Evolution is Stupid
We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.
-Kurt Vonnegut
Evolution is clearly real. But just because it’s real doesn’t mean it’s good. Evolution is a remarkably stupid process.
Evolution == Natural == Good?
Many say evolution is good because it’s natural. Running water isn’t natural. The fruit we eat isn’t natural. Look at what a natural banana was before we bred it for mass consumption.
If you want to understand what it’s like to be a natural human, visit uncontacted tribes. Warning: there’s a high chance that they’ll murder you. Conservative statistics say there are over 100x more homicides in Indigenous tribes than modern society. To put this in context, that’s at a rate of 10x more violent deaths than Europe experienced during the 20th century, which includes both World Wars!
It’s natural to have a high infant mortality and for women to die after childbirth. War, death, disease, and despair are natural. Fuck natural.
What’s unnatural is civilization, rational thought, human rights, and prosperity.
Evolution is Stupid
First, it’s slow. We haven't changed significantly in thousands of years. It’s why ancient philosophy is as relevant now as it was then.
Survival of the Sexiest
Survival of the fittest optimizes for those who can survive long enough to reproduce. That’s it. It’s not optimizing for fulfillment, happiness, purpose, intelligence, or contribution. Beyond minimum viable survivability, evolution becomes more survival of the sexiest. Peacocks are a classic example, but it’s seen everywhere.
Some species follow survival of the sexiest to their own extinction. It’s called runaway sexual selection; e.g., Irish elk had massive antlers selected by females as a sign of fitness. The large antlers required energy to grow and made movement and survival more difficult. RIP Irish elk.
By the Numbers
There are estimated to have been 5-50 billion total species that have ever existed. There are currently 8.7M total species on Earth. There's no other species we consider near the intelligence of homo sapiens. Evolution took out all the other homo species, e.g., Erectus, Neanderthal, Antecessor, Floreseisus. Some homo species may have been smarter, healthier, happier, more peaceful, playful, we don't know. We just know that sapiens won.
A system that, after billions of years, produced only one self-aware species that’s still alive is stupid.
Chance
Imagine a painter who spends a lifetime creating 5 billion paintings. Most of the paintings are incomplete, messy, or chaotic. They’re often nothing more than random brushstrokes on a canvas, discarded and forgotten. Among these billions of attempts, only one painting emerges that is truly beautiful, capturing the essence of life in a way that resonates with everyone who sees it.
This is evolution. A process that, after countless experiments and failures, produced one masterpiece: homo sapiens. Evolution isn’t a skilled artist with a clear vision; it’s a messy, trial-and-error process that just happened to produce something extraordinary by chance.
Autonomy
But what makes humanity unique isn’t just that we’re the one masterpiece among billions of attempts. It’s that we have the capacity to take the brush into our own hands—to create, improve, and transcend the randomness that made us. Humanity has the potential to bring order, purpose, and intentionality into the world.
Evolution is stupid, but that’s ok. We are byproducts of evolution and should understand it to understand ourselves. What makes humanity great is our ability to fight against our evolutionary instincts.