Evolution in progress?

I love NPR.  I've listened since the early 1970s, back when all you needed were two tin cans and a long hank of twine.  Back when a big contribution for the pledge drive was $30 --- a year.

So I was listening the other day and heard an interview concerning the PBS series on autism that is running this week.  It made me think about the children I've taught who were diagnosed or suspected to be on the autism spectrum.  They weren't the easiest children to teach, but they were always interesting and intriguing.

One of the factoids that emerged during that interview was that researchers have found genes and genetic markers that are associated with autism, but peculiarly enough, sometimes two parents with none of those genetic factors create children who have unique genes --- from neither parent.  That would make it a mutation.

That makes me wonder.

Just as it is always hard to see a situation you're in the middle of, wouldn't it be hard to know if we are in the middle of an evolutionary change?  Teachers and parents often joke about consulting children to get their electronics to work properly.  We are astounded at the facility they have with technology, even with little exposure.

One of the fascinating attributes of people on the autism spectrum is their intensity of attention to whatever has captured their interest.  Many of our most outstanding scientists, engineers, inventors and mathematicians are high functioning ASD folks.  (My brother sometimes refers to himself as an "aspy") It is very common for this "disorder" to be associated with extraordinary intelligence.  We are all familiar with the stereotype of the absent-minded professor ---- someone whose mind is so taken up with technical details that s/he cannot deal with people or life skills effectively.

So people who are not strong on social skills, but very adept at technology take the lead in developing the devices and systems that we are increasingly dependent on for business, education, comfort.  Social media takes the place of sociability.  Interactive software takes the place of teachers.  The loss of electricity means that the simplest transactions become arduous or even impossible. 

As technology increasingly seems to separate people on a face-to-face basis, the pace of social and technical change has jumped into high gear.  Children have never lived in a world without cell phones, personal electronics, or internet.  As humans, we are less tethered to our physical world and more bound by the reality created by our electronic connections.  Fewer people live together, smaller families abound. And even though, for now,  this is most common in the so-called developed world, it is spreading inexorably into all corners of the globe. 

I distinctly remember when I saw my first walkman.  I was at a state park in Ohio, hiking with a friend.  He pointed out an approaching young man who had headphones on as he walked, and said that was the wave of the future --- someday we'd all be walking around the world oblivious to each other and the environment around us.  He was a congenital pessimist, and has now been dead for several years, but he was an early consumer of electronics --- one of those guys on the Spectrum ---- and in that moment, showed prescience.


What do you think?  Are we in the midst of an evolutionary change?  Are we genetically selecting for less social interaction and more technical facility?  Is that what is needed in order for the species to survive?  Or is this an evolutionary dead end?