Evolutionary Trajectory: The Growth Of Information In The History And Future Of Earth (world Futures General Evolution Studies)

…[A]nd as we arrange the sequence of evolution’s advance, we discover an unsettling implication. Each step is an evolutionary curve; all steps together outline an accelerating advance for all biological evolution. Over half of the time was used to advance from procaryote to eucaryote. It took half again the time to reach the level of fish. And as the succeeding steps followed, the succession time shortened. It is the curve of an accelerating object building momentum, like a ball dropped from a height. The driving force goes unchecked; momentum sets the pace. Each major development in evolution begins slowly but, fed by its own momentum, begins to accelerate until it races to its developed state. When it reaches a final level—a high stage in evolution—the offspring of the new life form begin to repeat the cycle, evolving some feature that ultimately leads to another succeeding step. Segments of biology equilibrate and stop evolving, but the overall advance of the column does not reach equilibrium. To the contrary, it continues to accelerate stage after stage to such a rate that it suggests that the interval of man’s preeminence will be ominously short. We apparently have reached a critical point in biological evolution. Either the trend of evolution is no longer valid or a radical change in the evolutionary process is imminent. In any event, we are in the middle of something momentous that is taking place. —William Day, Genesis on Planet Earth (ch. 28, Yale University Press, 1984) The Evolutionary Trajectory THE WORLD FUTURES GENERAL EVOLUTION STUDIES A series edited by Ervin Laszlo The General Evolution Research Group The Club of Budapest VOLUME 1 NATURE AND HISTORY: THE EVOLUTIONARY APPROACH FOR SOCIAL SCIENTISTS Ignazio Masulli VOLUME 2–KEYNOTE VOLUME THE NEW EVOLUTIONARY PARADIGM Edited by Ervin Laszlo VOLUME 3 THE AGE OF BIFURCATION: UNDERSTANDING THE CHANGING WORLD Ervin Laszlo VOLUME 4 COOPERATION: BEYOND THE AGE OF COMPETITION Edited by Allan Combs VOLUME 5 THE EVOLUTION OF COGNITIVE MAPS: NEW PARADIGMS FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY Edited by Ervin Laszlo and Ignazio Masulli with Robert Artigiani and Vilmos Csányi VOLUME 6 THE EVOLVING MIND Ben Goertzel VOLUME 7 CHAOS AND THE EVOLVING ECOLOGICAL UNIVERSE Sally J.Goerner VOLUME 8 CONSTRAINTS AND POSSIBILITIES: THE EVOLUTION OF KNOWLEDGE AND THE KNOWLEDGE OF EVOLUTION Mauro Ceruti VOLUME 9 EVOLUTIONARY CHANGE: TOWARD A SYSTEMIC THEORY OF DEVELOPMENT AND MALDEVELOPMENT Aron Katsenelinboigen VOLUME 10 INSTINCT AND REVELATION: REFLECTIONS ON THE ORIGINS OF NUMINOUS PERCEPTION Alondra Yvette Oubré VOLUME 11 THE EVOLUTIONARY TRAJECTORY: THE GROWTH OF INFORMATION IN THE HISTORY AND FUTURE OF EARTH Richard L.Coren This book is part of a series. The publisher will accept continuation orders which may be cancelled at any time and which provide for automatic billing and shipping of each title in the series upon publication. Please write for details. The Evolutionary Trajectory The Growth of Information in the History and Future of Earth Richard L.Coren Drexel University Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Gordon and Breach Publishers Australia • Canada • China • France • Germany • India Japan • Luxembourg • Malaysia • The Netherlands • Russia Singapore • Switzerland • Thailand This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003. Copyright © 1998 OPA (Overseas Publishers Association) Amsterdam B.V. Published under license under the Gordon and Breach Publishers imprint. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information stora