Table Of ContentSPRINGER BRIEFS IN EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY
Ladislav Kováč
Closing Human
Evolution: Life in
the Ultimate Age
123
SpringerBriefs in Evolutionary Biology
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10207
áč
Ladislav Kov
Closing Human Evolution:
Life in the Ultimate Age
123
LadislavKováč
Faculty of NaturalSciences
Comenius University
Bratislava
Slovakia
ISSN 2192-8134 ISSN 2192-8142 (electronic)
SpringerBriefs inEvolutionary Biology
ISBN978-3-319-20659-2 ISBN978-3-319-20660-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20660-8
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About the Author
Ladislav Kováč (1932) was born in a small village in the Tatra Mountains in
Slovakia. He studied biochemistry at Charles University in Prague and became a
teacher and scientist at Comenius University in Bratislava and eventually head
of the Department of Biochemistry. In a political purge that followed the Soviet
invasion into Czechoslovakia in 1968, he was dismissed from the university and
worked as a clinical chemist in a provincial psychiatric hospital, where he learned
psychiatry, and later worked as a researcher in an institute for research on farm
animals,wherehelearnedethology.Afterthefallofthecommunistregimein1989,
hewas engaged inpolitics asMinisterofEducationandScience andindiplomacy
as Ambassador of Czechoslovakia to UNESCO, Paris. In 1993, he resumed his
positionasheadoftheDepartmentofBiochemistryatComeniusUniversityandfor
two years (1996–1998) was a visiting scientist at Konrad Lorenz Institute for
Evolution and Cognition Research in Altenberg, Austria. Since 2002 he has been
professor emeritus at Comenius University and works as a cognitive biologist.
Along with more than 200 scientific papers, he has published three books (in
Slovak):TheWheelsonanAngel:OfaCountryWhereYesterdayMeansTomorrow
(1990;apost-samizdatreportageontheRussiancommunistregime),Sublimityand
BeautyofTeacherVocation(1991),andNaturalHistoryofCommunism:Anatomy
of an Utopia (2007).
v
Prelude
One of the most popular pieces of the world’s art is the “Music for the Royal
Fireworks,” which German-born British musician George Friedrich Händel com-
posedin1749.TheworkprovidedabackgroundfortheRoyalFireworks,stagedto
celebratetheendoftheWaroftheAustrianSuccessionandthesigningofapeace
treaty. The music was performed on April 21, 1749 in the presence of King
GeorgeIIofGreatBritainandovertwelvethousandpeopleassistedatthepremière.
Anotherworkofmusic,“Mysterium”byRussiancomposerAlexanderScriabin,
maybeviewedasacounterpointtoHändel’swork.Skriabinstartedworkingonthe
compositionin1903,butitwasincompleteatthetimeofhisdeathin1915.Ittook
28 years of another composer, Alexander Nemtin, to finalize the sketches of
Skriabinandmakeoutofthema3-h-longworkknownunderthename“Universe”.
Scriabin’sdreamwastoperformthe“Mysterium”inthefoothillsoftheHimalayas.
The spectacle should have lasted for 7 days. Thousands of participants, clad in
whiterobes,wouldintonetheartist’ssongs,accompaniedwithamajesticorchestra.
Heplannedthattheworkwouldbeanorgyofsenses,thesensesofsmellandtouch
complementing vision and hearing. The ecstatic performance would culminate in
closingtheextantworld.InScriabin’sfancy,humanegoswoulddematerializeand
the human race eventually replaced by “noble beings.”1
Attheoutsetofthethirdmillennium,mankindhasenteredtheultimatephaseof
its evolution as a biological species. In view of biochemist Christian de Duve, life
appearstobea“cosmicimperative,”takingplaceatanyspotoftheuniversewhere
appropriateenvironmentalconditionspermitit(DeDuve 1995). Wemayconceive
evolutionasfumbling inamaze withmyriad ofblind alleys, gradually layingnew
hierarchical levels over the original groundwork. Humans emerged as a unique
biologicalspecieswiththecapacitytoexperienceemotionsconsciouslyasfeelings,
andsubjecttoemotional,cultural,andtechno-scientificevolutionsthatcomplement
1Information on the musical works of Händel, Skriabin and Nemtin is easily accessible on the
Internet. A comprehensive analysis of Skriabin and his mysticism was made by Boris De
Schloezer(1987).
vii
viii Prelude
thebiologicalevolution.Theentireevolutionfromitsstarthasexhibitedhyperbolic
dynamics, with doubling times becoming ever shorter. The dynamics of culture,
economy, and technology produce complexity that exceeds the human capacity to
understandandcontrolandisthemaincauseofthetwilightofhumanity(toreferto
another musician, Richard Wagner, as a pun on the title of his opera, “Twilight
of the Gods”). On the other hand, vibrant and brilliant exuberance of human feats
that illuminate the twilight may be metaphorically likened to the fireworks.
A novel role of humanists—scientists turned intellectuals—is to analyze the
consequencesoftheastoundingdynamicsand,byattachingvaluestoaccumulating
piecesofknowledge,maketheultimatephasesublimeandpassablewithminimum
political and social tensions. To achieve this, some fundamental tenets of the
Western thought, on which science has been grounded, should be reconsidered.
Speciesextinctionshouldbetakenasthefactofevolution.Insurmountablebarriers
tohumancomprehensionoftheworldshouldbehighlightedandfaithinunlimited
power of human reason and illusions about eternity and immortality abandoned.
Temporariness, which bestows upon human life its value and meaning, should
becomethefoundationstoneofanewsupremeandoptimistichumanism.However,
shorttheultimatephasemaybe,theperennialdreamofachievinguniversalhuman
happiness needs rethinking and revaluation.
Accordingly, scientists at a par with artists should participate in creating a
“music for the fireworks.” Humans cannot rule the world dynamics and to per-
ceptibly affect its direction. But intellectuals by their opinions can modulate
behaviors of individuals and consequently collective actions: the vision of a
moderate closing the life path of humanity, if amply disseminated and predomi-
natingoverotheralternatives,mayfacilitatelivingintheultimatephase.Thisbook
may be seen as an incipient part of this endeavor. It is no science fiction, but a
scientific reflection on the present and future of humanity.
References
DeDuveC(1995)Vitaldust:lifeascosmicimperative.BasicBooks,NewYork
DeSchloezerB(1987)Scriabin:artistandmystic.UniversityofCaliforniaPress,OaklandCA
Contents
Prelude. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
First Movement. Life as a Cosmic Imperative. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1 The Prime Question . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2 Macroworld and Microworld. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
3 Entropy and Probability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4 The Supreme Law: Maximum Entropy Production. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
5 The Ontic Principle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
6 Frustration: A Hallmark of Life. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
7 Darwin and Entropy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
8 Creative Evolution. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
9 Evolution of Life Is the Evolution of Cognition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
10 Evolution of the Universe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
11 The Epistemic Principle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Second Movement. Evolutionary Uniqueness of Humans. . . . . . . . . . . 37
1 A Transcending Dung-Beetle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
2 The Uniqueness of Humans. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3 Animal Artifaciens. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4 Animal Symbolicum. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
5 Hypersocial Animal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
6 Driving Force: Emotions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
7 Feelings and Meaning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
8 Runaway of Emotional Evolution: Hedonotaxis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
9 Toward Hedonic Fitness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
10 Alterocentrism. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
11 Living in Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
ix
x Contents
12 Paravolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
13 Artificial Hedonia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
14 Animal Artifactum. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Third Movement. The Ultimate Optimism: Finitics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
1 Unwearied Dreams of Technooptimists. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
2 Technooptimistic Fallacy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
3 Gloomy Doomsayers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
4 The Twilight of Humanity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
5 The Climax of Human Evolution. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
6 The Uncertainty of the Ultimate Age . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
7 Silentium Universi. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
8 Finitics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Finale. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
