[erik14th]

Well, yes there is a difference, evolution works by natural selection since nature is incredibly smart and the only changes that get actualized are those that are beneficial for survival and reproduction and those that do not hinder it.

Artificially controlled selective breeding doesn't mean evolution, take for example bulldogs which have been overbred by humans that prioritized looks, so a modern bulldog's health is frail compared to its ancestors, hardly what one would call evolution.

But on the elephants case, yes it is evolution as human interference seems to be mostly as a "regular" predator.

[WhiteSage]

It depends on what you consider environment. We are part of the environment for those animals, and they have evolved to increase survival and reproduction in this environment that contains us.

The bulldog health might be frail, but as a species it thrives in this environment containing us, as you can find them all around the world. The wellbeing of the individual is not an objective of evolution, just increasing survival and reproduction in a particular environment.

[erik14th]

Clearly I'm at fault here, my comment was pure garbage, I'm sorry(I'm not being sarcastic).

But I think there's a valid point there amid the nonsense, I see a qualitative difference between natural selection such as the elephants losing their tusks and selective breeding such as the bulldog example.

Mainly due to the fact that on the first case elephants are still choosing their partners and on the latter we're forcing dogs to mate which I see as a conscious interference in the process of natural selection.

Yes, bulldogs still exist, but were we to go extinct and they'd probably go with us as our selective breeding made them dependent on our technology which I think is true for some of the domesticated animals at least.

I say nature, as in natural selection, is incredibly smart because it seems to be a system to act based on pure, cold, although short sighted logic. The advantage our intelligence have over nature's, in my perspective, is long term planning, but given a bigger context there's no objective base to claim that's actually smarter as we might be running towards our own extinction, and I believe life will survive us.

[misnome]

> nature is incredibly smart

No, nature is not smart. If some feature helps you survive - even if it would be 'judged' bad in some other context - it is being selected for. That's evolution

> a modern bulldog's health is frail compared to its ancestors, hardly what one would call evolution.

And yet here it is, survived. The difference between selective breeding and evolution is just nuance and speed really, from the fact that it has some intelligent being with 'purpose' selecting deliberately.

[thaumasiotes]

> Well, yes there is a difference, evolution works by natural selection since nature is incredibly smart

No, this is magical thinking. Evolution works by differentials in the rate of effective reproduction.

> the only changes that get actualized are those that are beneficial for survival and reproduction and those that do not hinder it.

This isn't correct.

[zorga]

> Artificially controlled selective breeding doesn't mean evolution

Selective breeding is still evolution, it's just directed evolution. It's all evolution.