[foltik]

Humans don’t have a single utility function like bacteria adapting to antibiotics do. When one constraint is relaxed, a fractal of others emerges. Behavior dominates any evolutionary effect. That’s exactly what we observe in rich societies.

You never articulate why reproduction would become the dominant axis of selection, except by assuming it from the start. People empirically do not behave that way when material constraints are relaxed.

> the process of evolution is necessarily actuated through suffering

That’s a quasi-religious claim. At that point you’re no longer arguing “this will happen,” but rather “this must not happen,” because abundance threatens a worldview where hierarchy and enforced struggle are what give life meaning. That’s not “the big picture,” it’s your big picture.

Look at the last thousand years. We’ve removed famine, plague, illiteracy, and constant violence, once considered inevitable and essential to discipline and social order. Society didn’t collapse into meaningless each time those went away; we simply gained more freedom to choose for ourselves what gives life meaning.