Yarvinian evolution

"Yarvinian evolution" is the system by which dumb people arrive at dumb ideas instead of smart ideas because they think the dumb idea "sounds more badass".

The name is a hybrid between "Darwinian evolution" and "Yarvin" as in Curtis Yarvin, the "Dark Enlightenment" blogger-turned-philosopher whose grade-school-level dumb ideas were taken seriously by the likes of Peter Thiel and J. D. Vance.

The advent of conservative, "red pilled" or "black pilled" memes is a textbook example of Yarvinian evolution.

by snknarf- February 15, 2025

alien isolation

A great game but needs native VR support without having to install mods. The kind of game you’d play during a long flight. Amazingly doesn’t require an iPhone 15 pro or 16 to run unlike resident evil, assassin’s creed or death stranding, nine of which work on an iPhone 14 pro or regular iPhone 15 without jailbreaking.

alien isolation in VR would be awesome.

by smoking & vaping is for losers March 5, 2025

Theistic Evolution

The belief that God created life using the evolutionary process as His method. It reconciles scientific evidence for common descent with religious belief in a purposeful creator. God is the author of the natural laws that produced evolution, and possibly intervenes in subtle, non-disruptive ways. It's the "compatible update" for religious belief, where the Bible's "days" are geologic epochs and Adam is a representative figure emerging from a population of hominins.

Example: "His bumper sticker read: 'Theistic Evolutionist: God's method is smarter than your literalism.' He saw the fossil record as God's grand, slow-burn novel, with natural selection as the plot mechanism and humanity's moral sense as the climax He always intended." Theistic Evolution

by Abzugal January 30, 2026

Artificial Evolution

The guided or accelerated process of evolutionary change driven by human-designed selection pressures, rather than natural ones. This is done through direct genetic engineering (CRISPR), simulated evolution via genetic algorithms in software, or by creating controlled environments where only organisms with desired traits can survive and reproduce. The goal is to "breed" solutions—new materials, optimized proteins, or even novel lifeforms—at a pace millions of times faster than blind nature.

Artificial Evolution Example: Using a genetic algorithm to evolve the most efficient shape for a turbine blade by simulating thousands of generations of mutation and selection in a computer is Artificial Evolution. In a lab, forcing generations of bacteria to survive on toxic waste, thereby evolving strains that can clean it up, is directing evolution with a human goal.

by Abzugal Nammugal Enkigal February 3, 2026

Alien Evolution

The study of the evolutionary pathways and forces that have shaped life on other worlds, under environmental conditions utterly different from Earth's. This field theorizes about how natural selection might work in a high-gravity ocean world, under a perpetual twilight, or in a volatile, tectonically supercharged environment. It asks how sensory systems, locomotion, and intelligence might develop when the fundamental rules of the game—gravity, chemistry, energy sources—are changed.

Example: Theorizing about the Alien Evolution of the "sky-whales" of a gas giant: they might evolve hydrogen-filled bladders for buoyancy, filter-feeding on atmospheric microbes, and develop complex sonar for navigation in the perpetual clouds. It's using the logic of Darwinian evolution, but with a completely alien starting deck of environmental cards.

by Abzugal Nammugal Enkigal February 3, 2026

Community Evolution Theory

The study of how communities change and diversify over time through processes analogous to biological evolution: variation in practices, inheritance of successful norms, and selection pressures from the environment (both physical and social). It posits that communities are not static, but are subject to evolutionary forces where external challenges (resource scarcity, conflict) and internal innovation lead to the "descent with modification" of social structures, with some community forms thriving and others going extinct.

Community Evolution Theory Example: The Amish communities in North America exhibit Community Evolution. Faced with the selection pressure of modern technology, variations emerged: some groups strictly prohibit the grid ("Old Order"), others allow limited tech for business ("New Order"). These "speciated" community types inherit and modify core traditions, showing evolutionary adaptation to a changing cultural environment.

by Dumuabzu February 5, 2026

Critical Evolutionary Psychology

A critical examination of evolutionary psychology—questioning its assumptions about human nature, its methods for inferring ancestral environments, and its political implications. Critical Evolutionary Psychology asks: Are evolutionary stories just-so stories? Do they naturalize contemporary social arrangements by projecting them onto the past? How does evolutionary psychology handle cultural variation? Whose interests are served by claims that patriarchy, violence, or greed are "evolved"? Critical Evolutionary Psychology doesn't deny evolution; it insists that claims about our evolutionary past must be scrutinized for evidence, alternative explanations, and political context.

Critical Evolutionary Psychology "They claim women are naturally monogamous and men naturally promiscuous—therefore patriarchy is natural. Critical Evolutionary Psychology asks: what's the evidence? How much cultural variation is ignored? Could the same data support different stories? Evolution happened, but the stories we tell about it reflect our present, not just our past. Critical Evolutionary Psychology examines the politics behind the prehistory."

by Dumu The Void March 3, 2026