Human Species May Split In Two

gEvil (beta) writes "According to an article at the BBC, an evolutionary theorist in London suggests that humanity may split into two sub-species within the next 100,000 years. From the article: 'The descendants of the genetic upper class would be tall, slim, healthy, attractive, intelligent, and creative and a far cry from the "underclass" humans who would have evolved into dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like creatures.'" No missing link here, we already have the troll-like humans to prove it.

So to be clear...

[Anonymous Coward]

Half of us will be Swedish, and the other half will be British?

Sure, the Eloi are better looking

[homerjfong]

But when the all clear sounds, which side would you want to be on?

Good timing...

[Arathon]

I guess we should all be happy we came along now. Better to be dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like creatures while it's still politically incorrect to call us such.

Hey!!

[nate nice]

As a dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like creature, I take offense to this!

Stats?

[Datamonstar]

So... what kind of stats do the short goblin-like humans get? Want to make sure I don't inadvertadly lower any of my prime skills. ;P

wait, that sounds familiar..

[sam_paris]

Mac users and PC users You work out which is which..

Fox

[DoofusOfDeath]

Hey, it's only Fox New's fault if Republicans and Democrats entirely stop cross-breeding!

(You can't call it a troll if I don't say which one becomes the upper class :p)

Re:So to be clear...

[Savage-Rabbit]

Half of us will be Swedish, and the other half will be British?

Yes and the Brits will make revolting sausages out of the Swedes and eat them with bacon and eggs.

Re:Stereotypical Predictions from Dr. Curry ...

[Anonymous Coward]

"No missing link here, we already have the troll-like humans to prove it." quote from original article.

They do, and they did not have to look very far either: Just go to arstechnica, you find the majority of their sampleset used in their forums boards members, moderators, & the owner.

Re:So to be clear...

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody tag this as Old News, please! H.G. Wells made a very similar prediction more than a century ago.

Re:Stereotypical Predictions from Dr. Curry ...

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Women: "... pert breasts" (and presumably larger/fuller too)

Boy, he really hasn't studied human beings enough, has he? First he expects smart people to be beautiful (or the converse) and now he expects large boobs to be pert?

Re:So to be clear...

[colonslashslash]

I'm British, but that was fucking hilarious. Mod up haha.

I, for one, welcome our futuristic tall, slim, attractive, intelligent and creative sauna loving meatball munching copyright infringing swashbuckling pirate blonde overlords. May death come quickly to their enemies. Yaaaaar!

Re:So to be clear...

[slughead]

Half of us will be Swedish, and the other half will be British?

From the Oh-Snap! Dept.

Re:The Time Machine

[Anonymous Coward]

How insightful of you considering the article itself mentions H. G. Wells.

Re:Confounding factors

[Anonymous Coward]

The funny thing though is that even though many folks are obsessed with image and "beauty", people will choose mates for a variety of different reasons, that sometimes boggle the mind in their complexity or pathology and as long as you have people that are..... less than attractive with large amounts of financial reserves, you will always have confounds in the system.

I whole heartedly agree. Many times a day I wonder why I married my wife.

obligatory charles heston reference

[triffid_98]

A planet where apes evolved from men?

Nova was the perfect woman. Beautiful, Compliant, Mute.

Re:So to be clear...

[Gentlewhisper]

Half of us will be Swedish, and the other half will be British?

Nah, the top half will be the Mac users. The other half will be.. you know.

Re:Fox

[slughead]

(You can't call it a troll if I don't say which one becomes the upper class :p)

Sure I can! I'm libertarian, you insensitive clod!

Cup Holders!

[the_last_tmnt]

Following his logic, we will all also grow cup holders out of our sides and men will develop urinals out of the end of their genitals.

Figures...

[scooter.higher]

Just another step towards the elimination of the middle class...

Umm...

[M0bius]

Musicians are proof of how untrue this theory is because they show time and again that the hottest of ladies will sleep with the ugliest of guys as long as they can play a guitar, normalizing the gene pool.

Troll-like humans?

[Alizarin Erythrosin]

No missing link here, we already have the troll-like humans to prove it.

Yeah, they're called politicians!

Come on... high five! Anybody?

Re:Stereotypical Predictions from Dr. Curry ...

[dumdeedum]

First he expects smart people to be beautiful (or the converse) and now he expects large boobs to be pert?

Hush up, you. They may have taken away our dreams of flying cars and houses on the Moon, but breasts that are both large and pert is a future worth fighting for!

Re:So to be clear...

[pilgrim23]

I know! lets call one group Eloi and the other...oh...say Morlocks!
after all...you are who you eat...

Re:The problem with this is

[Scrameustache]

Intelligent, creative people are far less likely to pay attention to personal appearance

In order to dissuade you from this dellusion, I direct your attention to my dearest of college discoveries: Sexy art chicks.

Home Run Time

[mattwarden]

From the article: 'The descendants of the genetic upper class would be tall, slim, healthy, attractive, intelligent, and creative and a far cry from the "underclass" humans who would have evolved into dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like creatures.

Talk about a setup. I predict 90% of the comments on this article will be modded funny (regardless of whether they actually are).

Contraception

[justin12345]

Given that contraception is the real barrier to procreation these days, I guess women will evolve to be forgetful (namely in forgetting to their pill), and men will evolve to be impulsive or stupid (too impulsive to use a condom, or too stupid to use one properly).

Wait....

A Warning that Must be Heeded

[rlp]

... ugly, squat goblin-like creatures

Yet another dire consequence of too much time playing MMORPG's. As if the recent South Park wasn't warning enough.

Wasn't this...

[Nom du Keyboard]

Wasn't this an original Star Trek episode. The Cloud Minders, if memory serves.

And IIRC, some of them (her) wasn't ugly at all!

Besides, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Each new race might find themselves quite attractive.

(Slashdot Rule #17: Any post mentioning Star Trek the original series is to automatically be modded Insightful.)

Re:Hey!!

[dbIII]

As a dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like creature, I take offense to this!

There's no point being precious about it.

Re:So to be clear...

[ehrichweiss]

The smart, beautiful and creative ones?

Re:whoever wrote the article is gay.

[Gilmoure]

I call it...Derelict [tripod.com]!

I think there will be 10 sub-species

[Cloud K]

Those who understand binary and those who don't.

*ahem*

Anyway, aren't there already 2... males and females... might as well be completely different species sometimes :P

Or, to take the controversial line, perhaps the two will be natives and immigrants :)

Re:Bush Family Trees

[Venik]

Din't do a very good job, now did he? As they say, eugenics starts at home.

Re:So to be clear...

[einhverfr]

I didn't think the morlocks made sausage.... But then it was a long time since I read the book.

Re:It's already happening

[Vicissidude]

People who succeed in the face of adversity and serious obstacles are much stronger people than those raised with a silver spoon in their mouths. You need to look no further than America's two biggest dynasties the Kennedy's and the Bush's to see the deficiencies that develop in generations raised on a silver spoon.

Or Paris Hilton vs Mr Hilton.

Re:So to be clear...

[Ray]

I think we already have ample proof that won't be the case.

I, for one, welcome our dim-witted, ugly, squat goblin-like overlords.

Re:Bush Family Trees

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

George Bush Jr's grandfather Prescott Bush ... Prescott's law partner Tighe ... Connecticut (Bush family home state) ... Prescott's boss Averell Harriman

"I...am your father's...father's...law partner's...and home state's...and boss's...ad hominem."
"So what does that make us?"
"Absolutely nothing. Which is what your argument means!"

Re:The problem with this is

[revery]

Sexy art chicks.

Ah, yes, the sort of girl who will destroy your soul and then break up with you via interpretive dance, a psychedelic barrage of Tempera paint, and a thousand posterboard paper cuts.

Re:So to be clear...

[Skevin]

> Hopefully, half of us will still have boobs.

In the USA, 65% of the population have prominent breasts. The only problem is, only 50% of the population is female.

Solomon

Re:So to be clear...

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it just me or does this sound suspiciously like what Hitler was trying to achieve with his master race?

It's just you.

Re:So to be clear...

[siriuskase]

Apple will have 50% market share?

I'm confused...

[Belial6]

My 2 year old son has been bitten by other humans 10 times in the last 12 weeks. This would indicate he is Eloi, yet, I am far to unattractive to be anything other than a Morlok. Can Morloks produce Eloi offspring? Or do the Morloks get eaten too, and Wells forgot to mention that?

If Darwin is anything to shout about...

[cryptor3]

The Chinese will survive us all without any doubt.

I like Chinese, yes I like Chinese.

Re:On a serious note, ....

[laejoh]

For one thing, they don't have the access to birth control that allows the rich and middle classes to have unlimited sex (without barrier-style birth control methods like condoms, crevical caps, and diaphrams) without pregnancies.

What's this unlimited sex you're talking about?

Re:Bush Family Trees

[Jedi Alec]

By the way: the President is not "George Bush, Jr." He is George Walker Bush. His father is George Herbert Walker Bush.

Ye what!? Grandpa Bush was a Dune fan? Next thing you're gonna tell me G.W. is Baron Harkonnen denying the Fremen their hajj and hordes of desert-dwelling bearded men will use the natural resource found in their sands as leverage.

Re:Won't matter

[chromatic]

1913 just called. It wants its historically inevitable utopianism back.

Re:Correction to Last Sentence

[fusion9290991]

just look at Paris Hilton... a classic example of wealth reaching critical mass, no matter what she does, the money rolls in. Maybe one day she can afford to have that eyelid lifted :)

Re:BBC News is going to hell.

[craagz]

I'm not saying 1000 years from now there won't be classes, but look who was in power 1000 years ago. You think their descendents are still in power?

THANK GOD

You have made my day by suggesting 1000 years from now America won't be governed by George Z. Bush

Re:Doctor dick, tits, and technology fails it.

[PlusFiveTroll]

THANKS to technology.

And beer, don't forget the beer.

Re:I'm confused...

[Fred_A]

It could be a spontaneous mutation. Go see your neighborhood geneticist (don't eat him!), he should be interested by your case. Maybe he can publish. ;)

Re:On a serious note, ....

[ErroneousBee]

Evolution is not about massive shifts in genetics within a single generation.

It can be, just look at Downs Syndrome or dwarfism or albinism to see how much a simple genetic change can cause quite large body morphisms. Imagine if some unfortunate had all 3 plus excessive hairyness. They'd look like me.

Re:whoever wrote the article is gay.

[skinfitz]

sleazebag elitists. nuff said.

Speak for yourself, shorty.

Ahh the wonders of Alcohol

[bintech]

Ok, so assuming that all this 100,000 year stuff is true and the ugly get ugly and the sexy become sexy. But don't ya think that alcohol is really the compensating control of allowing this to happen? :)

Re:On a serious note, ....

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a nice place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there.

Dude, I live here.... Can I come visit you?

Re:whoever wrote the article is gay.

[zarozarozaro]

I don't think this will ever happen, the rich love to fuck the poor.