Can Survival of the Fittest Be Overcome.

The philosopher Thomas Hobbes described early human life as "nasty, brutish, and short".  This belief is incapsulated in the Darwinian theory of the brute struggle to survive.  Everywhere in nature we see the brute struggle to survive in that all animals must eat to live.  This brute struggle is reflected in a fierce competition between and within species in which the most fit survive and the weak perish.  This struggle is referred to as the "survival of the fittest" as first coined by Herbert Spencer.  However, in modern human civilized life we see a different story.  Human civilization demonstrates a weakening of this brute comptition as reflected in written law and moral code.  While the "fit" survive, the unfit and the weak are cared for so that they may survive too.  Modern medicine has led further in the direction of promoting the lifespan of the "unfit" and has aided the fit to become even fitter.  A codified system of objective moral law and widespread belief in a deity and in particular in the West the Christian religion which teaches compassion have led to a further civilizing influence.  While wars are still fought, they have decreased in scope and become more civilized affairs governed by law and conduct.  Force is often still applied but has greatly been lessened in scope and applied in a more direct and less haphazard manner.  These civilized influences raise an interesting question.  Can man and has man overcome the law of the survival of the fittest through civilization and its objective code of morality and prohibitions?  If we believe in a God, then we can claim that indeed this is our destiny.  Until our eventual redemption, overcoming the brute struggle to survive remains our divine mission and our highest accomplishment.