Yes, I do know about these things.blackrave said:Before we delve into further discussion I need to be sure that I speak in terms you understand I need to know what your education is. IT, economics, math, linguistics, etc.? Bachelor, master, etc.?Hagi said:The idea isn't tempting at all. It's hilarious if anything.
Your entire view of sexuality is hilarious. Your entire view of human psychology is hilarious.
It reeks of pop-psychology and simple easy answers for incredibly complex behaviors. Regarding evolution as some sort of conscious god that shapes species and behavior so that everything is engineered purely for survival. That our behavior is somehow consciously designed for procreation and survival. And that by simply thinking logically about how we ourselves would create our own species optimized for survival we can deduce our the reasons behind our own behaviors.
Utterly disregarding that this world is filled with thousands of species that survive and reproduce in the most convoluted and fragile ways imaginable. Evolution and survival instinct simply don't work how you think they do. They weren't engineered. They were accidents that survived. They're filled with inconsistencies, inefficiencies and convoluted methods. Just none of them bad enough to cause extinction. Yet.
Survival instinct isn't a conscious thing that's actively steering our behavior to what will produce exactly the right number of offspring, expertly calculating and directing to ensure our genes will live on. It doesn't care whether or not those genes carry on, it's incapable of caring.
Individuals and species aren't actively trying to continue their genetic lines, 99,99% of life nor the process of evolution even know what genetic lines are. They're simply doing random shit and the random shit that doesn't die out continues doing that random shit. The only thing that ensures is that from all that random shit there are some parts that in some way lead to just enough procreation to ensure that that specific random shit sticks around and that all the other random shit that's involved isn't quite shitty enough to cause extinction.
1. It looks simple because I simplified it. Seriously, you expected that I will write here course paper on animalistic behavior in human society? No, I won't, so get some books on ethology and read them yourself.
2. I was talking mainly about human beings, of course there are "less successful" examples of evolutions. Snails for example
3. Stop assuming things I never said! Of course instinct isn't "conscious" and it doesn't "care". It is like assuming that script can process information when written on the paper. It can't, but if you put it into right hardware it starts working. Same here. It is actually your brain that cares and at some extent it is you.
4. Of course, it isn't directly "steering our behavior", it influences our higher thought pattern and those are directly "steering our behavior", but that means that instincts are involved indirectly. And everything can be traced back to survival or reproduction. It is simple- just start critically asking yourself "why?", and don't stop at broad answers, like "I want to help planet", dig deeper.
5. Well, there isn't such thing as "random", it is simply effect that is achieved when shitload of complex systems overlaps.
6. Besides I'm supposed to be cynic here. Can argument between two cynics can even happen? :/
It's exactly your point 4 why I took it not as a simplified, short version, but as an hilarious misunderstanding on your part.
Critically asking yourself "why?" is not in any shape, way or form anything even approaching a valid method of gaining knowledge about the world and ourselves. There's no verification or falsification whatsoever involved. You can give any answer you please and conclude you 'feel' you've dug deep enough and finally arrived at the right one. It's like reading between the lines of a religious text, you can come up with whatever 'feels right' for you and nobody will be able to tell you you're wrong, which I'll admit is a very secure-feeling way of gaining knowledge. You'll never find anything you disagree with, that'll just mean you haven't dug deep enough. Unfortunately any answers obtained have little to do with reality beyond your own personal bias.
I mean there's a reason why psychologists are making MRI scans, learning about neurology, conducting surveys and experiments. It's because there's nothing empirical about simply asking yourself "why?", it's an hilarious form of gaining knowledge.
And there is such a thing as random. It's is not as a layman would assume something that was somehow generated outside the realm of causality. It is simply something that is impossible to predict to any degree of accuracy beyond it's given bounds. A dice thrown without any tricks is random, I can not predict it's outcome beyond that it will end up between the bounds of 1-6.