Genetics prof. shares theory of evolution

By Kristen Beaumont

Daily Staff Reporter

He predicted hundreds of millions would die of starvation due to a population explosion in the 1970s and 1 billion would die in the 1980s for the same reason. Stanford Prof. Paul Erlich played out some of his other theories on cultural evolution last night in his lecture in the Rackham Graduate School.

"Everybody ought to know more about evolution. If we are going to understand who we are and where we are going, we need to understand human evolution," Erlich said.

Erlich lectured on material from his new book, titled "Human Natures: Genes, Cultures, and the Human Prospect." But Erlich, a biologist, is known for his best-selling book, "The Population Bomb," in which he made predictions on the consequences of a dwindling food supply and exponential population multiplication.

He geared last night's lecture in a much different direction.

Erlich addressed four main issues - the impact of genes on behavior, the origins of ethics, the lessons to be learned from evolution and the possibility of altering evolution to change the progression of culture.

Erlich first addressed genetic impact on cultural and social behavior. He said virtually no human behavior can be encoded in our genes because culture shapes human behavior.

"The culture an infant grows up in determines how that child will behave," he said. Erlich also stressed that if a child grows up in an adopted culture, they will adopt that culture and leave behind the culture they were actually born into.

He emphasized the importance of cultural evolution, saying, "Right now we are undergoing cultural evolution because the brain is always changing as new attitudes and behaviors are learned."

While some students expected Erlich's lecture to be biology oriented, others responded favorably to the lecture.

"I thought it was interesting how he mixed both biological sciences and social sciences in his lecture. That is not typical in science lectures," LSA sophomore Jon Sabol said.

The lecture also raised questions in students' consciences.

"In the past I haven't liked a lot of Dr. Erlich's ideas on population, but this talk was very interesting and got me thinking about the idea of genetics and society. I know there is more I need to learn about that issue now," said Mike Wagman, an SNRE senior.

Erlich talked very briefly on ethics, focusing on the idea that ethics evolve along with humans. The professor said although chimpanzees and humans are related, chimps cannot have morals and values because they don't have the language to express themselves.

The last part of Erlich's lecture addressed evolution itself and the possibility of human action altering evolution. An important aspect Erlich stressed was that the human population is very sensory reliant on eyesight.

"It's very hard to train people that things are changing if our sensory images don't notice them," he said, because humans are trained to notice certain aspects of society.

Erlich said human action can shape the idea of cultural evolution.

"There's no group like a group of young people in college that can better steer our cultural evolution," he said. He also stressed the importance of students voting in order to get the world moving in the right direction.