Really, how did the human race reach this impasse

[spiderslegs]

Where PFBs, children who are too weak to hear the 'horror' of the Easter story & parties where they only eat crisps & shit have survived.

Really, we're so tragically weak, we should have died out shortly after we developed lungs.....

Very good OP. Interesting.

Certainly "childhood" is lasting through until people are in their late twenties/early thirties IME; Not a good thing in my opinion.

Completely agree OP.
Did anyone watch Horizon on evolution a few months back - sadly no longer available to watch www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00z6zc7
Short and curlies of it was that we are slowing down our own evolution thanks to our progress, ironically. So whereas our poorer and maybe weaker humans would have frozen to death in the past, now we all live in central heated bliss such Darwinian "survival of the fittest" culls are not likely in the present day.
I'm not for a moment suggesting that we give up central heating, but it's an example of how quickly we forget what was fairly recent history for humans.
IMO it's like the obsession with cleaning and killing 100% bacteria. We've annihilated our immune systems to the point that they clutch at skirt tails and squeal when a bug appears. Not to mention the over vaccinations which have now almost ensured Malaria has morphed and become stronger. And the reason? Because someone can make money out of it.

My kid is going to be in the Scouts whether she likes it or not (anyone else read that this is the first year girls have been higher in number than boys?). Hopefully then she will be a little tougher than all the ruddy "Princesses" out there

I still stand by my reasoning that if a pillock will walk out into a busy road without checking for traffic (probably with headphones on)and gets mown down, that must now be seen as Survival Of The Fittest. Surely? It's the only relative comparison to something chasing us for food.

Fab 123, does it bother you that the Nazis would have agreed with your post about the survival of the fittest?

Mmango I'm not sure you read my post properly. I specifically said "I'm not for a moment suggesting we give up central heating". I was merely pointing out that we are no evolving slower than we were because of such advancements. Please don't jump down my throat and compare my opinions to those of Nazi's .

If you haven't been keeping up on drug resistant disease then perhaps this link will help you understand my point a little before you decide I am Satan Incarnate

us.mobile.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE70B2XO20110112
Do you actually have an opinion btw?

Most people in modern society would do survive for long in a natural environment unless they are a quick learner/have some basic or advanced knowledge of survival or lucky.

Our children are basically covered in cotton wool whereas in other societies which are more in line with our ancestors children as young as 9 will be able to surpass an adult in our society with the survival ability in the wild. In such societies like those in the Amazon, some places in Africa, some places in Asia
North pole and various other places they still have pressures for survival of the fittest.

I doubt we are evolving at all we have no need to, there are no pressures to increase survival in our society. That being said there does seem to be some genetic degradation occurring it makes me wonder that no matter how advanced or successful a species there may be a time limit anyway.

Interesting Salt some kind of life cycle whereby the next main parasite comes along once we have managed to wipe ourselves out perhaps. All quite SCI-FI but does kind of make sense.

There was another programme on about how we wrap our kids in cotton wool and basically allow them near enough free reign to make decisions in the household that 30 years ago would have been unthinkable. The control has gone from the adults to children and with it any idea of authority and learning from those older than them. Alarmingly a lot of kids don't "see the point" in old people and there are now govt missions springing up to bridge the gap as the divide is so big. Obviously not everything geriatrics say is good and right, but the respect for them has diminished with this lack of communication.

Kind of reminds me of dog training courses where the trainer draws the family as the dog sees it, with him/her at the top of the pyramid. Increasingly seems to be happening with our kids.

And before I get shot down for being Victorian, I'm not suggesting we lock our kids in dungeons or anything horrific. I merely think adults need to make the rules and not the kids. We should be teaching them how to be respectful as well as how to survive - IMO it's all part of the same thing.

Children need to be gradually exposed to suffering and strife in the world. Even if they don't experience it themselves, it is important they understand that other children and adults do on a daily basis. This will give them perspective on their lot in life and appreciate how lucky they are to be born in a developed country in a loving intact family.

It is part and parcel of building up their emotional resilience to the inevitable brickbats that life will hurl at them. No matter how bad it gets, it could always get worse, far worse, so best to just gird their loins and get on with it. There are far too many unrealistic expectations and whinging going on these days.

I think generations who have lived through the war understand this. Stoicism is a cultural characteristic of the Japanese people. Some believe it is because natural disasters are very much part of the landscape of Japanese life and they are more used as a nation to loss and rebuilding. If you understand suffering and tragedy, you are less likely to focus on the tedious minutiae of your own lot.

We are not ALL tragically weak, only those of us of the urban first world.

Fab123, I would have felt less if you'd worded your post something like, "I'm not suggesting for a moment that death of 'weaker' members of society would be a good thing for the species", rather than 'I'm not suggesting for a moment we give up central heating' which is open to the interpretation that you'd just rather be warm. Really, the whole survival of the fittest thing when applied to humans has a very dodgy provenance and historical implications, as I'm sure you're aware.

Your link refers to treatments for malaria, not to vaccinations. The treatments for malaria haven't been widely misused in the way that, for example, antibiotics have been misused - they have been used to save the lives of people with malaria (hence a good thing). The malaria parasite is notoriously quick to evolve and new treatments are needed. This has nothing to do with your assertion in your first post about "over vaccination".

Incidentally, I would have agreed with you if you'd used antibiotics as an example - think superbugs. But the situation with malaria is very different, the evolution of the parasite isn't because of misuse of existing treatments.