So we've brought up the twin characteristics observable in our ongoing existence in this particular universe: the urge to persist and the pressure to dissolve. The two forces mutually pushing against each other drive the evolutionary process.
The development of social relationship groups was an evolutionary step which provided considerable advantages in many situations. There are recognizable benefits for individuals grouping together to hunt, forage, fish, protect one another, and mutually raise their young.
But the social group itself also becomes an environment, a secondary "ecosystem" with its own pressures and challenges. It isn't enough just to be the best adapted to the conditions and changes of the physical environment, survival in a social group requires another level of adaptation and development.
Individual animals or groups of animals can be the best suited physically and genetically to survive the physical environmental pressures of their region of the universe. But if they develop the really bad habit of ignoring - or worse: taunting - angry members of their own troop or neighboring troops, they can die just as quickly as if they had no legs or no esophagus. Reproduction of their excellent genetic footprint is wiped out just as effectively.
Social awareness and social skills become hugely important for species that live and function in social groups. Social group relationships then began to drive a secondary level of evolution beyond the merely physical. One can live or die, reproduce or not reproduce, based on social conditions, relationships, and events.
The natural processes which drive the evolution of physical forms is still in play in the social environment. The urges of persistence and pressures of dissolution are still the driving factors. But the characteristics which give advantages in the social environment are now those of awareness, pattern recognition, and mental mapping. These characteristics – of careful observation of the environment, recognizing patterns and generating and maintaining mental maps of territory and events – were all very adaptive skills developed in numerous species for negotiating the physical landscape. Some social species began to apply these same skills to the landscape of the social environment – to their great advantage.
Those most aware of changing psychological conditions in the group or between groups, best at reading the intentions of the others in the social environment, most resilient in adjusting to changing social conditions, were best adapted in the social environment. In fact, even those with inferior genetics could potentially survive better in a social environment than those with stronger genetics if they had stronger social skills.
The social environment provided a protective secondary environment that had the dynamic to support and sustain members with weaker genetic constitution if those members provided a noticeable advantage in maintaining the social structure of the group which sustained all its members.
So what eggs do these particular chickens lay? See the next post.
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