Anyway, he still remains Homo œconomicus

Indeed; in one my text I call him/her "Homo consumer".

I think this view is a bit technocentric, though, which I try not to be in my work. I definitely think that technologies have changed and are shaping our information and communication behaviors and our way to work. they have definitely gave us access to much more information simultaneously and without major barriers connected to geography. This has definitely downsides - including the mental exhaustion that being constantly online provokes. I think we are still adapting to these changes and still finding ways to cope with them, as "homo sapiens". I definitely do not think we can talk of another species, though, as shown by the many ways people backlash from technologies, too, and find ways to control their access and use of them.

No. Perhaps you can find another word than 'species'?

'Homo online' is an original term, and it gives immediate context and meaning. So I think it's semantically sound. Homo is also definitely an animal, so that's right along the scientific consensus.

But I think that 'species' is a biological term, which requires evolution (or at least breeding) to have passed, e.g. natural selection to have taken place. The effects you describe are real and relevant and worth of study, but I would suggest using another term than 'species'.

Natural selection might occur at a later stage correlating to being online or not. But right now this is all still strictly nurture, and no nature. Contrast the term 'anthropocene' for the new era of man-made/caused climate IS used in line with older terms like pleiocene, but in contrast this is because we HAVE actually altered the atmosphere through mass CO2-emissions.

Not going/being online COULD of course start playing a role in human reproduction at a later stage. E.g. 'breeding children' through get-togethers initiated via Tinder or a similar platform becomes the norm, while strict birth control correlates heavily with completely 'off-the-grid' people. Or vice versa! So this could be investigated. I believe the current (first-world) generation has already been shown to have less sex than the previous due to increased screen time (caused by Netflix). But of course having intercourse and procreating are not the same thing if you stay strictly scientific, e.g. a much more important factor is choosing or abstaining from birth control measures.

Because you use the word IS, not WILL BE. I would suggest not bending the meaning of the word 'species'. I would consider that 'semantic laziness', and species will hopefully remain relevant for other animals. Feels more like pseudoscience to me.

I personally believe that general evolution has stopped for us humans, since we've sped up our own development/changes as a species to a much quicker time scale, but they are in cultural, scientific and artistic areas. Richard Dawkins introduced memes (instead) of genes for these cultural changes in his monumental book 'The selfish gene', so perhaps he or a fellow scientist has come up with an alternate term for 'species' as well.

Bart, I agree with most of what you say; I have a couple of remarks.

(1) I am not sure that "nature" and "nurtue" can be easily (strictly) differentiated in the context of the discourse about evolution. I cannot elaborate this now; I only mentioned the problem.

(2) I appreciate Dawkins' efforts, but I do not consider his discourse "monumental". Let me mention a paragraph from my book "Existence and Ephemerality" (Amazon/Kindle) in which I put forward a critical remark on Dawkins' discourse (in "The selfish gene").

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"If you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature", says Dawkins. "Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish" (p. 3). This claim seems clear, but it is actually problematic. Why would we - and how could we - teach "generosity and altruism" if we are "born selfish"? Creatures that are selfish have neither desire nor ability to do something like this. Dawkins does not explain well enough what selfishness and altruism mean. Let us assume that I help others because I enjoy doing this (it makes me feel superior): am I selfish or altruistic? If you say "both", this will not solve the problem. We can try to solve this problem by assuming that people have selfish and altruistic inclinations, as well as valid reasons for both kinds of behaviour. For the optimal life of individuals and community, it is necessary to keep these two inclinations (and behaviours) in an optimal proportion, in a sort of balance.

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I read Dawkins' book long ago, and I cannot say much about it now, beyond this note that I wrote at that time.

Hi Mario, Thanks for the reply. 'Monumental' indeed was subjective. Seminal is perhaps a better word.

I found altruism to be one of the main topics of Dawkin's book 'The selfish gene'. Dawkins spends paragraphs and paragraphs looking at it's pro's and cons and resulting increase and decrease of it in the population of different species. He uses the prisoner's dilemma and variations of it. As the title of the book indicates: it's the genes that he describes as selfish, not the individuals (necessarily).

The selfishness or unselfishness of an individual cannot really be traced back to the selfishness of his/her genes. The genes are always selfish (e.g. self-propagating), but the individual may be unselfish. I don't know if this is what you mean by "both". But the genes and the individual are separated by a layer of 'emergence'.

At the level of the gene there is no use for the basic human emotional response or view of 'selfishness'. You just have to accept it as a mechanism or description of the process.

I agree with Elizier Yudkoswky that using the word 'emergence' can be tricky as he argues in this article: http://lesswrong.com/lw/iv/the_futility_of_emergence/

But at least 'emergence' is a much more precise description than "both", which indeed would not be satisfactory.

Bart, thank you for your explanations. You are obviously more familiar with biology than I am. My question about a "new species" was intended in a metaphorical (hyperbolic) sense rather than in a literal sense.

Regarding Dawkins, I appreciate his discourse and energy, but as a (former) computer programmer, I hold that his discourse is not precise enough. (Imprecise programs do not work well.) Let me mention my comment on his discourse about death in his The God Delusion.

"Being dead will be no different from being unborn", says Dawkins. "I shall be just as I was in the time of William the Conqueror or the dinosaurs ... There is nothing to fear in that" (p. 357). Correct, there is nothing to fear in that, but there is a lot to regret about that. Because the situation is such as I do not want it to be. I do not want to be such as I "was" thousand years ago. That is the essence of the problem about death. Regarding fear, I fear dying as a possibly painful process, but I do not fear death; I only regret the fact that I must die and that the moment of my death is approaching. I regret the fact that I am getting older, that my health is slightly worse than thirty years ago, and that I will vanish forever. This is not a matter of fear, but of regret: of the most profound regret.

In sum, Dawkins offers me a wrong consolation. People should be taught a serious computer programming, to learn to speak in a precise way. Gods forgive mistakes, computers do not.

Regarding "emergence", this is a magic word: for me, it means something like this: "this phenomenon obviously happens (exists), but we do not have a precise explanation how & why; so, we say that it emerges".

Incidentally, it is not good to call genes selfish; to be selfish, one must be conscious, which genes are probably not.

It is wrong to call a river intelligent for the reason that it can find a sea thousand kilometres away; to be intelligent, one must be conscious, which rivers are probably not.

Anthropomorphic explanations are not good (enough).