Originally posted by dehammer:
Originally posted by Blacknad:
So what's the selective pressure? Who's eating short people?
This is more about diet and better sports science.
Blacknad
There is a mish-mash of ideas here. The fact is that in the developed world, successful people sire less progeny than do the lower social orders. Career people put off having children and are far more likely to have a single child.
The number of American women who have only one child has doubled over the last two decades http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Family/story?id=2178396&page=1 "Twenty percent of the family population is one child," Newman said. "In the major metropolitan cities, like New York and Los Angeles, that number is 30 percent. People are having children later, which leaves less time for having the second child. Housing is expensive. The divorce rate hovers at 50 percent. Often both parents are working, and child care is a factor."
In the UK, professional people seem to mostly have single children. Anecdotally - at my daughter's nursery almost all of the children have zero siblings. If you want to see who is breeding, then you have to look to those on welfare. Look at council estates where girls start having children at 14 - 16 and just carry on. Some neighbours of my parents are long term claimants of sickness benefit. They have eight children and are expecting another. People who don't work are the only ones who can afford children. At $1189 per month for my three year old's nursery fees I am in no hurry to have another.
So if, as you say, the beautiful people are getting hired, they will probably be the ones contributing less to the gene pool.
Society does not reward the faster, taller or smarter. They are the ones that will pay through their noses to bring their children up (if they do have any at all), whilst those who cannot or will not work can pop them out one after another and the state will pick up the tab.
It's something, but it's certainly not survival of the fittest.
Blacknad.
