Humans are evolving like never before… here’s what it looks like

A new study has found that where you live – and who you’re surrounded by – has a greater impact on your life than the genes you inherit.

Timothy Waring, an associate professor of economics and sustainability at the University of Maine, explained that the way humans learn, share ideas and develop innovations within their societies now appears to shape our individual futures a great deal.

‘Ask yourself this: What matters more for your personal life outcomes, the genes you are born with, or the country where you live?’ Waring told the Daily Mail. 

‘Today, your well-being is determined less and less by your personal biology and more and more by the cultural systems that surround you – your community, your nation, your technologies.’

While this phenomenon, which he has dubbed a ‘great evolutionary transition,’ has been unfolding for 2.5 million years – since humans diverged from primates – the study author argues the process is accelerating faster than ever in modern societies.

‘We see it all around us, from eyeglasses to vaccines to food safety systems – [they all comprise] group-level cultural systems that preempt natural selection on human genes,’ Waring explained.

He and fellow researcher Zachary Wood created a new concept called the Evolutionary Transition in Inheritance and Individuality (ETII) to provide a testable way to study culture’s growing influence on turning societies into ‘superorganisms.’

Evolution is the gradual process by which living things adapt and change over time through genetic traits passed from parents to offspring.

It can take thousands to tens of thousands of years for a change (like lactose tolerance) to spread widely in a population, depending on selection pressure and population size 

The new theory suggests that modern human society can speed up this process, potentially making it hundreds or thousands of times quicker, which creates large-scale changes shared across an entire group of people exposed to certain cultural traditions and new knowledge.

This, they said, could propel communities to be better equipped to solve extinction-level challenges like disease outbreaks or environmental disasters. 

While communities have shared technologies for centuries, such as indigenous groups sharing tools or farming methods, the new idea here is the scale and speed of cultural influence today.

Modern societies use advanced systems like global healthcare networks and digital communication to progress far beyond how past groups could.

While ancient conveniences like fire or spears helped early humans, Waring said the current pace and impact of cultural progress is game-changing and could continue for millions of years – quietly embedded in the everyday items people take for granted.

For example, the researchers noted that advances such as modern medicine, the creation of hospitals and widespread hygiene practices have done far more to increase human lifespan than any genetic changes seen in recent evolutionary history, such as developing a tolerance to lactose or changes in skin color to protect against UV radiation.

An important part of the progress, he said, is that this progressed development can not be done alone.

‘No one person can create a computer, or become a doctor with modern scientific knowledge of health,’ Waring told the Daily Mail.

‘These things require vast groups of experts carefully organized to achieve precision and accuracy in helping us live as individuals.’

However, Waring and Wood wrote in the journal BioScience that with this need for groups, societies could soon move away from celebrating individuality with awards like the Nobel Prize.

‘In a nutshell,’ Waring told the Daily Mail, ‘we are in the middle of this transition now, and it’s getting faster.’

‘Cultural evolution eats genetic evolution for breakfast,’ Wood said in a university release. ‘It’s not even close.’

The researchers reached their conclusion by reviewing past studies and theories, applying a mathematical formula to compare the paces of cultural and genetic change, and examining historical milestones like the rise of agriculture and written laws.

According to the ETII theory, groups in a better position to thrive as a team would be able to avoid the ‘most brutal parts’ of genetic evolution, which can include the famous ‘survival of the fittest’ theory. 

That theory of natural selection – which often refers to organisms adapting to changing environments or dying off – has been applied to early humans who competed in the fight over resources, leaving weaker competitors dead.

However, cultural evolution can also help prevent natural disasters or diseases that have wiped out large populations throughout history, such as the Black Death, which killed millions and shaped who survived to pass on their genes in the 14th century.

Vaccines and public health measures helped humans adapt to pandemics like COVID-19 much faster than genetic resistance (think, antibody development) could have evolved, saving millions of lives in just a few years.

Waring did note that some cultural innovations don’t always end up benefiting our evolutionary path.

One example he gave was overreliance on smartphones. Many people seemingly retreat from society and only communicate through their digital devices.

Overreliance on smartphones might hurt evolution by reducing face-to-face social learning, which the study saw as key to cultural growth.

‘There is nothing special about evolution – it’s not perfect, it’s not always adaptive, it doesn’t always create great outcomes, either,’ Waring told the Daily Mail.

‘Do we rely too much on our phones? Yes, we do. And if we know how cultural and technological change tends to unfold, and where it’s taking us, we can be better poised to do something about it.’