It turns out your postcode might actually shape your destiny a fair bit more than your DNA ever will. That’s according to a new study, anyway. Where you live and who you hang around with could well a bigger say in your future than the genes you inherit. Timothy Waring, an associate professor at the University of Maine, says humans are now evolving less through biology and more through culture. He told the Daily Mail: ‘Ask yourself this – what matters more, your genes or the country where you live…?’ (Picture: Shutterstock/Bobrova Natalia)
Waring calls this shift the ‘great evolutionary transition’, a process that began when humans branched away from primates some 2.5 million years ago. But now, he says, it’s speeding up at an extraordinary rate. Everyday inventions such as glasses, vaccines and food safety systems are part of what he describes as cultural tools that ‘pre-empt natural selection on human genes’. In other words, society itself is now steering the evolutionary wheel. Not genetics. (Picture: UF Health/Jackie Hart/PA Wire)
To study this phenomenon, Waring and his colleague Zachary Wood developed something called the Evolutionary Transition in Inheritance and Individuality, or ETII. It’s a mouthful, but it basically measures how culture transforms societies into what they call ‘superorganisms’. Evolution has traditionally meant slow genetic change passed down through generations, but Waring’s team argues that cultural evolution works on fast-forward – sometimes hundreds or thousands of times quicker, in fact. (Picture: Getty Images)
That speed, the researchers say, gives modern humans a rather major advantage. Cultural evolution can make whole communities adapt to global problems far quicker than biology ever could. Disease outbreaks, climate disasters, resource shortages – these are all survival tests that used to depend on genetic luck. Now, progress spreads through shared knowledge rather than survival of the fittest. The scientists call this a move toward co-operative resilience rather than competitive selection. (Picture: Getty Images)
The idea isn’t that humans have stopped evolving biologically, but that cultural innovation has taken over as the main driver. Waring points to medical advances, hospitals and hygiene as examples that have done far more for human life expectancy than any genetic tweak, like lactose tolerance or skin colour adaptation. Our shared systems of knowledge, he says, are quietly reshaping who we are. (Picture: Getty Images)
None of this could happen alone. ‘No one person can create a computer, or become a doctor with modern scientific knowledge of health,’ Waring said. Modern progress, he argues, depends on giant webs of collaboration – groups of experts working together in precision-built systems. And as societies evolve this way, we may one day move past the idea of individual genius altogether. (Picture: Getty Images)
Wood puts it even more bluntly: ‘Cultural evolution eats genetic evolution for breakfast.’ The pair reached their conclusion by analysing historical examples such as agriculture and lawmaking and running the numbers on how cultural and biological changes spread. Their findings suggest that societies function best as teams. (Picture: Getty Images)
Not all cultural changes are helpful, though. Waring warns that some innovations might actually stunt our development. The smartphone, for example, has connected billions yet reduced our face-to-face learning – a crucial part of cultural progress. As he put it: ‘Do we rely too much on our phones? Yes, we do.’ Evolution, he reminds us, isn’t perfect. But if we understand where it’s taking us, we might stand a better chance of steering it a little more wisely. (Picture: Getty Images) Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source
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