Evolution encourages diversity. At any given point in time and place, some people are better adapted than others. The least adapted make up at least some of the poor. By this relative definition, some poor will always be with us, even though their standard of living is rising continually.
Evolution is predicated on some distribution of genetically inheritable characteristics with differential survival / reproductive benefits. Depending on a number of other characteristics, one might end up with highly diverse, or highly homogeneous local or regional populations.
You are right in general, but for succinct Internet discussion it is necessary to simplify as much as possible. Unfortunately this can sidetrack the discussion as flaws in the simplification are addressed.
In the case of humans, evolution did encourage diversity, if only because it created sexual reproduction in humans, which increases the diversity of offspring. And of course, humans are not all identical today, implying an evolutionary response to different environmental conditions.
I don't believe the comment you are replying to is Social Darwinism. As I understand it, that particular view set is actually a belief/value system, while the comment you reply to is merely an observation that assuming variety, there will always be a bottom rung.
The comment directly implies that some people are born predisposed to being poor on a genetic level, which is... absurd isn't even close to the right word.
Gee, I kind of hate to say this, but my expensive genetic disorder is why I am deeply in debt and homeless. It is not due to lack of intelligence, ineptitude, etc. It is simply expensive to treat. So I have difficulty with the idea that our genes in no way impact this outcome. I was STAR student, a national scholarship winner, etc ad nauseum. In fact, I am in financial trouble because I figured out how to get well when that is supposedly impossible. It all came out of my pocket.
By Social Darwinism, I'm referring to the idea that 'economic outcomes make right'. If you are poor or destitute, it is because you are inferior and you deserve your plight.
It is a monstrous ideology that has produced nothing but suffering.
I am aware of that and on your side, which is why I said I hate to mention it. Even in CF circles, people hotly debate things like whether or not it is moral for a couple to have more kids after having a child with CF, knowing they could have another child with a tortorous, incurable condition. I had my sons well before I had a diagnosis, so I never wrestled with that question. I understand why people would not want to knowingly inflict such a thing on a loved one. But it easily becomes a slippery slope of "people like you should not reproduce". However, I also feel strongly that you do not get good solutions by claiming genetics play no role, merely to try to avoid a political hot button. Life tends to be a bit more complicated than bigots or people with a political agenda want it to be.
Interesting. I didn't mean to discount that possibility and my strong reaction to the GP's implication was in the opposite direction as my comment looks in retrospect. I think health issues are a huge cause of poverty for families that were uninsured or didn't have sufficient coverage and I could definitely understand that happening with congenital cases. I'm sorry I came across so un-understanding, I was reading the parent-parent comment as "people are born lazy" which I found myself annoyed at. There are a lot of "poor people get what they deserve/are lazy" comments here that are dressed up to seem nicer (that frustrate me) and sadly I managed to (to you at least) come off even more sourly because I didn't express myself properly. Apologies.
No, not at all. I just hate to say it because it does potentially reinforce social darwinism. The reality is that there is some evidence that genetic disorders also correlate to high iq. In other words, it is very likely that my mental ability to solve my problem is rooted in the genetic disorder I have. So I hate listing it as evidence which might empower bigotry and the like. I am different from other people. That has its good points and bad points. But it definitely is the crux of my financial problems.
There are also step functions when dogma comes into the question. Copernicus and Galileo were both right about heliocentrism, but when heliocentrism was politically incorrect, the scientific consensus was wrong.
This seems to be a nonsequitor. "Social Darwinism" isn't a single coherent movement, but those who have espoused it in various forms have only occasionally been specifically concerned with the mechanism as far as I can tell. The grandparent just said "evolution" and spoke of adaptation.
That's quite a general statement for the discussion here, which you then use to make a specific conclusion about the human behavioral issue under discussion in this thread. Could you kindly fill out the reasoning steps you are implicitly following with more citations to research on each factual assertion you are relying on?
even though their standard of living is rising continually
This is generally correct. A popular book on the issue (I don't endorse ALL its conclusions, but I like its citation of many different reliable references) is The Rational Optimist.
It's pretty simple: Humans are diverse. Evolution created humans. Therefore, evolution created human diversity. "Encourages" is perhaps the wrong word--evolution really produces diversity because it responds to the diverse conditions of the earth.
However, this is just background color, it doesn't change the argument. As long as humans are generically and epigenetically diverse there will be differences in fitness. In capitalist societies it makes people more or less wealthy; in other societies it makes them more or less powerful, or influential, or with more or less social status. There are other factors that can make someone poor but this one seems impossoble to completely remedy.
When you say "it's pretty simple: Humans are diverse" you are still making a pretty nebulous statement. What does diversity even mean there? On what basis are you resting your argument that evolution created human diversity, and is not in fact working against it? How do you compare genetic diversity to socioeconomic diversity in a way that is useful or sheds light on their actual relationship?
There is no question genetics play a role, the question is how big of a role do they play? You haven't gotten anywhere close to answering that.
umm.. no evolution does not encourage diversity. "encourage" implies that there is some sort of hierarchy or level in terms of evolution, and there isn't.
These sorts of points are silly, and wrong. If the general tendency of life under evolutionary processes is "diversity", through whatever natural processes are at play, then its reasonable to say in common language that "evolution encourages diversity".
Personally, I disagree that evolution encourages diversity. It seems to me that diversity occurs in spite of it, as a result of our ever changing, dynamic, earth.
Your body system has something called the major histocompatibility complex. The MHC collects proteins from parasites and shows them to the immune system to start a counterattack. If everybody had the same MHC, a virus that figured out how to evade it would be able to attack with impunity. So the MHC genes are under tremendous selective pressure to to evolve variety, and there are a huge number of mutants out there in the population.
Consider a genetic variation that if you inherit one copy you communicate well but if you inherit two copies you stutter. Communicating well will be selected for, but stuttering will be selected against. If the probability of having one copy is P, then the probability of having two copies is P squared. For example, if 5% of people have one copy, then 0.25% will have two. The variation will be selected for until it is so common that the gain in fitness for one-copy people is balanced by the loss in fitness two-copy people. (The real situation is more complicated, since variations in many genes interact to affect each other's fitness.)
