This has been something I've been thinking about for a while.
It seems to me -at a certain point- Intelligence/Education would start becoming disadvantageous for a species fitness. Certainly education and intelligence has exploded our population and helped increase our life span by a factor of 3. But, it seems to me there is an "intellectual tipping point" where it becomes a hindrance, evolutionarily.
I'm not just talking about things like climate change and a nuclear apocalypse (or some other man-made Doomsday device), which our intelligence makes possible. That is part of it, but I'm also talking about how education and IQ are -disputedly- inversely related to birth rates. [1]
Babies are one of the most expensive things you can get, and -statistically- they DECREASE your happiness.[2] It would seem someone acting in rational self interest wouldn't want to have kids. I've also seen Existential Depression in Gifted Individuals. If you need a REASON to live -and there isn't one- it sounds like that could be disadvantageous.
However, I realize this could be cherry picking on my part. Maybe more intelligence is always good and there isn't some evolutionary tipping point. Or, maybe its like IQ and wealth, it never becomes a hindrance it just starts to help less as you have more.[3]
Intelligence is neither inherently advantageous or disadvantageous for evolution.
Let's start with evolutionarily 'bad' as you called it. This is a good point to define first. Evolution "cares" about survival of the fittest through natural selection. Of course it also "cares" about propagation of the species at large. Basically evolution cares about multiplying and existing. Nothing more.
Notice that we are the only species to evolve our level of intelligence? Intelligence requires an immense resource investment. Our brains a metabolically very costly from a fitness perspective. What's more is that we don't even derive benefits from this costly biological venture until years and years of neural development. No matter how you cut it, most three year olds are incapable of survival. Three years of feeding an organ that is up to that point largely useless for evolutionary fitness.
It then becomes easy to see that few species can afford such an incredible investment to help improve their survival. A large number of species simply produce as much offspring as possible and hope some of them make it to adulthood. Many species don't live long enough to make neural development of a costly brain organ worth it.
Basically, intelligence is not evolutionarily advantageous for a vast majority of species. Species are like decks in magic. They each have their own constraints and limitations and their own strategy for survival.
The metagame changes every now and then. Sometimes, what's advantageous in one context can turn disadvantageous in others.
It's clear that intelligence was beneficial to our evolutionary fitness at one point in time. But science has never proclaimed that it always will be--anymore than having 4 force of wills in your legacy deck will always advantageous. Imagine a meta with 90% burn decks.
I think its probably most accurate to state that intelligence is neither inherently advantageous or disadvantageous. At best it is advantageous for some species some of the time.
It seems to me -at a certain point- Intelligence/Education would start becoming disadvantageous for a species fitness.
Erm... We're a species that's grown to seven billion strong, are capable of surviving pretty much anywhere on land, and are at the top of the food chain. So no, intelligence is emphatically not disadvantageous for a species' fitness. Certainly not for ours.
I'm not just talking about things like climate change and a nuclear apocalypse (or some other man-made Doomsday device), which our intelligence makes possible. That is part of it, but I'm also talking about how education and IQ are -disputedly- inversely related to birth rates. [1]
Probably because people with higher education are generally in cities and in the higher socioeconomic tiers of society, whereas the people with the greatest birth rates are generally from poorer, rural areas.
Evolutionary fitness is a function of a huge number of variables. Even if we accept for the sake of argument that there's some sort of intelligence tipping-point, it's only going to exist for a small configuration of those other variables. Suppose it's true that kids make you less happy so intelligent people have fewer kids and after a certain tipping-point, at which point this effect produces a stronger negative reproductive pressure than the gain from increased intelligence. This would cause evolution of higher intelligence to slow down, certainly. But it would also exert a strong positive selective pressure on individuals whose happiness is less negatively impacted by children.
If you think of fitness as a landscape on a many-dimensional plane, we might run up against a valley walking in one direction. But if we walk a bit in an orthogonal direction, we'll find that valley is no longer in the way.
People without proper sexual education tend to have more children so sure, it's disadvantageous but because it isn't selected for it really doesn't matter.
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What's the big deal? You could have played multiple Righteous Avengers for years now.
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It seems to me -at a certain point- Intelligence/Education would start becoming disadvantageous for a species fitness. Certainly education and intelligence has exploded our population and helped increase our life span by a factor of 3. But, it seems to me there is an "intellectual tipping point" where it becomes a hindrance, evolutionarily.
I'm not just talking about things like climate change and a nuclear apocalypse (or some other man-made Doomsday device), which our intelligence makes possible. That is part of it, but I'm also talking about how education and IQ are -disputedly- inversely related to birth rates. [1]
Babies are one of the most expensive things you can get, and -statistically- they DECREASE your happiness.[2] It would seem someone acting in rational self interest wouldn't want to have kids. I've also seen Existential Depression in Gifted Individuals. If you need a REASON to live -and there isn't one- it sounds like that could be disadvantageous.
However, I realize this could be cherry picking on my part. Maybe more intelligence is always good and there isn't some evolutionary tipping point. Or, maybe its like IQ and wealth, it never becomes a hindrance it just starts to help less as you have more.[3]
What do you think?
Let's start with evolutionarily 'bad' as you called it. This is a good point to define first. Evolution "cares" about survival of the fittest through natural selection. Of course it also "cares" about propagation of the species at large. Basically evolution cares about multiplying and existing. Nothing more.
Notice that we are the only species to evolve our level of intelligence? Intelligence requires an immense resource investment. Our brains a metabolically very costly from a fitness perspective. What's more is that we don't even derive benefits from this costly biological venture until years and years of neural development. No matter how you cut it, most three year olds are incapable of survival. Three years of feeding an organ that is up to that point largely useless for evolutionary fitness.
It then becomes easy to see that few species can afford such an incredible investment to help improve their survival. A large number of species simply produce as much offspring as possible and hope some of them make it to adulthood. Many species don't live long enough to make neural development of a costly brain organ worth it.
Basically, intelligence is not evolutionarily advantageous for a vast majority of species. Species are like decks in magic. They each have their own constraints and limitations and their own strategy for survival.
The metagame changes every now and then. Sometimes, what's advantageous in one context can turn disadvantageous in others.
It's clear that intelligence was beneficial to our evolutionary fitness at one point in time. But science has never proclaimed that it always will be--anymore than having 4 force of wills in your legacy deck will always advantageous. Imagine a meta with 90% burn decks.
I think its probably most accurate to state that intelligence is neither inherently advantageous or disadvantageous. At best it is advantageous for some species some of the time.
Probably because people with higher education are generally in cities and in the higher socioeconomic tiers of society, whereas the people with the greatest birth rates are generally from poorer, rural areas.
If you think of fitness as a landscape on a many-dimensional plane, we might run up against a valley walking in one direction. But if we walk a bit in an orthogonal direction, we'll find that valley is no longer in the way.