Survival of the Fittest?

Do you agree with it? Since nature really plays on that level.

 

I do in part. The idea that all life is a struggle isn't right, i'm not struggling now, the trees outside aren't struggling, and the bugs aren't either; we're all mostly just living. The struggles are brief, mostly life is pretty chill.

But yeah, that's when the selection really occurs, during the struggle. Be it a rabbit struggling to escape the fox, or the fox struggling t catch the rabbit, or the rooster struggling to impress the hen (sexual selection), only the fastest rabbits, fastest foxes, and sexiest roosters will make the cut. The rest die or don't get to breed.

 

i dont think its survival of the fittest its just survival of those who can survive. you dont have to be particularly the best of your species. the word 'fittest' has implications that divert the true nature of nature.

since species can only breed within themselves, the individuals in a species who survive for whatever reason are the ones who the species will end up being defined by.

one example that sorta shows another angle of natural selection is where a certain trait becomes a negative if too many of a species have it.

sociopaths have a unique ability overall to exert control and power over other people. so according to survival of the fittest, these people should be the ones to pass on their genes. however sociopaths can only function optimally in an environment where everyone else is not a sociopath. and so there is a self limiting factor.

its all about how things fit into their environment uniquely.

it could be said that this is merely the case whereby what trait defines the fittness is constantly changing. and this is indeed the case but i think the fact that what is fit can change depending on the individual moment means that what is fitter in one situation isnt fit in the other, and with situations continuously changing, you cant give a certain organism an inherent 'fit' status. theyre merely surviving at that moment or not surviving.

so it is those moments of 'struggle' that give a moment where an organism might NOT survive.

it just happens that overall the fittest have an advantage but that is not teh defining nature of nature, imo, but the momentary continuation of surviving, by whatever means

 

I'm not sure what you mean by "do you agree with it?"

Do I acknowledge it as the most natural state? Yes.
Do I think it is the most efficient and most beneficial state? No.

 

survival of the most adapted for their niche.

 

It can be used to predict probabilities. =)

 

Not so. The fittest survive statistically more often than the less fit. Of course, there are a range of different aspects of an organism that can be selected for simultaneously, so it's pretty complex. But it's simple logic. Faster rabbits will evade predators better (statistically, and that doesn't rule out other deaths like falling rocks or illness), and will thus survive more to breed more.

So it's true that at any given time, "unfit" individuals may survive while "fit" ones don't. But in the long run, statistically, the fit will outsurvive the less fit.

 

Exactly. It might be true, but it's trivially true.

 

And it should be pointed out that this phrase has nothing to do with evolution or Biology. It was coined by Herbert Spencer and is meant to be applied to Sociology. By "the fittest", he intended "the fittest society" not the fittest individual.

 

Errr, I thought Darwin was the one who first coined the term "natural selection" as survival of the fittest?

 

thats just a risk assessment though. you cant predict what will happen so as far as fact is concerned, its not valid. as for assessing risks, probability is of course the only thing to rely on. as far as what does happen, anything really can happen so you cant scientifically say 'the fittest survive', though you can say 'the fittest are more likely to survive'

i think theyre pretty different things

 

What survives is what survives.

It wont come as a suprise that the species best suited to any particular enviroment.
Is most likely the one to survive.

This is where humanity crossed a line. We became, through reason, able to change the enviroment to maximise our survival chances.
Evolution for humans then became.
Not the same evolution that applies to ALL OTHER THINGS.

We evolved beyond darwinian evolution.

Occam

 

the principles are the same - there are simply different struggles.

human selection has of course become another form

 

some of you seem a bit confused and since i didnt see simple explanation i thought i would provide one.
if you read alot of egghead books you will find that what that refers too is natural selection, for instance if you put a bunch cats of various sizes in a forest with alot of heavy ground cover in time there would only be small cats becouse there the ones who can reach the food source, and therefore the most fit to survive under those conditions
and humans have not reached the end of evolution, the word was a bad choice, but perhaps necasary at the time, It sounds like it means get smarter, evolve to some higher plane of consousness or some such crap. It realy just means to change, and we are most certenly doing that. we are not near as proflific as we once were, we are taller with less muscle mass, and we are aging more slowly, to a point were even puberty seems to be pushed back. who knows what the future holds for us, most likely we will intervene on natural selection and alter ourselves. and once that begins on a wide scale we will most likely be almost unrecognizable in a relativly short while

 

No.

 

the fittest do indeed survive. the vested misconception however is to equate competitive strength with this fitness. the fittest arn't always the sharpest teeth, the strongest claws, but rather those SPECIES that can coexist in ways that mutualy sustain a complex web of species, and has little to do with the fortunes of individual members of any of them.

to equate fitness with strength in this context is one of those big lies that is so easy to get away with because the context itself isn't as simple as it is so romantic to pretend that it is. or rather isn't WHAT it is so romanticly simplistic to pretend that it is.

=^^=
.../\...

 

In this context, "fit" means ability to pass on genes. That includes any means by which the organism stays alive and able to reproduce, such as ability to aquire/consume food and avoid illness. The ones who do this most efficiently are the "fittest."

Yes, I agree that it exists in nature. Do I believe that it exists in modern society? Not in the same way as in nature.

 

Survival of the fittest and natural selection are not the same thing. For example Island X has two inhabitants--the Bobs and the Neals. The Bobs are intelligent, strong, quick, and capable of manipulating their environment. The Neals are slow, unintelligent, incapable of creating technology, and continue to exist only because of a lack of natural predetors. Volcano Y exists at the center of Island X. On Tuesday, Volcano Y erupts sending a pyroclastic flow down the west side of the mountain and killing every Bob on Island X. The Neals watch this happen with dull interest and then eat some fruit. The fittest did not survive. Geographic location is luck. I could have used an asteroid collision just as easily. Survival does not necessarily signify fitness; it may simply signify luck.

Anyways, survival of the fittest was merely an excuse for one society to dominate or destroy another society. The dominating or destroying society is fitter than the society being destroyed or dominated.