The theory of evolution, formalized by Charles Darwin, is as much theory as is the theory of gravity, or the theory of relativity. Unlike theories of physics, biological theories, and especially evolution, have been argued long and hard in socio-political arenas. Even today, evolution is not often taught in primary schools. However, evolution is the binding force of all biological research. It is the unifying theme. In paleontology, evolution gives workers a powerful way to organize the remains of past life and better understand the one history of life. The history of thought about evolution in general and paleontological contributions specifically are often useful to the workers of today. Science, like any iterative process, draws heavily from its history. It is a FACT that the earth with liquid water, is more than 3.6 billion years old. It is a FACT that cellular life has been around for at least half of that period and that organized multicellular life is at least 800 million years old. It is a FACT that major life forms now on earth were not at all represented in the past. There were no birds or mammals 250 million years ago. It is a FACT that major life forms of the past are no longer living. There used to be dinosaurs and Pithecanthropus, and there are none now. It is a FACT that all living forms come from previous living forms. Therefore, all present forms of life arose from ancestral forms that were different. Birds arose from nonbirds and humans from nonhumans. No person who pretends to any understanding of the natural world can deny these facts any more than she or he can deny that the earth is round, rotates on its axis, and revolves around the sun.
Evolution is a force than nothing can escape. Communities evolve constantly and although there is no standard of where a society should be at any given moment, communities evolve individually. Then in reaction to a developing community, people grow and change. Then in reaction to people evolving the tools that people use develop. This constant evolving usually happens so gradually and slowly that it is hard to detect. As we look back we can see the evolution is a major component of our lives. By focusing mainly on what a person needs to be an active member of society in the New England area we can see exactly how evolution takes its toll on us. Comfort, necessity and luxury are a constantly changing aspect of our society. As we look deeper into the constant changing of what a person needs to be an active member of a community we notice the continuos alteration of what exactly defines a comfort a necessity and a luxury. Comfort by definition is a condition of pleasurable ease or well being. By that definition there are endless numbers of object that could serve as a comfort. Take public transportation for example. The thought of having the train that takes us into the city is a commonly know option. Not always have people been able to choose public transportation as a method of getting to and from. Dating as far back as 1889 when the first method of public transportation was developed in Massachusetts. Before this the thought of having a bus or train run to the main areas of a community was absolutely unheard of. But in today’s society there are many people who depend of the train or bus to get to work or to school or wherever it is they are going. When exactly did public transportation change from a luxury to a comfortable part of society? We can not exactly put a date on it but as you look back in time with me we can see how slowly and unnoticeably a societies way of life can change. In conclusion a comfort to us now was at one point and time a luxury to the communities who discovered the amazing attributions that have so nicely shaped our society today.Secondly we can take this observation a little closer to today. If we look at the definition of necessity we find that it means pressing or urgent need. This is an incredibly debatable subject. Who says what is “necessary” to me is “ necessary” to you. Well I guess we can speak in broad terms that engulf the entire community. If we take computers for example we can think back about twenty of even ten years. The computer was the appliance of the rich or the important. Now not only does almost every building contain at least one computer but we leave incredibly important tasks to the computer. If we concentrate we can see that the computer is in the final period of transition between a luxury and a necessity. Let’s take nuero surgery, for examples in 90% of the operations on the human brain in Boston are assisted by computers. In that scheme of things a computer is practically a necessity. We can even take this a step further and take a guess about what the future holds. At the rate of speed in which the computer is taking over we can make an educated guess that within the next ten years computers will have made all the adjustment and become a full necessity and no longer a luxury. Lastly let’s look at a portion of our society that everyone is not lucky enough to always participate in. By definition a luxury is something inessential, usually expensive that provides pleasure and comfort. This is probably the easiest part of our society to examine. Everything in the past two categories started as a luxury and progressed their way down to necessity and even all the way down to comfort. Today’s comforts will usually end up as tomorrow’s necessity as we can see in the example of the computer. Today’s luxuries might include a fancy car or even a personal airplane. Weather element lasts thorough the transition between the luxury necessity and comfort mostly depends on the general acceptance of the majority of the population. If we think rationally we can make another educated guess that a personal air plane will never make it to be a necessity much less a comfort. But on the other hand there are some luxuries like a mechanical housekeeper (commonly known as a robot) that just might have what it takes to nestle itself into our everyday society. All in all the luxury, like all other components of society, is constantly changing and relatively difficult to pinpoint but we will see as time progresses which luxuries can stand the test of time.
Weather we are talking about computers, public transportation or even personal airplanes we can see that there are many ways to define a comfort, necessity, and a luxury. No matter how we define them it is plain to see that in our society there are all different people whom all have their own opinion of what exactly defines each of the terms listed above. Regardless of the culture, the people, and event the materialistic aspect of a society, time is and will be forever changing our life in respect for what we need to be an active member of society weather it be a luxury a necessity or a comfort.