Evolution is the process of a species changing to suit it's enviroment

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The discussion centers on the concept of evolution and its implications for human development, particularly in the context of environmental adaptation versus genetic intervention. It posits that humans have shifted from evolving to adapt to their environment to modifying the environment to meet their needs. This raises the question of whether eugenics or reprogenetics might be the only viable methods for improving humanity. The conversation explores the potential for human evolution through isolation in space colonies, suggesting that if these colonies were to remain disconnected from Earth, they could evolve independently over time. It is noted that speciation does not require a small gene pool; even with larger populations in separate colonies, significant evolutionary changes could occur due to neutral evolution over extended periods without interbreeding.
Gelsamel Epsilon
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As I understand it evolution is the process of a species changing to suit it's enviroment. Based on this definition I ask a question.

Is Eugenics and Reprogenetics the only way?

I believe that humans will never evolve from their current form because humans now change the environment to suit them, rather then change to suit the enviroment. So will the only way to better mankind be a rigorous Eugenics or Reprogenetics program be the only way to improve mankind as a whole?
 
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Rapid evolution (speciation) occurs when a parent species becomes isolated into demic populations that have different environmental pressures--especially small populations. Such an outcome for humans is possible when we establish colonies in outer space. This future time will provide great possibility for human evolution if such groups lose contact with Earth yet survive and reproduce, perhaps by random genetic drift so as to alter ability for breeding with humans on Earth (change in hormones involved in ovulation or sperm production or fertilization process, etc.??)--fun to speculate.
 
If the gene pool is sufficiently expressed in outerspace colonies then speciation would not happen, correct?
 
Gelsamel Epsilon said:
If the gene pool is sufficiently expressed in outerspace colonies then speciation would not happen, correct?

Not so. It doesn't require a small gene pool to have evolution. Suppose you had two of those space colonies with plenty of founding individuals in each. Then wait a half million years or so with no interbreeding between the colonies. Just by neutral evolution alone even if there weren't any different adaptive gradients on the two planets (very unlikely), the two populations would be quite different.
 
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I am reading Nicholas Wade's book A Troublesome Inheritance. Please let's not make this thread a critique about the merits or demerits of the book. This thread is my attempt to understanding the evidence that Natural Selection in the human genome was recent and regional. On Page 103 of A Troublesome Inheritance, Wade writes the following: "The regional nature of selection was first made evident in a genomewide scan undertaken by Jonathan Pritchard, a population geneticist at the...

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