The modern office is basically forcing humans to evolve into 'stress-proof' versions of ourselves.
March 20, 2026
Original Paper
Labour as Evolutionary Environment: Artificial Selection in Modern Ecologies
SSRN · 6321501
The Takeaway
This paper argues that rather than being finished, human evolution is being steered by the 'manufactured niche' of the workplace. Conditions like chronic stress and artificial lighting act as selective pressures, favoring individuals whose biology can tolerate these extremes and effectively 'breeding' the future workforce for productivity.
From the abstract
Human labour and human biology co-evolved for millennia, but contemporary workplaces impose conditions that contradict the evolutionary traits shaped over millions of years. Conditions such as sedentary behaviour, artificial lighting, sensory restriction, emotional suppression and chronic stress create a manufactured niche that disrupts systems such as circadian rhythms, metabolism, vision and stress physiology. This paper argues that such environments function as active artificial selection reg