Ask A Genius 1476: Human Features and Flaws: Evolutionary Strengths, Brain Bugs, and Big-Data Limits
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): Ask A Genius
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2025/08/07
Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner examine human strengths like abstract thinking, endurance, and reproductive success, alongside evolutionary flaws—such as brain vulnerabilities, adrenal overactivation, and limited big-data capacity. They explore how modern life misaligns with our biology, creating stress and irrationality, while AI emerges as our likely cognitive successor.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Structurally, what do you think are the most prominent features and bugs in human beings, in the current context?
Rick Rosner: Well, we’re small-data creatures in a big-data world. But we’re also the planet’s first generalists—and that’s why we dominate. We’re not the best at anything physically, but we have the most flexibility in our thinking.
The things we can think about are the least tied to what we are as animals. We can think about anything, and that’s led to technological dominance and easier lives for humans. So much so that we now have, what, 8.2 billion people on the planet?
Like you said earlier, almost everyone survives to childbearing age. We don’t live in the savage environments that used to kill us early. Most of us die deep into our post-reproductive years.
But there’s a limit to what our brains can do. And we’ve built our successors—machines—who are going to be better at big data analysis. That’s one of the most significant weaknesses of being human. Our strength, though, is that we can think about abstract stuff. Dogs can think about dog things, but they’re lost when it comes to human concepts.
What do you think are the biggest adaptive strengths and drawbacks?
Jacobsen: Strengths? Upright posture with flat heels is biomechanically efficient. Binocular vision. Forward-facing eyes. Large frontal lobes. And we’ve got endurance physiology—if you look at the math, we’re built for long-distance movement. Sure, lots of animals can sprint faster—horses, cheetahs—but over distance, in ancestral environments, humans could outlast predators. The idea is that a hyena might chase you and eventually tire out long before you do.
Our brain size is another key advantage, particularly in areas associated with memory, such as the hippocampus and neurogenesis.
Rosner: But one big drawback is death. We spend our entire lives gathering experience, building mental models of the world, and then—gone. All that information disappears. We can record some of it, but it’s not the same as beingthe living model.
Jacobsen: Maybe that’s nature’s way of updating the package—like a ZIP file. DNA and epigenetics work like compressed blueprints that express potential based on environmental interaction. It’s an elegant form of biological distribution—an incremental improvement system for an imperfect but adaptable organism.
Zooming out, the universe itself is running down, at least per mainstream physics. Thermodynamically, entropy is increasing. We’re heading toward what’s called “heat death.” But that’s billions of years away—even under the Big Bang model.
Locally, entropy doesn’t always increase—life itself is a kind of local reversal of entropy. But the larger trend is clear. The universe wastes more order than it preserves. nd yet biology is this fascinating attempt to preserve order—at least temporarily—using DNA and structure. Evolution is still a sloppy process. It’s not designed. It has no master plan. It just exploits every niche it can.
If it has an “agenda,” it’s total impartiality. Everything that can exist, does—or tries to.
Rosner: That leads to another category of weakness—brain vulnerabilities. We talked earlier about how easily our brains can be fooled. And some of those weaknesses are designed, especially in the sexual domain. The brain tricks us into wanting sex, even when it’s irrational. That’s adaptive in some ways, maladaptive in others.
Jacobsen: It’s a double-edged sword.
Rosner: Another strength is reproduction—we’re incredibly successful at making more of us. That’s why we’re everywhere. You’re almost asleep.
Jacobsen: Yeah, but here’s one more: our adrenal glands are too big.
Rosner: Meaning we burn out?
Jacobsen: Exactly. Back on the savannah, when your average lifespan was under 40, you needed that adrenaline spike to escape danger.
Rosner: But now, that same system gets triggered over things like bidding on eBay. I do the same—last five seconds only. And in those final 30 seconds, my heart pounds like I’m hunting or fleeing something. But all I’m doing is clicking a button. It’s absurd. But that’s how we’re wired.
Jacobsen: So, yes, I’d agree with that. There are all sorts of misalignments between what we evolved to face and what we now face in modern life. Those misalignments can debilitate us.
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