Argumentative Essay: Has Human Evolution Stopped

Has Human Evolution Stopped From the start of the hominid lineage, evolution has been a significant factor to why we are the way we are today. Evolution is the change in allelic frequencies in a population over time. Recently, many have begun to question if humans have stopped evolving because of medical advancements and our culture. Many claim that evolution has come to a halt due to significant advancements in medicine and our culture. Others believe that evolution has not stopped. I believe that evolution has not come to a halt due to our culture and medical advancements because mutation, natural selection, gene flow, and genetic drift are still active forces of evolution. Just by the fact that human life is not stationary (people are born

The “thrifty gene” helps people who posses it gain weight and fat when there is a plethora of food (Diamond, 2003). This was used to help people during times of famine, but now causes cardiovascular problems and diabetes due to the plethora of food available to us now (Diamond, 2003). It also helps in areas where there is less communication to the modern world to survive when food becomes scarce. A recent adaptation is lactase persistence and lactase intolerance. The people who were associated (lived near) with domesticated cattle were able to adapt and break down sugars found in milk (Balter, 2005). Europeans were generally associated with domesticated cattle and about 70% have the lactase persistence gene (Balter). All the examples above were recent examples of selection in human history and more gene selections are stated in the chart below (Balter, 2005).

Gene flow is the migration of an organism in and out of their population to another, thereby introducing genes of a different population to the current population. 4,230 years ago, before colonization of both India and Australia, gene flow was observed between these two countries (Pugach et al., 2013). Not to mention, there was certainly gene flow during the colonization period as well. Gene flow, due to our culture is actually at an all time high as people travel all throughout the world with the use of boats and planes.

Genetic drift is also a major method of evolution. Genetic drift is the random change of gene frequency in a gene pool. Genetic drift will most likely always be present in society due to the reason that it is a random change, such as a catastrophe like a natural disaster or famine. Today, we have progressed so far as to predict when a natural disaster will occur and to better prepare for it; however, we cannot completely stop natural disasters or other types of genetic