BBC News: Human Species 'may split into two'

That's interesting, there are definate possibilities, but as science moves along, we seem to be leaning towards the idea of creating the perfect child before they are even born, and if that is the case then we we would just have a large group of Eloi and an incredibly small group of Murlocks that would die off in a short period of time

Mmm...I doubt the human race will be able to hold on long enough for that to happen.

Random question...how did you set up that link to the article? What was the code you used?

This article is utter poppycock (and that's being genteel about it). The person who espoused this nonsense is named Oliver Curry, who only recently got his Ph.D. from the Government Department of the London School of Economics. What that has to do with evolution, I have no idea. He is, however, a member of the Evolutionary Moral Psychology Group, whose internet haunt I have yet to visit for fear of terminal brain damage.

In any event, Dr. Curry has a fundamental misunderstanding of not only how evolution works, but how it ties in with human society. There are groups of people that have been around for well over 10,000 years, first in my mind being Aborigines in Australia. I mean no disrespect to them, but they aren't all supermodels. Furthermore, the idea than ANY species, (even our own) has a "peak" is a dim-witted assertion and a westernized take on evolutionary "progress." In life there are those that survive and those that don't, and the most complex or intelligent do not always make the cut. Dinosaurs were highly complex and derived, but were wiped out 65 million years ago by a number of catastrophes we are still working out. Were these animals magnificient and complex? Indeed, but the only way the word "peak" should be used is in terms of biodiversity and success in the environment, not as some sort of Platonic ideal that can be fallen from.

The basis for Dr. Curry's assertions are obvious, in that Westernized society seems fascinated with tall, muscular men and silky-haired, firm-bosomed women. [Note: I've strayed from using the terms beautiful and handsome because they are relative, and indeed in the eye of the beholder. For instance, I will never understand why anyone finds Paris Hilton attractive in any measure of the imagination]. Depictions of the "elite" grace magazine covers along many a supermarket check-out lane, not to mention television, movies, music, and most forms of entertainment. Does this mean that we are artificially selecting for these traits? Hardly. The people who exhibit these ideals of "perfection" Dr. Curry describes are few and far-between, so I suppose the rest of us "goblins" will have to get by somehow? Genes are freely mixing in our society, and there is not going to be the formation of some beautiful super-race and ugly trolls below them as in the Time Machine. You know, come to think of it, someone else had the idea of actually creating a superior race, and I believe Adolf Hitler was his name. Indeed, there were quite a few people even in America who supporrted the eugenics movement, or rather, a movement to try and "perfect" ourselves. Luckily, such crackpot and ethically fallible notions have fallen out of favor, but Dr. Curry does show us the obsession with the Barbie and Ken body types the western world has.

Human society has changed greatly since the advent of agriculture, and although man transcends the connection with animals from which he was derived, this does not mean that all is fair or equal. Most of the world is struggling to meet even the most basic of needs like food, shelter, and clothing, and the environment will shape their genetic makeup along with the "privaleged" members of western society. In fact genetic change has been happening ever since the animal that would someday call itself human was born, resulting in any number of traits that make up the races today. This is not to say any group is superior or inferior to another, but that we bear the stamps of our forefathers in our DNA, and the change continues with every child being born. All the social impacts upon mate selection is too broad a topic to get into here (and I believe I've more than used up my time to comment), but if anything technology has allowed a greater mixing of different traits rather than creating one group that is ugly and another that is beautiful. Someone who spends all their time at a computer in the dark, CAN in fact marry a someone commonly looked upon as beautiful, so this idea of sexual selection being split into two distinct camps is ridiculous. People are getting together in more ways than ever before, with more geographic reach than ever before, so to me, our phenotypes will continue to produce a range from homely to gorgeous; it all works on a continuum and everyone has their own idea of beauty.

To make a long argument short, Dr. Curry has made a half-assed statement that one day all the men will look like GI-Joe and all the women will look like big-bosomed anime characters. There is nothing to support this than perhaps Dr. Curry's own wet dreams, and only goes to show that the spectre of eugenics can still rear it's ugly head once in a while to make some sort of asinine, racist statement. My comments may not be nice, but I will not abide anyone taking for granted the wonderful diversity that is Homo sapiens; something to be celebrated, not "perfected".