosphere is shifting and adapting to the insertion of gargantuan amounts of fossil fuel related greenhouse gas emissions. The overall life force is adapting, creating a new equilibrium. The biggest questions are what will be lost in the process and whether or not humans will be part of the new balance. Perhaps the mounting pressures will push us to finally live up to our self-prescribed name Homo sapiens, which is Latin for “wise man.”

In honor of and hope for these extraordinary, precious and precarious times.

Cylvia

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Recent Speaking Engagements

I was honored to be interviewed on Spirit Café podcast on the topic of Economic System Change. Here’s a link.

And, my recent talk at Unity Spiritual Community titled, “The Meaning of Life.”