Humans are cocky, plain and simple. We think we are better and smarter than every other organism on this planet. From a human perspective, we are all that and more. We have navigated the four corners of the earth, inhabited every continent, and explored and left our mark everywhere — from the ocean’s bottom to outer space.
“Survival of the fittest” is the most common phrase for the justification of human egocentrism. Being raised a vegetarian and studying Buddhist philosophy during my teenage years, I never felt this was true. Sometimes, in the midst of discussion, a friend of mine may reference the stupidity of other animals (an example being chickens and turkeys hold their beaks up to the sky in the rain and drown — which is horribly untrue, I might add). A friend might also claim how these animals essentially deserve to be eaten or out-competed by the human race.
The truth, however, is that evolution has resulted in each and every organism having specific characteristics that help it survive. Perfect? No. Adequate? You bet.
What is it about the human race that makes us special? The one thing we have going for us is our extreme cephalization, or brains, that allow us to solve problems, use tools and so on. It was only a matter of time before an organism like us came along. However, there are other organisms that do have large brains, such as parrots and octopi. Humans as a whole are not that strong and cannot outrun many predators — in this day and age, we would probably not survive in the wild.
Take a look at organisms containing chloroplasts — they can, leaving the details out, convert sunlight into a useable form of energy for their cells and basic functions.
Other organisms, such as some bacteria, can form endospores that let them withstand extremely high temperatures and chemical penetration and avoid drying out, lasting up to 11 years at a time. Humans cannot do this, because the situation never called for it. At the risk of sounding cheesy, everyone and everything is special in its own way — these “special” characteristics simply arose via evolution if the situation warranted it.
I am not trying to bash humans in any way — I simply think we need an ego check. It is at times like these where I think of the lottery and gambling.
Brought to my attention by Terry Burnham and Jay Phelan in their book “Mean Genes,” the California State Lottery consists of picking six numbers, any combination, between one and 51, and having these numbers match up to the numbers randomly drawn. Most lotteries and gambles have awful odds, yet humans do not realize it statistically — studies show that humans oftentimes
overestimate odds by more than 1,000 percent.
Perhaps this is the reason that more than $50 billion a year are lost on gambling, and perhaps it is also the reason you did not realize that the odds of winning the California lottery are one in 18 million.
Burnham and Phelan praise the statistical prowess of the woodpecker. Woodpeckers have to take their luck and guess which tree contains their next meal. However, how do they know if the tree they’re pecking on is completely empty, or if they are simply looking in a bad spot? Complex mathematics shows that in a tree with 26 holes, woodpeckers should leave after encountering six empty holes — and studies show that woodpeckers do just this. We can call woodpeckers and other organisms stupid all we want, but we will still lose to them in a game of Texas Hold ’em, no matter how good our poker face is.
In my evolutionary biology class, we learned about one of the most flawless organisms ever. This organism, nicknamed the “Darwinian Demon,” essentially maximizes all aspects of fitness, with an extremely high reproductive rate after birth, high-quality offspring and an indefinite life span. The only catch is that this organism is purely hypothetical — it cannot exist because of the tradeoffs and constraints of life. If it were to exist, it would out-compete all other organism, including humans. Humans are by no means the winners of the evolutionary race — we are no “Darwinian Demons.”
This is just an opinion of mine. People will disagree with me, saying that humans were made in the image and likeness of God, and so be it. I acknowledge that if I deny evolution and take a creationist standpoint, my argument would suddenly crumble. However, if you do take an evolutionist standpoint,
it stands that there are no such things as higher organisms. There are simply more and less complex organisms, made adequate enough to survive in their environment. Humans have no right to hold their noses up high — if we do, we just might drown in the rain.