As Guilty as Gets…Born

[Mitch Bass]

Not many thousands of years ago, there were two human like beings. One type being more savage than the other was able to dominate and reproduce. We are decendants from these more savage, hostile beings. Humans kill more of their own kind than any other animal. Does anyone disagree that nature has designed humans to be the most hostile animals on our world and only through how humans are raised do we seem to have anything like caring and kindness?

[Fuzzwood]

Nature didn't design anything. Don't pretend that evolution had any kind of conscious.

 

Also it seems that the more social archetype actually survived. The Neanderthaler tribes were self-sustaining and there was little to no interaction between settlements, in contrast to the homo-erectus tribes that got a very primitive foreign aid going (one village helps another through a harsh winter and the first village is bound to receive help when they need it from the other village).

Edited May 23, 2014 by Fuzzwood

[Mitch Bass]

Nature didn't design anything. Don't pretend that evolution had any kind of conscious.

 

Hmm…interesting…I could see how my words could be horribly misinterperted. I never meant to suggest that evolution had a consciousness, but did you or do you not agree that evolution is process?

[Fuzzwood]

No harm done and I agree. Indeed, it is a process and many of its footprints and changes can be tracked by means of fossils. However, it is not a process towards a set end goal nor will it ever be 'complete'.

Edited May 23, 2014 by Fuzzwood

[Phi for All]

I don't like the perspective from here.

 

The selection for high intelligence brought both good and bad, which is common among traits. And some of the traits we consider good can be bad as well, and I think that's the perspective needed here.

 

Humans form loyalties more strongly than other animals, even loyalties to other humans we've never met, and those loyalties cause us to fight beyond where other animals would run away to lick their wounds. Humans will often fight until death is the outcome, and continue to fight even then. It's our loyalty to family, friends, country, even concepts like liberty that sometimes push us to extreme behavior.

 

Our intelligence also helps us understand how ethical treatment between humans stems from our cooperative and collaborative natures. So yes, raising children to recognize the need for caring and kindness is essential, because it's a big part of what keeps all our marvelous traits working together so productively.

[CharonY]

 

Humans form loyalties more strongly than other animals

 

I would rather say "than some other animals". Social behavior can be found in many species and I am pretty sure we share some basic mechanics that make us want to be social (as opposed to primarily solitary animals).

Edited May 23, 2014 by CharonY

[Phi for All]

 

I would rather say "than some other animals". Social behavior can be found in many species and I am pretty sure we share some basic mechanics that make us want to be social (as opposed to primarily solitary animals).

 

Point taken. Perhaps I'm placing too much emphasis on how our high intelligence can distort what would be normal in other species. We're certainly not the only animals that show loyalty, but I think we take loyalty to a degree other social animals don't.

 

There are other humans defending me right now that have never met me, never will, who would risk their lives to ensure that I'm safe. I'm willing to share my resources with those humans and I've never met them either. And I'm willing to extend that loyalty in varying degrees to hundreds of millions of fellow humans. If the whole planet were threatened, there could be billions of us working as a species to meet it.

[CharonY]

It is going slightly off-topic here, but there are mechanisms that are even stronger than our feeling loyalty. Social insects die for their hive, for example. Vampire bats would sacrifice valuable nutrients to feed non-related individuals, each act at the potential loss of their life (as blood does not hold much nutritional value) and so on. I think it is fair to say that if we look much closer at social behavior of animals (and honestly our knowledge of behavior in the wild is really limited) I am quite confident that we will see behavior that at least rival our own. We do have the ability of empathy, which appears to be an important element and so do many other social mammals.

 

What I am saying is that what we perceive as social behavior arising from intelligence, is most likely rooted in a similar mechanistic context as other organisms. We do express it differently, but then it is also because or living conditions affect the way we express it. For example, if we were organized in communities with food limitation, I am pretty sure that we would detect much more evidence of altruism based on kin selection.

[Mitch Bass]

I don't like the perspective from here.

 

The selection for high intelligence brought both good and bad, which is common among traits. And some of the traits we consider good can be bad as well, and I think that's the perspective needed here.

 

So yes, raising children to recognize the need for caring and kindness is essential, because it's a big part of what keeps all our marvelous traits working together so productively.

 

From what I have discovered about evolutionary biology, I find this response highly interesting. It seems, you are suggesting that our high intelligence made us realize that we should raise our children to recognize the advantage of caring and kindness. But then does this mean we have to teach our children to be kind and caring and as I was kind of suggesting when I opened this post, that humans are guilty of being born with a lack of kindness and caring. What is the opposite of kindness and caring. Cruelty. And this is what I was suggesting that humans are guilty of being born with.

[Ophiolite]

Cruelty is an interpretation of a behaviour. Is a lion cruel when it kills a gazelle and begins to eat it while the gazelle is still alive?

 

If we observe humans as objectively as possible, forgetting we are also human, then we see behavioural patterns of both aggression and cooperation. There is a mountain of research that indicates both of these characteristics are a consequence of genetic predispositions modified by environmental effects. (One of the big environmental effects is how other members of our species treat us, so there is plenty of room for various feedback loops - positive and negative.)

 

We could not have established the global, technological civilisation we are part of without the aggression, nor could we have done so without the cooperation. What language and culture have allowed us to do is to achieve a better balance between these two potentially opposing forces. (The upcoming soccer World Cup is an example of how this can balance can be achieved in a beneficial way.) The ongoing civil wars, terrorism, criminal activity and the like are all evidence that we have not yet mastered this balancing act.

 

The good news is that we are getting better at it.

 

(A note to Phi for All: chimpanzees so a deep sense of loyalty to members of their tribe. I suspect it is on a par with human loyalty when we first became a distinct species.)

[StringJunky]

It is going slightly off-topic here, but there are mechanisms that are even stronger than our feeling loyalty. Social insects die for their hive, for example. Vampire bats would sacrifice valuable nutrients to feed non-related individuals, each act at the potential loss of their life (as blood does not hold much nutritional value) and so on. I think it is fair to say that if we look much closer at social behavior of animals (and honestly our knowledge of behavior in the wild is really limited) I am quite confident that we will see behavior that at least rival our own. We do have the ability of empathy, which appears to be an important element and so do many other social mammals.

 

What I am saying is that what we perceive as social behavior arising from intelligence, is most likely rooted in a similar mechanistic context as other organisms. We do express it differently, but then it is also because or living conditions affect the way we express it. For example, if we were organized in communities with food limitation, I am pretty sure that we would detect much more evidence of altruism based on kin selection.

Perhaps the difference between humans and other animals, like the bats you mention, is that we have the choice to resist instinctive behaviour patterns within ourselves and select a different behavioural path whereas in most animals the behaviour is hard-wired and extant from cognition or as you put it: mechanistic.

Edited May 24, 2014 by StringJunky

[Ophiolite]

Perhaps the difference between humans and other animals, like the bats you mention, is that we have the choice to resist instinctive behaviour patterns within ourselves and select a different behavioural path whereas in most animals the behaviour is hard-wired and extant from cognition or as you put it: mechanistic.

We are certainly very good at rationalising our choices. In many instances we delude ourselves into thinking they are reasoned responses. Instinctual drives are hard to combat, else there would be fewer subscribers to on-line dating services.

[Phi for All]

It is going slightly off-topic here, but there are mechanisms that are even stronger than our feeling loyalty. Social insects die for their hive, for example. Vampire bats would sacrifice valuable nutrients to feed non-related individuals, each act at the potential loss of their life (as blood does not hold much nutritional value) and so on. I think it is fair to say that if we look much closer at social behavior of animals (and honestly our knowledge of behavior in the wild is really limited) I am quite confident that we will see behavior that at least rival our own. We do have the ability of empathy, which appears to be an important element and so do many other social mammals.

 

What I am saying is that what we perceive as social behavior arising from intelligence, is most likely rooted in a similar mechanistic context as other organisms. We do express it differently, but then it is also because or living conditions affect the way we express it. For example, if we were organized in communities with food limitation, I am pretty sure that we would detect much more evidence of altruism based on kin selection.

I agree that the roots of such behavior are the same, just that our particular combination of selected traits seems to enhance some of this social interaction to a level other animals can't reach. I suppose it's not really fair to look at it that way, since our abilities match our environments just like any other species.

 

From what I have discovered about evolutionary biology, I find this response highly interesting. It seems, you are suggesting that our high intelligence made us realize that we should raise our children to recognize the advantage of caring and kindness. But then does this mean we have to teach our children to be kind and caring and as I was kind of suggesting when I opened this post, that humans are guilty of being born with a lack of kindness and caring. What is the opposite of kindness and caring. Cruelty. And this is what I was suggesting that humans are guilty of being born with.

 

I don't think that at all. Humans are extremely cooperative, and cruelty is at odds with that. We may be cruel to those we aren't currently cooperating with, but I think our social structures tend towards nurturing and mutual benefit. In general, the cruel and unkind are punished in human societies.

 

(A note to Phi for All: chimpanzees so a deep sense of loyalty to members of their tribe. I suspect it is on a par with human loyalty when we first became a distinct species.)

Noted, and thanks to you and CharonY. I should have taken the time to be clearer about what I meant to begin with. The OP suggests we're savage and cruel right out of the box, but I think our high intelligence gives us a substantially deeper understanding of the benefits of cooperative societal behavior than other species. Chimps can be loyal to their tribe, but will the chimps from Selous Game Reserve willingly donate resources/defend/help the chimps from the Moyowosi Game Reserve simply because they're all Tanzanian chimps? Perhaps it's simply unfair to compare us to other species in this light.

[Mitch Bass]

This is my third or fourth day that I have found this scienceforum.net and I don't mean to get personal but so far every response to my oringal post has been amazingly intelligent and well thought out. I thank you all for the energy and effort you have put into the words you have written. Beng new, unknowing…I was not sure what the person in the previous post was indicating when they wrote about the OP. I am guessing it stands for "oringal poster". If someone can tell me if that is correct I would greatly appreciate it. Also on the lower right hand side of my screen it says in a box "with one checked post" if anyone can tell me what that means I would greatly appreciate this is as well.

 

If OP does stand for ORIGNAL POSTER than I can say when the OP wrote AS GUILTY AS GETS…BORN…what I was specifically suggesting that humans are born more cruel than any other animal can be. Humans alone as an animal on this planet know the pain they are inflicting and will even find it funny sometiimes. Have any of you seen "America's Funniest Home Video" where the father from fulll house 'Bob Saggat' host a show in which people try to win ten thousand dollars by sending in what will be determined as the 'funniest" video. People told me, and I actually did some research to substantiate what they were saying, that a great deal, if not a majority of the videos that were deemed the "funniest" had an element of someone getting hurt. Whether it be a father playing catch with his son and the son throws the ball hard into the father's nether regions (I am wondering where I got the term nether regions and if it means the area of the body I am indicating…between the legs….the most sensitive two things on a male body….I would be more exact but I am still a new person here and don't know the guidelines in terms of words that can and cannot be written without being offensive in this scienceforum.net.)

 

Many scorpions have deadly venom. It is a fact that the smallest of scorpions have the most potent poison. For the same governing dynamics of evolution that made it so the smallest scorpion has the deadliest venom, humans are relatively harmless and defenceless except for one aspect of our being. Like the smallest scoprpion we to have a weapon that allows us to survive and reprodcue despite our relative weaknes. This weapon is intelligence. Like the smallest scorpion that is the weakest of its kind which has the most powerful poison, humans, are the most vulnearable of all animals but humans have the most power intellect.

 

I am not speculating this part of my thinking. It is a fact, that the human baby is more helpless and more helpless for longer than any other newborn animal. We have only two real reflexes and without help, no human baby would ever survive. Yes, many animals are dependent at birth. None, though, for as long and as much as humans. And there is a reason for this and it is as follows:

 

some animals, when born, instantly are indepenedent. They are born with the relfexes to do what they must to continue to exist. Intelligence was such a powerful trait in terms of survival and reproduction, that as our evolutionary ancestors evolved, they slowly began to lose their reflexes and instead were guided by emotion. Reflex is behavior that is automatic and there is no room for intellectual decision making in a purely reflexive organism. Yet evolution gave us someething that we now have where we can use our intellect while still doing what it takes to live. So the question is what replaced our relfexes that allowed for a degree of freedom for our thoughts to guide our behavior as opposed to reflexes…the answer is something that no other animal has ...pain and the subjective experience of pleasure.

 

 

Only an organism that can feel pain can be said to be cruel. I am not speaking of being vicous, or dangerous, or destructive, I am talking about cruelty which means causing pain in another being and knowing it and for whatever selifsh reason, doing it anyway.

 

The loyalty that I have been reading about throughout this post is a result of the fact that humans can be so cruel to each other, that human loyalty evolved as an evolutionary trait to protect us from our own kind.

Edited May 24, 2014 by Mitch Bass

[Ophiolite]

I must strongly disagree with you on the point of cruelty. What you are describing as cruelty is a side effect of a sound survival instinct to shoot first and ask questions later, coupled with a perfectly reasonable distrust of the unknown i.e. a member of a tribe you are unfamiliar with.

 

Only a small proportion of humans are deliberately and consistently cruel. It is reasonably well established that these persons either lack, or have a very low capacity for empathy. We see "cruelty" practiced by our primate cousins - in particular I return to chimpanzees, with which I am most familiar. Granted we've never seen a chimp subject one of its fellows to waterboarding, but some of the interactions certainly match what I think you would call cruel were it witnessed in humans.

 

So, in summary, other animals display cruelty and much of this cruelty either has a survival value or is a side effect of behaviour that does.

[Phi for All]

Another problem I have with this perspective is that it's far too black and white in terms of what's beneficial or not in a selected trait. It almost never works that way, traits have strengths and drawbacks. Cruelty sounds harsh but has applications for defense, especially in humans who have a higher intelligence and perhaps a deeper understanding of what it means to face a cruel foe. If your tribe has a reputation for cruelly destroying tribes that resist you, how many lives are actually saved because they're all afraid to fight you?

 

Essentially, the perspective in the Opening Post is cherry-picking the aspects of a trait and judging the whole by a part, sort of a Poisoning the Well argument, or a reverse Composition fallacy. Cruelty/hostility is always bad, kindness/caring is always good. We know this isn't true, especially when we're talking about the survival of the whole species and not just individuals.

 

I'm also uncomfortable targeting individual traits and making sweeping judgements about them. It's obvious that no single trait is responsible for how we've developed (with the possible exception of walking upright, imo). It's all intertwined and cumulative.

 

As CharonY and Ophiolite have pointed out, much of what we do as humans has roots in the social behavior of of many other species, and we need to look at ourselves in that light. Life is much more nuanced than this perspective allows for. I'm learning to reevaluate my assumptions along these lines, and it isn't always easy. Take lying for example, we assume it's a bad thing in humans, but for our children, lying signals a huge developmental marker. Lying is a sign that the child is thinking ahead to the future to ensure a better outcome, and that's just one aspect of a skillset that's very important to us.

[Mitch Bass]

s

 

 

Essentially, the perspective in the Opening Post is cherry-picking the aspects of a trait and judging the whole by a part, sort of a Poisoning the Well argument, or a reverse Composition fallacy. Cruelty/hostility is always bad, kindness/caring is always good. We know this isn't true, especially when we're talking about the survival of the whole species and not just individuals.

 

Phi for All, I could be wrong but it seems you are suggesting that I have indicated that I consdier cruelty/hostily as always bad and kindness/caring as always good?

 

I have been heavily infiuenced by Fred Nietizche and have read much of his material including the Beyond Good and Evil and The Reevaluation of Values. I am no making a judgmenent call on whether being cruel is bad or being kind is good. Cruelty to enemies can save a country. Kindness is a result of the genes at a selfish level. Altruism exists because of how evolution works on the individual genetic level or just as much, humans are so physically in need of others ot survive, altruiism and kindness are traits that have resulted in because for practical self survival purposes. Human evolution has made it so that humans feel good helping other humans.

 

My point in the beginning was that the human animal being the only animal that is nearly devoid of all reflexes, is the only animal that even has the capability of being crue as I am using the word cruel. However I did not call this post As Guilty as it Gets because of the cruelty factor at all. There are many who say that humans are born innocent. I am saying that out of all the animals, humans have the least innocence because of our superior intellect. I am saying we are not innocent but take in mind that I am using this word innocence to connotate a lack of awareness.

 

In the wars the United States is fighting there is a lot of utilzed unmanned drones both that can be equipped to attack and do damage. If a drone accidentally identifies an innocent person as an enemy and fires upon them, this does not make the drone evil. The drone is unthinking and will do whatever programming guides the drones activity. A computer program is like a reflex. A reflex is like driving on road with double yellow lines. What humans and humans alone have is the intellegence to make it so that we are like on a road with broken white lines giving us options.

I must strongly disagree with you on the point of cruelty. What you are describing as cruelty is a side effect of a sound survival instinct to shoot first and ask questions later, coupled with a perfectly reasonable distrust of the unknown i.e. a member of a tribe you are unfamiliar with.

 

Only a small proportion of humans are deliberately and consistently cruel. It is reasonably well established that these persons either lack, or have a very low capacity for empathy. We see "cruelty" practiced by our primate cousins - in particular I return to chimpanzees, with which I am most familiar. Granted we've never seen a chimp subject one of its fellows to waterboarding, but some of the interactions certainly match what I think you would call cruel were it witnessed in humans.

 

So, in summary, other animals display cruelty and much of this cruelty either has a survival value or is a side effect of behaviour that does.

Perhaps the problem is that we are not using the some working defintion of the word 'cruelty". You are suggesting that other animals display cruelty and that this cruely has a survival value or is a side effect of a behavior that does. I have about three certrain believes, all else are educated guesses, conjectures, but from all I know only humans have the capacity for what I am calling cruelness or kindness because

to be cruel or kind as I am using the word, or the product of thought and feeling, neither of whch other animals have. As I said, earlier in this post an unmanned drone that because of its programming accidentally does something like identifies a group of people as terrorists when they are not, and then launches an attack upon them and destroys them all…this is not what I am considering to be cruel. Perhaps you can tell me how you are using the word cruel. As far as I can tell you are using the word to indicating any kind of behavior result in harm or destruction. If that is how you are using the word than yes, other animals can harm or destroy just as humans can. So without putting a word to this, I am just going to state that humans are born and become the only animals that have the thought and feelings to be do help or hurt. Humans have choices and therefore are responsible for what they decide.

 

 

I'm also uncomfortable targeting individual traits and making sweeping judgements about them. It's obvious that no single trait is responsible for how we've developed (with the possible exception of walking upright, imo). It's all intertwined and cumulative.i

 

I find it interesting that you consider walking upright more responsible for how we've develped than our intelligence. Humans lack the physical attributes that other animals have that allow them to survive. Our flesh is soft our weapons are sharp. Without the intellgence to create weapons to hunt or food to grow we would not be able to live as we have been doing for many thousands of years. Keep in mind, that our distant ancestors had a much greater arsenal of physical attributes to survive than we do. The smarter we got the less these attributes were passed along because without them we could still survive. Do you know that sevety four percent of the people wth an above average IQ have a reason to wear glassses while only thirty-eight percent of the average population has the use for glasses. The single trait of intelligence is responsible for how we have developed to such an extent that we have lost our reflexes and gained the potential to experience pain and the subjective experience of pleasure. If you want me to explain how the evolution of intelligence ended up causing the human animal to have the potential to feel pain and the subjective feeling of pleasure I wlll. Certainly my thinking here has nothing to do at all with the idea that Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge and then were exiled from Eden. I am a man of science and not of religion although I am spirtual.

Edited May 27, 2014 by Mitch Bass

[Ophiolite]

You make a clear distinction between the awareness of man and other animals that is not justified.

You make a clear distinction between the amount of instinctive behaviour of man compared with that of other animals that is not justified.

You make a clear distinction between the motivation of man versus that of other animals that is not justified.

 

In short, you have a flawed understanding of the distinction between humans and other animals in terms of behavioural drivers. As a consequence your conclusions - based as they are on false premises - are wrong.

[Phi for All]

Perhaps you can tell me how you are using the word cruel. As far as I can tell you are using the word to indicating any kind of behavior result in harm or destruction. If that is how you are using the word than yes, other animals can harm or destroy just as humans can. So without putting a word to this, I am just going to state that humans are born and become the only animals that have the thought and feelings to be do help or hurt. Humans have choices and therefore are responsible for what they decide.

 

"Cruel" has an emotional element to it that makes it a human concept, imo. It's not harm or destruction, it's ignoring suffering with no remorse. Plenty of animals seems cruel by this definition, but again, I think the emotional element is a completely human one.

 

There's a danger in assuming our intelligence makes us better than other animals, as others have been reminding me. We're different, but most of those differences are variations on animal behavior we observe and then paint over with human emotions and justifications. Our reasoning is more sophisticated, but there is little difference in the underlying mechanisms. We're animals too.

 

I find it interesting that you consider walking upright more responsible for how we've develped than our intelligence. Humans lack the physical attributes that other animals have that allow them to survive. Our flesh is soft our weapons are sharp. Without the intellgence to create weapons to hunt or food to grow we would not be able to live as we have been doing for many thousands of years.

 

 

Well, evolution doesn't focus on a single attribute. Many traits are dependent on the presence of other traits. But I think if you were to look at a single event that helped make all the others possible, it would be freeing our hands for carrying, tool use, building, digging, communicating, throwing, better field of vision, and a whole host of other benefits. We were smart enough to figure out that running on two feet was faster and let us grab more resources and run back to shelter with them, but walking upright helped us develop nimble hands for exploration and manipulation, and that made us even smarter. Our intelligence didn't reach its real potential until we mastered agriculture and animal husbandry. Not having to roam the countryside looking for food constantly gave us the time for specialization and then our intelligence really grew.

 

But intelligence grew right alongside our other traits, they all fed off each other. And none of that would be possible if we were still walking on all fours. As much as any single trait can be a game-changer, I think walking upright is the precursor to how well all our other traits developed.

[Mitch Bass]

 

 

But intelligence grew right alongside our other traits, they all fed off each other. And none of that would be possible if we were still walking on all fours. As much as any single trait can be a game-changer, I think walking upright is the precursor to how well all our other traits developed.

 

LIke the opposable thumb. The opposable thumb allowed our intelligence to create the weapons and tools and inventions that made it so we became at the top fo the food chain. But as you said , intelligence grew alongside with other traits. Which came first the opposable thumb that made intellencgence so useful that it evolved at such rate that a book such that a book was written about the how dangerous the speed of the intellectual evolution (well you know I cant of the books name right now and when i do I will talk more about this.) So a thumb as opposable as our only exits in an animal so as ourselves with the intelligence to make it an advantage. Which started first, our thumbs becomeing oppsoable or our intellligence ,,,I apoliogze…I have done so much intellectally these past few days and my brain needs to charge up again before I can consider wrting something at this point that will have the clarity I usually wish to achieve.

I will leave you with this bit of trivia you will hopefully finding at least a little amusing: Based on the dynamics of evolutiion it is not a mystery which came first the chicken or the egg. The answer…the egg.

[Phi for All]

LIke the opposable thumb. The opposable thumb allowed our intelligence to create the weapons and tools and inventions that made it so we became at the top fo the food chain.

 

Lots of animals have opposable thumbs. Lots of primates even have opposable thumbs on what we call their feet as well as their hands (two sets!), but they still walk on all fours primarily and thus don't get the benefits.

 

I'm not comfortable with the "top of the food chain" concept either. It assumes the humans have everything they need to hunt, which in our case is several other humans, terrain that favors us, and at least some rudimentary tools if not modern firearms. Would you be "at the top of the food chain" if I dropped you alone near a waterhole in the African savannah?

 

Humans kill more of their own kind than any other animal.

 

Citation needed. Some snakes only eat other snakes. The insect world can be extremely violent towards same species. Birds kill each other over territorial disputes as well. Considering chickens outnumber humans almost 3:1, and nobody investigates the death of a chicken, I'd have to say there is a lot more possibility for genocide in animals than you may think.

 

I will leave you with this bit of trivia you will hopefully finding at least a little amusing: Based on the dynamics of evolutiion it is not a mystery which came first the chicken or the egg. The answer…the egg.

 

 

Speciation: the chicken egg that got laid by a creature that was almost a chicken.

[overtone]

Humans kill more of their own kind than any other animal.

Unlikely. We have incoming dominant male lions killing all cubs, wolf packs killing trespassers, many species of are fish major predators of their own young, many large birds killing rival nestlings, and so forth. It's not as spectacular as human warfare, but it is continuous. Note that despite a lack of predation on themselves and comparatively long lifespans, big fierce animals are sparse on the landscape - what happened to the excess reproduction?

 

Humans may be the kindest animals on earth. They keep pets, rescue the injured, protect each other's children, sometimes care for complete strangers. And it works - their pets kill pests and warn of enemies, the strangers reciprocate and extend their resources, they become a pack the size of a herd.

 

It's quite possible the winners in that long ago competition between different kinds of humans were not the biggest, most violent, fiercest, etc, but the ones best at sharing and cooperationg with each other - the kindest.

Edited June 4, 2014 by overtone

[magnocrat]

The neuroscientist and famous atheist Sam Harris believes the self and free will are illusions. This could lead to us not being responsible for any of our actions we live in a deterministic universe.

Steven Pinker in his book the clean slate declares we carry a huge evolutionary baggage which influences our actions. We certainly seem to behave like intelligent animals on a survival of the fittest course of action.

[overtone]

 

 

The neuroscientist and famous atheist Sam Harris believes the self and free will are illusions.

No more so than any other perceived entities at their level. The world might indeed be definable as an illusion in some sense, but then we would need a new word for what we are calling illusions now - the stuff that, if you forget it's there, can't hurt you.

 

This could lead to us not being responsible for any of our actions we live in a deterministic universe.

This is the Newtonian error of mistaking substrate for pattern. Substrates do not cause, even, much less determine, patterns.

 

The bricks do not cause the wall.

[magnocrat]

Thanks for your comment but it lost me.

I'm an average layman with a measured IQ of around 105. Im retired and try to keep upto date with the experts as I have time. Sam Harris claims to prove this point but I must say it seems to fly in the face of common sense