Friday, July 14, 2017

Not my human evolution.

Back in December, I tweeted out some thoughts about a blog post by Jerry Coyne.

A lot of people noticed, including JC (who wrote a few response posts) and his followers (some of whom like to tell me I'm stupid).  And a lot of anthropologists, scientists, and journalists noticed too, and beyond my circles.

A page out of "Think BIG and Kick-Ass
in Business and Life" by President Business
When this happened, I was traveling with my family for the holidays, and only brought my phone, not my laptop. (Despite my laptop being more than a "work" tool, I have fierce work-life opinions so it stayed behind.)

In January, when I got back to my computer, I wrote up something that had been simmering for many years but that started really bubbling when Judd Apatow tweeted out a page on evolution from one of Trump's books, during the campaign. Then it all boiled over with the JC incident.

I knew where I wanted this essay to go and I sent it there as soon as I finished the last sentence. They said yes, then they went to work on editing and finding the right time to post when other stories wouldn't completely overshadow it.

It's up today at the Washington Post. Click on this to go there.

Warning! If you were sitting in our symposium at Evolution 2017 in Portland last month, it may give you déjà vu.


5 comments:

Jason Antrosio said...

Awesome work! Thank you so much for the ongoing and necessary work you are doing. And for getting it out there to the public. I think I was able to leave the first Washington Post comment. Hope it helps!

Jason Antrosio said...

Also I've used this article as an update to a webpage I've been working on regarding Evolution & Natural Selection Anthropologically. Thanks so much!

Holly Dunsworth said...

Thank you so much for your support and everything else, Jason!

Jason Antrosio said...

Thank you!

Ken Weiss said...

Holly,
I like to ask students who are mired in the alpha male ideology simply to take the Shopping Mall test: go and sit at a coffee shop in your nearest mall, and watch the people go by. You'll see couples, kids (i.e., reproductive success) in tow.....of all shapes, sizes, education levels, social status, visual acuity, and so on. Anyone seeing that who thinks or echoes phrases like 'survival of the fittest' needs to get a pair of glasses.

Also, the fact that we are genetically variable and statistically in Hardy Weinberg equilibrium (random mating at the gene level) shows that even if there were some truth in a given Just-So story about Trumpish males, it is nothing close to the real story. That is simply not what our patterns of variation show. And as has long been argued, the big tough guy males are often those killed first in battle, a concern for societal genetic well-being that goes back at least to Plato.