Danny McGee was up his 59th tree
Have you seen the raisin bran commercial recently? More importantly, do you remember having seen it over 15 years ago? Not sure exactly when, but I'm sure it's an 80's commercial. I'm not sure why I was so excited to see it, but I was.
Speaking of food, I think it's time for a bit of a diet. Not like a regimented strict diet, just a concious effort to eat better. Some people don't think I need it. Just the other day Sandi was telling me I have a totally sexy bod (I'm paraphrasing of course). But the reason for that is because I don't think Sandi has actually seen me with my shirt off. Evolution has naturally promoted the concealment of fatness. You see, back in the olden days, people discovered that it was much easier to hunt a fat guy than a sabre-tooth tiger. The fat population quickly declined, except for those few who had the intuition to cover themselves with mammoth hides. Unfortunately, in modern times, without the sabre-tooth tigers and mammoths to promote homo-sapien's favourable traits, we are deevolving. The worst cases of this deevolution involve speedos.
(Actually I do believe we are weakening our species through the preservation and promotion of weak traits; moreover, it appears to be in our very nature to do so. It's strange to think that evolution could have promoted an anti-evolutionistic trait. In the few minutes since writing this I have already thought of dozens of comments, arguments and couter-arguments around that thought, but I'm just going to leave it at that.)
In any case, I do need to focus on reducing things like potato chips, and increasing stuff like vegetables. Focus on preparing "real" meals instead of instant things. The main problem there is that when I realise I want to eat, I want to eat NOW, not 45 minutes from now. Maybe I can get better at realising "I think I will be hungry in an hour" and act accordingly.
posted by ninjashowdown @ 9:46 p.m.
6 Comments:
I wouldn't say that we're de-evolving... humans have just changed the environment that natural selection is working with. Before our environment favoured strong, athletic individuals, but now we're favoring smart, intelligent, socially savvy individuals. Fat people can fall into this latter category.
However, like tends to mate with like. You might be interested in the following article that predicts that humans will split into 2 species in the future, an elite good-looking, slender, and intelligent species and the dumb, ugly working classes.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6057734.stm
Science without question is not science: 'What the hell? How can the BBC News publish this tripe?', and 'I might have believed this nonsense could come from some late 19th century eugenicist, but now? Is there any evidence...?' Those are biologist PZ Myers's comments on the BBC story that claims the human species may split in two.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/10/utter_nonsense.php
I do agree with you Evelyn that memetic and biological evolution seem to have become inextricably intertwined - thus the intelligent fat people being favored over the dumb fit ones. What I don't get, hoever, is how it is that the smart fit ones aren't still winning overall - does memetic strength (smarts) preclude genetic strength?
Scott: good luck with the diet dude! You always were a fat mother.... ;\
I think it's cuz the slim smart ones aren't having enough children. I mean most of us in the developed and educated world are spending so much time getting an education we don't have kids until much later in life.
I think that's part of the basis for the article too. The elite (slim, tall, intelligent) are going to be a minority because they are being outbred by the masses (short, broad, and dumb).
Though I said "I'm going to leave it at that" as it would take hours to even outline all my thoughts without going into depth, I'll clarify that the serious part of my "deevolving" statement was not really about fat vs lean, smart vs dumb, but more to do with medical science allowing "defective" people to survive and breed and produce more "defective" people.
Perhaps I should have left out that paragraph so everyone could focus more on imagining me wearing mammoth hide looking at a menu that lists "sabre-tooth tiger", "fat guy", and "potato chips" and me grunting "ug" as I point to... which will it be?!?
(and no jokes about "we don't have to imagine, that was last saturday night!")
Ah, I get it... so you're thinking modern medicine has made it easier for the weak and genetically defective to survive. I've thought the same thing too.
But the thing is you have to consider the reproductive success of lineages, not just an individual. So what if a person with a genetic disorder manages to survive to reproduce with the help of doctors and hospitals? Their children and their children's children may not be any more successful if they inherited the faulty gene.
And again, like breeds with like. Generally healthy people will be attracted to healthy, leaving unhealthy people with unhealthy. The article mentions that there will be genetic haves and genetic have-nots in future generations because of this.
Short, broad, dumb. No wonder my parents tried every single piece of ^$#%#$@@ under the sun to make me taller.
That aside, be careful of fitting people into stereotypes. As they say in the math world - a theorem does not exist out of findings until no counterexample can be found.
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