Evolution and Human Society

Today, I am going to use some fundas of evolution, psychology and wildlife behaviour to present a hypothesis. Basically, this is inspired by a training module at Forest research Institute (FRI), Dehradun organized for IRS probationers. First, the instances that triggered my thought processes...

A video of the Planet Earth series was shown to us at FRI. It was an excellent video in terms of cinematography and documentary conceptualization. Not just that, it showed in great details the mysteries of animal behaviour. Have you wondered why the peacock is more beautiful than the peahen? Why the lion looks smart and the lion ordinary? Closer still, why women need so much cosmetics to look beautiful? The answer lies in evolution.

The basic rule is survival of the fittest. Owing to this, the female has a natural tendency to choose the best mate possible to help her reproduce.Please mark that the power to choose is with the female. Since the female has the power to conceive and create life, she doesn't need any other merit. The male doesn't have this kind of power. It can reproduce only by mating with a female. And the male wants to reproduce because it wants its genes to survive. So every male tries to attract females towards itself by looking good, or doing various pranks, or even winning in a duel with other males. Male frogs attract female frogs by crocking at the top of their voice. The frog who produces the best sound is preferred by the female. In some birds, a male who is more colourful, and dances better than others is preferred by the female.


But mind you, not everytime the female gets to choose. When does the female lose her power to choose a mate? When she is under the control of a male. This was made evident from an excellent lecture on tigers delivered by prof. Y.V. Jhale of Wildlife Institute of India (WII) at FRI. While discussing tiger behaviour, he explained that tigresses mark their territory inside the forest in terms of amount of prey availability. If the density of prey is low, physical area under her control is high and vice versa. On the other hand, a tiger determines his territory by seeing the number of tigresses in the territory. So if each tigress has an area of X under herself and there are Y tigresses that the tiger wants to control sexually, then the tiger's area is X*Y. Now, how does the tiger maintain a hold over his territory? Once again it is survival of the fittest. If the tiger is strong enough, he will fend his territory against rival tigers. But if a rival tiger is stornger, he defeats this tiger in a duel and conquers the territory.

Now comes the interesting part. Suppose a the tigresses in the tiger's territory have some cubs. Now when this tiger is defeated by another tiger (or may be is killed by poachers), a new tiger comes to occupy the territory. This tiger kills all the cubs. Why? Because a tigress with cubs doesn't mate. And, reasons Prof. Jhale, the tiger 'is desperate. It wants to reproduce'. This statement is going to be the baseline on which my whole thesis is based. At this point let us draw a few conclusions:

1. The Collective Unconscious leads to evolution
One of the most controversial yet intriguing concepts in psychoanalysis is that of the collective unconscious by Carl Jung. Jung reasoned that every living being inherits a collective unconscious from its ancestors. This unconscious psyche consists of archetypes that helps one in evolution. For example, no one teaches a child to fear the dark. Fear of darkness is always there and keeps a toddler out of harm. Hence, it is functional in helping the child survive. This is an instance of many things a being doesn't learn but knows. And these archetypes, passed on from the ancestors of the species, help in survival. Hence, the collective unconscious is basic to evolution of species

2. Reproduction as an Unconscious motivation
I have already mentioned that every animal, every being, every species is desperate to reproduce. The female in every species wants to mate the best of the males and the male in every species wants to mate with (or sexually control as the case may be) as many females as possible. The female who has the power to create wants the best genes for its womb, and the male who has plenty of sperms wants to have as many of progeny as possible. But are these animals as intelligent? Are they so conscious of their genes? NO. Their nature can be explained not by any conscious motivation but by archetypes.
No species can survive without reproduction; hence the need for passing down archetypes through the collective unconscious. Every being inherits this archetype as part of the collective unconscious from the ancestors of the species. Hence, if you ask a woman what she looks for in a husband, her answer invariably revolves around intelligence, power and money. These are the fundamental elements which can help a progeny survive and prosper. The beauty is that she doesn't even know the real reason why she is impressed by these in a man! All this happens in the unconscious. A woman is more turned on by intelligence and physical strength rather than power and money. This is because power and money are derived characteristics and can be attained, but intelligence and physical strength can't be.
At this point, I would like to make an observation about love. What they call pure love doesn't really exist. The ones among you readers who consider themselves romantic will disagree vociferously, but the truth is that you are rarely aware of your unconscious. You fall in love with the person who you think can get you the best children and help rear them. There are of course many other factors in determining love, but this is a major factor (I may very well be wrong. I myself am in company of people who are exploring the spiritual and unconscious bases of love)


3. Every species evolves and dies
This is but obvious. As the fittest get to mate with women and pass on their genes, the not-so-fit genes die out in the race. Slowly but steadily one species gives rise to another species, stronger and more at comfort with the environment. The new species can better adapt to changing environments. Hence, man evolved from apes. Man has the ability to manipulate his environment in ways that no other species can. But man is not the end. Homo Sapiens will give way to another species, stronger and more powerful. This new species will be better able to adopt with nature than we can. Already we can see how fast climate is changing. As climates will become more erratic and drastic, and resources will become scarce, man won't be able to adapt. A new species will then evolve, mostly consisting of the best genes in we humans. We will be relegated to the status of apes, and they will rule.


A Hypothesis on Human Society and Evolution

Till now, I have just discussed the basics of evolution and evolutionary psychology. Now I come down to the observation I had made during a moment of introspection. And this concerns my favourite subject: sociology. Yes, society is powerful. It is an invisible, abstract entity that Durkheim had claimed controls all activities of human beings. Many scholars, through the ages, have marvelled on how something created by humans could come to influence humans so heavily. Many scholars have also marvelled at how society is self-sustaining: how it balances institutions, norms, and social behaviour in order to survive.

My argument is that society also plays against the process of evolution. The process of evolution necessitates that the best genes in a species interact to produce the fittest individuals who will then mutate. Society hampers the process of evolution by sustaining the inferior genes of homo sapiens. How does society do this?

First, society puts a tab on women's power to choose. In almost all traditional societies (other than tribal societies), there is a control over sexuality of women. In the caste system, caste endogamy is practised. That means a woman couldn't marry a person from outside her caste. Hence, if an individual from the Chandal caste has superior genes to most Brahmins, he can't pass it on to Brahmin women. Similarly, inter-tribe marriages are also prohibited to a great extent. In deed, the woman in the caste systemhas no choice regarding whom she marries. She has to marry wherever men barter her out. Arranged marriage system is a beautiful system wherein a man outsources to his mother the responsibility of getting him a beautiful wife. As a result, even an idiot good-for-nothing fellow may get a good bride (hopefully my mother will not let me down). And if this bride doesn't reproduce properly (translation: get the family male children), the good old mother helps the chap dispose of this bride and gets for him a new bride with added dowry!

The point is, society stratifies humans into groups like caste, class, race, religion etc which prohibit proper interaction, let alone ability of women to choose. Further, the religious norms and social values prevent free interaction of man and woman. By doing this society slows down the process of evolution. But for how long? Even society is changing. Societies change primarily due to physical changes and changes in ideas (the interested may refer to Ogburn's theory on material culture and non-material culture). Generation of new ideas change society. For example, the idea of India defeated the British government in colonial India. This idea was generated by reformers, journalists, and freedom fighters.

The most relevant ideas today are that of postmodernism that make norms and values irrelevant. The advent of such ideas are resisted by other ideas, such as traditional ideas that lead to fundamentalism and inidents of moral policing. But ultimately, postmodernism will dominate (none can stop an idea whose time has come) and make irrelevant most barriers. The process has already started in the western countries.Once this happens, the opposition of society to the process of evolution will diminish.

The ultimate goal of life
All of us have aspirations. Some have great expectations while some others are happy with whatever they have. Everyone has goals, some long-term while others short-term. In between all this, what may be the ultimate goal of life? Now, I won't go into the realm of spirituality, being mostly a cynic in such matters. But I will nevertheless deal lightly with some philosophical questions. In this physical world, in this world of perceived reality, we yearn for money, power, influence, sex etc. We have goals. But when we leave this world, we leave behind all this. A man's dead body needs no more than seven feet long land area. Since Hindus burn the dead, one doesn't need even that. This truth creates an unconscious fear in every human being. This unconscious fear motivates humans to yearn for procreation. Parents want to see their offsprings succeed in life. This prompts me to ask a question: Is procreation the ultimate goal of life?