The Black HunterThe key is a minimum of compromise, and a simple,unimpeachable reason to existRegistered Userregular
edited June 2007
My worry is the teenagers, the kids under 16 mostly.
They are being brought up in a cushion coated "It's the adults fault" world.
All these kids are learning is that it is always someone elses fault.
Parents can't discipline, you can sue someone for knocking over your drink and you can't have opinions different to anyone elses around you, otherwise you are a sheep, a government lover and religious.
Yes, but that is because the gene is selfish, not you.
Animals partake in altruism even though they themselves, as individuals, pay the whole cost and gain zero benefit. You are right, the point of altruism is to increase the chances of your genes surviving and being passed on, but if the "self" we are talking about is the individual, then the statement "all actions are selfish" is wrong.
So basically this explains why we are naturally inclined to sacrifice ourselves to protect the children we already have instead of going 'fuck it, I can just go make some new ones'.
Anyways, you still have a choice, but it is also still a self-serving sacrifice. What would the consequence be if you did not let the gene win out? You would live your life in regret and misery. Also the gene is part of you, so you can't detach it from the individual. It's like saying I am not a pessimist, only a portion of my brain is.
No, the point is that you have to ask yourself on what level in the biological hierarchy the target of selection is for altruism. And the answer is, on the level of the gene, not on the level of the individual or the group.
I would have done the simpler argument for everyone being selfish. Namely, that even completely 'altruistic' actions give the altruists warm fuzzies, or reinforce their positive self-images, or make them feel they've done their duty. That one is just semantics, though, because we generally consider people who enjoy doing good to be good people.
Yes, but that is because the gene is selfish, not you.
Animals partake in altruism even though they themselves, as individuals, pay the whole cost and gain zero benefit. You are right, the point of altruism is to increase the chances of your genes surviving and being passed on, but if the "self" we are talking about is the individual, then the statement "all actions are selfish" is wrong.
So basically this explains why we are naturally inclined to sacrifice ourselves to protect the children we already have instead of going 'fuck it, I can just go make some new ones'.
Anyways, you still have a choice, but it is also still a self-serving sacrifice. What would the consequence be if you did not let the gene win out? You would live your life in regret and misery. Also the gene is part of you, so you can't detach it from the individual. It's like saying I am not a pessimist, only a portion of my brain is.
No, the point is that you have to ask yourself on what level in the biological hierarchy the target of selection is for altruism. And the answer is, on the level of the gene, not on the level of the individual or the group.
I would have done the simpler argument for everyone being selfish. Namely, that even completely 'altruistic' actions give the altruists warm fuzzies, or reinforce their positive self-images, or make them feel they've done their duty. That one is just semantics, though, because we generally consider people who enjoy doing good to be good people.
Black Hunter: :?:
Selfishness as popularly applied is virtually code for "sociopath"
Selfishness as popularly applied is virtually code for "sociopath"
I don't really meet sociopaths, or indeed people who don't get warm fuzzies from being nice. I guess that can be an optimistic world-view, if I think about it right. The trick is just engaging people's sympathies--there's no question of whether they (mostly) have them. You're right, though.
I dunno, it seems like, by any reasonable measure that the average person's life is likely far better today than it ever has been in the course of human history. Things aren't getting worse, they're constantly getting better and better.
Of course, I'm also in the middle of reading the Singularity is Near, so I'm anything but pessimistic about the future at the moment.
Pessimism's strength is its accuracy. The world is more bad than good unless you modify your perceptions with the specific end of making the good things more noticeable or important to you. This is necessary for a healthy mind, but it also is lying to yourself. I thought I was just being depressing in thinking this, until I read a very interesting book, Stumbling on Happiness by psychologist Daniel Gilbert. Amusingly, though, to be healthy, it's also necessary that we are unaware that we're lying to ourselves.
Optimism's strength is that it allows its believers to be constructive, and eventually accomplish things. These things are neither as special nor important as optimists believe, but they do get a lot more done.
I am really unsure about the future, but sure as hell parlty scared, because of new technology which will be reaching levels beyong anything in the past.
We will (as mentioned) be able to genetically engineer things, I don't really mind making food work better, but inevitably we will start modifying humans, and in the hands of an oppressive regime, or indeed a corrupt regime, the effects of this ... well fuck. I don't want to think about it. Even in a non oppressive regime the effects can be terrible, the class devide will be solidified in ways unimaginable.
Essentially the technologies of oppression will be so refined I begin to fear a revolt will be made impossible in any nation.
And then you have Robots, and this I am not sure how I feel about, I think they are going to be inevitable, we're going to invent some form of AI, and it will inevitably surpass the biological human braun, probably even after it has been genetically improved. What the hell will that lead to? robot wars? human meshing with robots to form cyborgs, or entirely moving our conciousness into mechanical thingers?
That's not so scary though...
A more direct worry is the further weakening of democratic institutions and increased power in the private sectors.
I guess we'll see though
fjafjan on
Yepp, THE Fjafjan (who's THE fjafjan?)
- "Proving once again the deadliest animal of all ... is the Zoo Keeper" - Philip J Fry
And about the selfish thing, yeah. Everyone serves themselves. If you act to the benefit of others you're really acting to please yourself. It's a tendency of human beings to act only in the interest of their own motives. But in that standard there are such things are selfish and assholish motives, like not appreciating the existence of other things besides yourself. Just because we're all selfish doesn't mean that guy isn't a jackass. But I don't think Mr. Jucar was trying to say that, only that we act in the interest of our own motives, which can be varied to some degree but mostly serve our own existence. Because if they don't, we don't exist to point out our awesome goodness to everyone.
Edit: And all this is worth pointing out because so many people like to pretend that their innocuous selfishness is really them being good people.
Pessimism's strength is its accuracy. The world is more bad than good unless you modify your perceptions with the specific end of making the good things more noticeable or important to you. This is necessary for a healthy mind, but it also is lying to yourself. I thought I was just being depressing in thinking this, until I read a very interesting book, Stumbling on Happiness by psychologist Daniel Gilbert. Amusingly, though, to be healthy, it's also necessary that we are unaware that we're lying to ourselves.
Optimism's strength is that it allows its believers to be constructive, and eventually accomplish things. These things are neither as special nor important as optimists believe, but they do get a lot more done.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
People use 'ironic' because the actual word sucks. There's a real urge to find a better word than 'coincidental'. 'Coincidence' is more like a slur against religion these days. It doesn't evoke any humor.
Pessimism's strength is its accuracy. The world is more bad than good unless you modify your perceptions with the specific end of making the good things more noticeable or important to you. This is necessary for a healthy mind, but it also is lying to yourself. I thought I was just being depressing in thinking this, until I read a very interesting book, Stumbling on Happiness by psychologist Daniel Gilbert. Amusingly, though, to be healthy, it's also necessary that we are unaware that we're lying to ourselves.
Optimism's strength is that it allows its believers to be constructive, and eventually accomplish things. These things are neither as special nor important as optimists believe, but they do get a lot more done.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
Pessimism's strength is its accuracy. The world is more bad than good unless you modify your perceptions with the specific end of making the good things more noticeable or important to you. This is necessary for a healthy mind, but it also is lying to yourself. I thought I was just being depressing in thinking this, until I read a very interesting book, Stumbling on Happiness by psychologist Daniel Gilbert. Amusingly, though, to be healthy, it's also necessary that we are unaware that we're lying to ourselves.
Optimism's strength is that it allows its believers to be constructive, and eventually accomplish things. These things are neither as special nor important as optimists believe, but they do get a lot more done.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
Well I'm not so pessimistic as to think things are going to go back to 1500 type humanity.
But our current lifestyle is simply not sustainable. We consume such a rediculous amount of resources in the west. As resources diminish, and others (China, India, etc) begin to consume at an ever increasing rate, we will have no choice but to consume less. Which will mean more expensive everything. So no more SUVs, 3 car driveways, regular flights, wasting huge amounts of food, power so cheap its almost free.
And for that aspect, I think that will be a good thing.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
I think over any 50 year stretch of time, you're generally hard-pressed to find things not having improved. Both globally and on a local scale. Unless your choice of time period ends in a civil war, or something, things improve.
Really, I've just never gotten this sort of pessimism. I suspect it's largely a function of kids growing up and suddenly realizing the world is not all gumdrops and blowjobs. They then figure that sense the world isn't as rosy a place as they thought it was ten years ago, this must mean that the world has gotten worse in that period.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
The primary source of my pessimism is in the way humanity functions, and is seemingly doomed to function.
An immense amount of the negative in this world is through active efforts. It would take -less energy- for people to cooperate than it takes to run around burning books and gay-bashing and all the other pointless miseries we apply to one another in order to perpetuate various power figures and idealogies.
The fact that human beings can derive pleasure, indeed, self-actualization of the most twisted sort, by simply being absolute DICKS, does not provide me with any hope in human ability to actually -end- its self-inflicted miseries.
We can minimize it, we can punish it, we can hide it.
But there will always be some asshole who'll sneak in to someone's yard and set their family pet on fire just to watch it struggle.
--
Also, you guys pretty well figured out my stance on selfishness. A+.
Currently my life kicks ass. Looking ahead, my life might kick a bit more ass. Frankly, I think I have life figured out for me. However, I am an incredibly laid back person so pessimism might not work with that.
Oh, I'm pretty comfortable with -my- personal life, and I'm still happy to be alive. I mean, -kitties exist-. Yeah yeah, genocide rape torture whatever. KITTIES, people. KITTIES.
The nice thing about being immensely pessimistic about humanity is it makes it easier to not give a shit about humanity.
Oh, I'm pretty comfortable with -my- personal life, and I'm still happy to be alive. I mean, -kitties exist-. Yeah yeah, genocide rape torture whatever. KITTIES, people. KITTIES.
I just expect things to turn out how they usually turn out, personally. Pessimism and optimism are both...well...eh. If I have a math test, I'm not "I'm sure I did great" or "Oh god I'm going to get an F". I consider how I've been doing in math, and arrive at the conclusion.
So yeah, the future? Pretty much the same as now. Maybe a little shitter or better...but going to be pretty much the same.
...then again, I'm one of those people who just likes the middle ground.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
I think over any 50 year stretch of time, you're generally hard-pressed to find things not having improved. Both globally and on a local scale. Unless your choice of time period ends in a civil war, or something, things improve.
Really, I've just never gotten this sort of pessimism. I suspect it's largely a function of kids growing up and suddenly realizing the world is not all gumdrops and blowjobs. They then figure that sense the world isn't as rosy a place as they thought it was ten years ago, this must mean that the world has gotten worse in that period.
For me that's close, but it was more like "Wow, lots of things are horrible and I never even noticed. What ELSE don't I know?"
And then you start looking.
As a species we're capable of incredible acts of generosity & beauty.
As a species we're also capable of spectacular acts of brutality and cruelty.
We paint and build bridges and make vaccines.
We also rape, murder and just break shit and for no really good reason mostly.
In general, we don't see the big picture and if we do, oftentimes we sacrifice that for what works for us NOW. In short, we're selfish as so many have noted. Some of that is expected as it's been bred into us.
In many ways we still are representative of our caveman attitude that has got us so far in so little time. Unfortunately, it can be really hard to go against that nature. (i.e. when dealing with an asshole in a business meeting you don't really just have 2 options: a) run or b) cave said fucker's head in with a rock)
Those two options worked great for a long, long time. We should have a bigger playbook by now.
Part of me thinks that if enough of us "team player" types can get past that we'll be fine.
The other part thinks airborne ebola wouldn't be a bad start.
Pessimists can be great at contingency planning but you really have to know when to stop.
For me that's close, but it was more like "Wow, lots of things are horrible and I never even noticed. What ELSE don't I know?"
And then you start looking.
As a species we're capable of incredible acts of generosity & beauty.
"As a species" - what does that mean? If I had to pick a generalization that sucked, that would be it. "As a species" only really works when you're describing either instinctual behaviors or genetic heritages and little else. As a species lions eat oryx's but individually sometimes traumatized lions will adopt an oryx:
As a species we're also capable of spectacular acts of brutality and cruelty.
We paint and build bridges and make vaccines.
We also rape, murder and just break shit and for no really good reason mostly.
Again, this doesn't say a god damn thing except that oh hey, take 6 billion individuals imperfectly formed by the evolutionary process and you might get wildly varying outcomes. It's not even a particularly compelling explanation at that when you remember that as usual the damage an individual can do tends to be several orders of magnitude more visible then the good they could do, and we would expect there to be a lot more good people then bad people by this metric.
In general, we don't see the big picture and if we do, oftentimes we sacrifice that for what works for us NOW. In short, we're selfish as so many have noted. Some of that is expected as it's been bred into us.
In many ways we still are representative of our caveman attitude that has got us so far in so little time. Unfortunately, it can be really hard to go against that nature. (i.e. when dealing with an asshole in a business meeting you don't really just have 2 options: a) run or b) cave said fucker's head in with a rock)
Those two options worked great for a long, long time. We should have a bigger playbook by now.
Part of me thinks that if enough of us "team player" types can get past that we'll be fine.
The other part thinks airborne ebola wouldn't be a bad start.
Pessimists can be great at contingency planning but you really have to know when to stop.
Pessimists fucking suck at contingency planning. They're the emo annoying teenagers of the adult world and I was them to shut the fuck up with their depressing bullshit and do something useful before they start whining about things.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
I think over any 50 year stretch of time, you're generally hard-pressed to find things not having improved. Both globally and on a local scale. Unless your choice of time period ends in a civil war, or something, things improve.
Really, I've just never gotten this sort of pessimism. I suspect it's largely a function of kids growing up and suddenly realizing the world is not all gumdrops and blowjobs. They then figure that sense the world isn't as rosy a place as they thought it was ten years ago, this must mean that the world has gotten worse in that period.
You know, I recently read a study that found an inverse correlation between age and focusing on the negative aspects of a story. The implication was that younger people naturally fixate on the negative and that this fixation eases as you get older. I should go see if I can find it.
Feral on
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
I like to think of our selfishness as this planet's fail safe for humanity.
We'll probably become too much for ourselves and this planet and in the end we're going to destroy ourselves. This is neither good nor bad - it just is.
And then the planet will recover and life will go on. I'm pretty content with when I've been born and consider myself lucky - I just wish things could be better. I've got it good compared to most.
For me that's close, but it was more like "Wow, lots of things are horrible and I never even noticed. What ELSE don't I know?"
And then you start looking.
As a species we're capable of incredible acts of generosity & beauty.
"As a species" - what does that mean? If I had to pick a generalization that sucked, that would be it. "As a species" only really works when you're describing either instinctual behaviors or genetic heritages and little else. As a species lions eat oryx's but individually sometimes traumatized lions will adopt an oryx:
As a species we're also capable of spectacular acts of brutality and cruelty.
We paint and build bridges and make vaccines.
We also rape, murder and just break shit and for no really good reason mostly.
Again, this doesn't say a god damn thing except that oh hey, take 6 billion individuals imperfectly formed by the evolutionary process and you might get wildly varying outcomes. It's not even a particularly compelling explanation at that when you remember that as usual the damage an individual can do tends to be several orders of magnitude more visible then the good they could do, and we would expect there to be a lot more good people then bad people by this metric.
In general, we don't see the big picture and if we do, oftentimes we sacrifice that for what works for us NOW. In short, we're selfish as so many have noted. Some of that is expected as it's been bred into us.
In many ways we still are representative of our caveman attitude that has got us so far in so little time. Unfortunately, it can be really hard to go against that nature. (i.e. when dealing with an asshole in a business meeting you don't really just have 2 options: a) run or b) cave said fucker's head in with a rock)
Those two options worked great for a long, long time. We should have a bigger playbook by now.
Part of me thinks that if enough of us "team player" types can get past that we'll be fine.
The other part thinks airborne ebola wouldn't be a bad start.
Pessimists can be great at contingency planning but you really have to know when to stop.
Pessimists fucking suck at contingency planning. They're the emo annoying teenagers of the adult world and I was them to shut the fuck up with their depressing bullshit and do something useful before they start whining about things.
I guess I could have said "people" rather than "as a species." Personally, I don't see the difference. Individuals is more apt, though.
I wasn't explaining anything so I'm not sure what you're getting at. It's just an observation. Incenjucar hit it exactly earlier. There are tangible benefits to cooperation/team play. What do people GET out of being dicks?
The metrics angle is interesting & I see what you're getting at. I guess that would be great to know and impossible to prove.
As far as us still mainly relying on fight or flight goes, those work well in the wild. I don't think they're enough to cover your ass once you're a part of a civilized society. Civilized society has just been an eyeblink considering how long we must have lived without any rules.
I'll take a pessimist to do my planning any day. They allow for deviations in the plan. They think ahead about what could go wrong. Worst case scenario should be addressed in any plan as far as I am concerned. Again, there needs to be limits to how far you want to take that, but in measures it can be good.
As a pessimist, when things go right you get to be pleasantly surprised.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
I think over any 50 year stretch of time, you're generally hard-pressed to find things not having improved. Both globally and on a local scale. Unless your choice of time period ends in a civil war, or something, things improve.
Really, I've just never gotten this sort of pessimism. I suspect it's largely a function of kids growing up and suddenly realizing the world is not all gumdrops and blowjobs. They then figure that sense the world isn't as rosy a place as they thought it was ten years ago, this must mean that the world has gotten worse in that period.
You know, I recently read a study that found an inverse correlation between age and focusing on the negative aspects of a story. The implication was that younger people naturally fixate on the negative and that this fixation eases as you get older. I should go see if I can find it.
Pessimists fucking suck at contingency planning. They're the emo annoying teenagers of the adult world and I was them to shut the fuck up with their depressing bullshit and do something useful before they start whining about things.
Swear all you want, but pessimists make excellent planners, they're looking ahead. It seems the optimists are the ones who think "maybe all this CO2 were putting in the atmosphere is harmless". The pessimists are the ones who are planning ahead, realizing what needs to be fixed. You're confusing pessimism with whining, which is much different.
Pessimists fucking suck at contingency planning. They're the emo annoying teenagers of the adult world and I was them to shut the fuck up with their depressing bullshit and do something useful before they start whining about things.
Swear all you want, but pessimists make excellent planners, they're looking ahead. It seems the optimists are the ones who think "maybe all this CO2 were putting in the atmosphere is harmless". The pessimists are the ones who are planning ahead, realizing what needs to be fixed. You're confusing pessimism with whining, which is much different.
No they're not. Optimists are equally capable of planning ahead. Pessimists are just whingey about it.
Pessimists fucking suck at contingency planning. They're the emo annoying teenagers of the adult world and I was them to shut the fuck up with their depressing bullshit and do something useful before they start whining about things.
Swear all you want, but pessimists make excellent planners, they're looking ahead. It seems the optimists are the ones who think "maybe all this CO2 were putting in the atmosphere is harmless". The pessimists are the ones who are planning ahead, realizing what needs to be fixed. You're confusing pessimism with whining, which is much different.
Ehh, your both wrong. The people planning ahead are by definition optimists because they have a positive hope for the future and a positive opinion of their ability to influence it, and by definition pessimists because they have adopted an expectation of the possibility of failure and and have accepted the possibility of their having an inability to positively effect the outcome of the situation. It's called dealing with reality, and if you don't on some level deal with that both good outcomes and bad outcomes exist you will never get anything done. I generally prefer the words cynicism and naivety to express the two extremes.
As to the world in general, we have a history of real forward progress, to assume that we will enter a never ending backslide into oblivion is rather silly. That isn't how people work and we have at least 40,000 years of history since the founding of the first city to prove that no matter the rate humanity generally tends to move forward. This does not negate the possibility of backslides nor the fact of humanities propensity towards horrific acts, merely puts what we are dealing with now in perspective, it is a relative high note and bodes well for the future, though there is plenty of room to go backwards in case of a backslide. If worse comes to worse and the world collapses into dystopia, just be glad you lived in teh golden age everyone will be furiously trying to recreate. ~.^
Posts
They are being brought up in a cushion coated "It's the adults fault" world.
All these kids are learning is that it is always someone elses fault.
Parents can't discipline, you can sue someone for knocking over your drink and you can't have opinions different to anyone elses around you, otherwise you are a sheep, a government lover and religious.
It's a total backflip.
I would have done the simpler argument for everyone being selfish. Namely, that even completely 'altruistic' actions give the altruists warm fuzzies, or reinforce their positive self-images, or make them feel they've done their duty. That one is just semantics, though, because we generally consider people who enjoy doing good to be good people.
Black Hunter: :?:
Of course, I'm also in the middle of reading the Singularity is Near, so I'm anything but pessimistic about the future at the moment.
Optimism's strength is that it allows its believers to be constructive, and eventually accomplish things. These things are neither as special nor important as optimists believe, but they do get a lot more done.
We will (as mentioned) be able to genetically engineer things, I don't really mind making food work better, but inevitably we will start modifying humans, and in the hands of an oppressive regime, or indeed a corrupt regime, the effects of this ... well fuck. I don't want to think about it. Even in a non oppressive regime the effects can be terrible, the class devide will be solidified in ways unimaginable.
Essentially the technologies of oppression will be so refined I begin to fear a revolt will be made impossible in any nation.
And then you have Robots, and this I am not sure how I feel about, I think they are going to be inevitable, we're going to invent some form of AI, and it will inevitably surpass the biological human braun, probably even after it has been genetically improved. What the hell will that lead to? robot wars? human meshing with robots to form cyborgs, or entirely moving our conciousness into mechanical thingers?
That's not so scary though...
A more direct worry is the further weakening of democratic institutions and increased power in the private sectors.
I guess we'll see though
- "Proving once again the deadliest animal of all ... is the Zoo Keeper" - Philip J Fry
I think the OP probably lacks perspective because they are young.
Edit: And all this is worth pointing out because so many people like to pretend that their innocuous selfishness is really them being good people.
Uh, no? Why is this ironic.
I look at the material condition of humanity in 1500 and I look at it today in 2007 and I have to say - overall I'm pretty pleased.
Because it's using a word to suggest something other then its literal interpretation. Well almost, closer then most uses of the word irony.
This is why I advocate optimistic pessimism.
Everything's shit, but we can make it better.
Well I'm not so pessimistic as to think things are going to go back to 1500 type humanity.
But our current lifestyle is simply not sustainable. We consume such a rediculous amount of resources in the west. As resources diminish, and others (China, India, etc) begin to consume at an ever increasing rate, we will have no choice but to consume less. Which will mean more expensive everything. So no more SUVs, 3 car driveways, regular flights, wasting huge amounts of food, power so cheap its almost free.
And for that aspect, I think that will be a good thing.
Win.
I think over any 50 year stretch of time, you're generally hard-pressed to find things not having improved. Both globally and on a local scale. Unless your choice of time period ends in a civil war, or something, things improve.
Really, I've just never gotten this sort of pessimism. I suspect it's largely a function of kids growing up and suddenly realizing the world is not all gumdrops and blowjobs. They then figure that sense the world isn't as rosy a place as they thought it was ten years ago, this must mean that the world has gotten worse in that period.
An immense amount of the negative in this world is through active efforts. It would take -less energy- for people to cooperate than it takes to run around burning books and gay-bashing and all the other pointless miseries we apply to one another in order to perpetuate various power figures and idealogies.
The fact that human beings can derive pleasure, indeed, self-actualization of the most twisted sort, by simply being absolute DICKS, does not provide me with any hope in human ability to actually -end- its self-inflicted miseries.
We can minimize it, we can punish it, we can hide it.
But there will always be some asshole who'll sneak in to someone's yard and set their family pet on fire just to watch it struggle.
--
Also, you guys pretty well figured out my stance on selfishness. A+.
The nice thing about being immensely pessimistic about humanity is it makes it easier to not give a shit about humanity.
And I agree with you 100%.
So yeah, the future? Pretty much the same as now. Maybe a little shitter or better...but going to be pretty much the same.
...then again, I'm one of those people who just likes the middle ground.
For me that's close, but it was more like "Wow, lots of things are horrible and I never even noticed. What ELSE don't I know?"
And then you start looking.
As a species we're capable of incredible acts of generosity & beauty.
As a species we're also capable of spectacular acts of brutality and cruelty.
We paint and build bridges and make vaccines.
We also rape, murder and just break shit and for no really good reason mostly.
In general, we don't see the big picture and if we do, oftentimes we sacrifice that for what works for us NOW. In short, we're selfish as so many have noted. Some of that is expected as it's been bred into us.
In many ways we still are representative of our caveman attitude that has got us so far in so little time. Unfortunately, it can be really hard to go against that nature. (i.e. when dealing with an asshole in a business meeting you don't really just have 2 options: a) run or b) cave said fucker's head in with a rock)
Those two options worked great for a long, long time. We should have a bigger playbook by now.
Part of me thinks that if enough of us "team player" types can get past that we'll be fine.
The other part thinks airborne ebola wouldn't be a bad start.
Pessimists can be great at contingency planning but you really have to know when to stop.
PSN: Broichan
Again, this doesn't say a god damn thing except that oh hey, take 6 billion individuals imperfectly formed by the evolutionary process and you might get wildly varying outcomes. It's not even a particularly compelling explanation at that when you remember that as usual the damage an individual can do tends to be several orders of magnitude more visible then the good they could do, and we would expect there to be a lot more good people then bad people by this metric.
Why?
Pessimists fucking suck at contingency planning. They're the emo annoying teenagers of the adult world and I was them to shut the fuck up with their depressing bullshit and do something useful before they start whining about things.
You know, I recently read a study that found an inverse correlation between age and focusing on the negative aspects of a story. The implication was that younger people naturally fixate on the negative and that this fixation eases as you get older. I should go see if I can find it.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
We'll probably become too much for ourselves and this planet and in the end we're going to destroy ourselves. This is neither good nor bad - it just is.
And then the planet will recover and life will go on. I'm pretty content with when I've been born and consider myself lucky - I just wish things could be better. I've got it good compared to most.
I guess I could have said "people" rather than "as a species." Personally, I don't see the difference. Individuals is more apt, though.
I wasn't explaining anything so I'm not sure what you're getting at. It's just an observation. Incenjucar hit it exactly earlier. There are tangible benefits to cooperation/team play. What do people GET out of being dicks?
The metrics angle is interesting & I see what you're getting at. I guess that would be great to know and impossible to prove.
As far as us still mainly relying on fight or flight goes, those work well in the wild. I don't think they're enough to cover your ass once you're a part of a civilized society. Civilized society has just been an eyeblink considering how long we must have lived without any rules.
I'll take a pessimist to do my planning any day. They allow for deviations in the plan. They think ahead about what could go wrong. Worst case scenario should be addressed in any plan as far as I am concerned. Again, there needs to be limits to how far you want to take that, but in measures it can be good.
As a pessimist, when things go right you get to be pleasantly surprised.
PSN: Broichan
I'd love to read it if you can find it.
PSN: Broichan
No they're not. Optimists are equally capable of planning ahead. Pessimists are just whingey about it.
Ehh, your both wrong. The people planning ahead are by definition optimists because they have a positive hope for the future and a positive opinion of their ability to influence it, and by definition pessimists because they have adopted an expectation of the possibility of failure and and have accepted the possibility of their having an inability to positively effect the outcome of the situation. It's called dealing with reality, and if you don't on some level deal with that both good outcomes and bad outcomes exist you will never get anything done. I generally prefer the words cynicism and naivety to express the two extremes.
As to the world in general, we have a history of real forward progress, to assume that we will enter a never ending backslide into oblivion is rather silly. That isn't how people work and we have at least 40,000 years of history since the founding of the first city to prove that no matter the rate humanity generally tends to move forward. This does not negate the possibility of backslides nor the fact of humanities propensity towards horrific acts, merely puts what we are dealing with now in perspective, it is a relative high note and bodes well for the future, though there is plenty of room to go backwards in case of a backslide. If worse comes to worse and the world collapses into dystopia, just be glad you lived in teh golden age everyone will be furiously trying to recreate. ~.^
I guess I'm guilty of using pessimist when I should be using realist. Cynicism/Naievety is a great way to describe the two extremes.
PSN: Broichan