Worse off as a species?

[Knonsense]

Your rant lacks a clear argument form. Try something basic, like modus ponens.
p -> q
p
Therefore: q

Anyway, the main problem in your idea is that if we don't assume that human beings are of equal value, then some idiots will take it upon themselves to evaluate people.

The worldview that all humans are equal may be less realistic than your proposed form of meritocracy, but nobody really deserves the right to decide who is greater than who. If they had such a right, bad things would happen.

I would say that more competition in schools is a good thing. Grade inflation is a problem. Also, some of my mini-rant is not directed entirely at the OP.

 

[hannahdonno]

Humanity is just another form of animal, to classify it as anything else is pure foolishness. Is humanity worse as a species because we don't let survival of the fittest take place?

Absolutely.

Competition to survive is what drives any species to improve itself. (through breeding or intentional action) A species survival depends on its ability to improve itself over time.

First off what makes us a superior to the rest of the animal kingdom is not emotions or feeling because its obvious by studying nature that other animals are more than capable of experiencing them. What makes us superior is the fact that we can overcome or natural instincts with reason and logic. That is the only thing that makes us better than the rest of the animal kingdom. That being said let me get to my major point.

In our society we like to delude ourselves into thinking that all people are equal. Are they really just because they happen to be of the same species they are equal? That is simply not true, its not race or anything like that that make us unequal. Its actions, the actions that one make throughout there life is what judges how good/bad a person is. A good person is not equal to a bad one. (unless you want to make a argument that Hitler was equal to Gandhi).

Since our world is based off of competition there will always be winners and losers. This is a fact of life and nothing anyone can do or say will change that. Are winners and losers equal? NO THEY ARE NOT. The Person who won was either naturally better smarter stronger or worked harder its one or the other. Since he/she won he is not equal to the loser. In the natural world The losers usually don't get to breed so their genes are removed from the pool and the species improves by it.

We are all unequal and what determines how good/bad or useful/unuseful we are is our actions we take throughout our lives and how well we compete in those said actions.

We are moving away form that aspect of human activeity because for some reason we think its below us. Why??. Instead off tell our children about how equal we all should be why cant we tell that we are all unequal but how good/bad you are is totally up too you. What we should be doing is allowing everyone to have the chance to compete equally. Instead of having one style public school we should have many. What one you can go to is up to how well the child does in previous schools. It would allow the top students to have more direct competition with each other so they can become stronger/ better people. Competition is what brings out the best qualities in people nothing else.

And what's your point?

 

[Skeleon]

You're asking for natural selection?
Humans are no longer natural in that sense, we haven't been since we first made fire.
We have replaced natural evolution with a technological and cultural one.

There's no need for "good genes" anymore and people should finally start realizing that.
Humanity isn't going to "grow weak" without selection.

Talk like that sickens me.
It belittles everything humanity stands for: Rationality, intellect, ethics.

 

[Oldmanwillow]

You should be careful you're getting pretty close to the idea of eugenics, which has been tried and failed.

The problem with that eugenics that has been tried in the past is that it worried about superficial things (race, eye color, mainly things that were focus on appearance). Since appear has nothing to do with how well a person or animal will survive or compete. Would eugenics work if they worried about important issues like intelligence, immune system, reflects, ect. That has never been tried i would like to think that it could work.

"indeed you seem to be right on the fact that we are obviously unequal in terms of usefulness and winner/looser(ing) that is definitely not the central point of equality". I do believe that that is the central point of equality. The idea that all human life has fundamental worth just because they are human is a dated religious concept that need to be removed from our society. We need to evolve past our date religious concept and embrace trying to improve our species/ society.

 

[ElephantGuts]

But there are always going to be people who are better and worse than others, so why not stop now? Even if we keep on with evolution, and the stronger survive, there will still be strong versus weak. We may as well stop now.

And we are still advancing. Mostly technologically, but we're also becoming more civilized. Wars are generally less frequent and (or atleast) on smaller scales. We're focusing more on helping people, eliminating poverty, and such. Think about how things were in Medieval or Ancient times. Constant warfare, most people are uneducated peasants with short life spans... I'm usually a pessimist but I'd say things are looking up.

 

[Cliff_m85]

Oh, natural selection, I'm so sorry they killed you.

QFT.

We've stopped evolving, not because we've reached our pinnacle, but because we are repeatedly diluting the gene pool without correcting it.

Wrong.

 

[Oldmanwillow]

You're asking for natural selection?
Humans are no longer natural in that sense, we haven't been since we first made fire.
We have replaced natural evolution with a technological and cultural one.

There's no need for "good genes" anymore and people should finally start realizing that.
Humanity isn't going to "grow weak" without selection.

Talk like that sickens me.
It belittles everything humanity stands for: Rationality, intellect, ethics.

But there are good ones and bad ones. Would you say that a bum has equal value to a medical researcher. The bum just lives off the expense of others while the medical researcher live to improve the lives of others.

Just because we have technology doesn't mean that we should abandon natural selection. Because if non longer have other species to compete with because our reason and technological prous means that we need to actively compete more with other humans to improves our selves as a species. There is always room for improvement we should never stop trying to improve even if its possible to achieve perfection.

 

[Mr0llivand3r]

human beings have a desire to conquer nature.

thus Human Race = Epic Faliure

 

[supermaster1337]

You know what this sounds alot like Natzism. Hmm very similar. Or it can be just me (which i know its not)

Lets go kill the weak and make sure the genes dont get passed down because they are inferior (Jews).

im just saying this sounds alot like he wants an aryan race.

It's not the same, because it's not based on skin colour, religious beliefs, or anything else that doesn't matter.
It's completely acceptable to discriminate against stupid people.

umm who did the natzi's go after first. The stupid, retarded, handicapped people.

 

[Scops]

Would you say that a bum has equal value to a medical researcher. The bum just lives off the expense of others while the medical researcher live to improve the lives of others.

So what happens when some young journalist writes an article about that bum, tells his story, and creates a self-help movement that ends up turning thousands of depressed people back into productive members of society?

There isn't some mythical equation that someone plugged the numbers into and decided that every life was equal. It's never been about that. It's about being CREATED equal. It's all about potential.

Forget judging people to find out if there lives have meant anything to this point. Do you want to try to judge what someone is worth the second they are born? You can't do it, at least not in countries where people have the chance to better their situations, regardless of what they start with.

Edit: Also, what happens when that medical researcher turns out to be the next Dr. Mengele? Potential swings both ways.

 

[Internet Kraken]

What you seem to be forgetting is that there is never a perfect species.

There is always going to be people at the top and people at the bottom. If we as a species evolved to have superior genes then those genes would no longer be superior. Everyone would have those genes, and what was once considered superior would be normal. Pathogens would evolve as a result of humans evolving, so there would still be disease and death.

So there is no reason to kill off the weak and let the strong flourish.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Oh, natural selection, I'm so sorry they killed you.

QFT.

We've stopped evolving, not because we've reached our pinnacle, but because we are repeatedly diluting the gene pool without correcting it.

There is no pinnacle of evolution.

 

[Skeleon]

But there are good ones and bad ones. Would you say that a bum has equal value to a medical researcher. The bum just lives off the expense of others while the medical researcher live to improve the lives of others.

Just because we have technology doesn't mean that we should abandon natural selection. Because if non longer have other species to compete with because our reason and technological prous means that we need to actively compete more with other humans to improves our selves as a species. There is always room for improvement we should never stop trying to improve even if its possible to achieve prefection.

Following your logic, there wouldn't even be a need for medical researchers, since all those who are too weak to survive an infection ought to die off, anyway.

Why do we have society? Medicine? Laws? Politics?
To abolish the laws of nature, to circumvent them, to make life worth living for every human being.
Of course there are always those who contribute more and those who contribute less for whatever reason. That doesn't mean they forfeit their Human Rights all of a sudden.
Who knows how the bum ended up where he is today?
How many of them are war veterans?
Honest labourers who lost their job and home because of an economic recession?

What separates us from cruel, uncaring nature is the ability (and usually also the drive) to help our fellow man. Because that's how we are programmed, genetically we are meant to live in a society, in a group of people who protect each other (think of our close relatives, apes). And even without that, our society is based around a certain set of rights and ethics (not necessarily based on religion, either), which should be guidelines for how a society works.

And as I said, natural selection hasn't been valid for thousands of years. Why reintroduce it now? Look at what we have accomplished by disregarding the laws of nature, by becoming superior (at least in my opinion) than the animals we breed, slaughter and consume.
All of these things were possible because we build a society, because we made it possible that people could specialize, become philosphers, researchers, engineers...

Humans aren't natural and it is good that way.

Also, note that evolution is never directed towards improvement but at "fitting" into the current circumstances. Our circumstances of living have changed since we left the jungles of Africa, therefore the direction of our evolution has changed as well. There's no need to arbitrarily intervene and wipe part of the gene pool from the Earth just because you have different ideas of value than the next guy.

 

[guess who]

As an asthmatic all I have to say is 'Please don't send me to a death camp'.

 

[Neonbob]

As an asthmatic all I have to say is 'Please don't send me to a death camp'.

You wouldn't be. Unless you're an idiot. I'm basing my selections off of brainpower here!

 

[Oldmanwillow]

Just because perfection is impossible does that truly mean that its not something worth trying to accomplish?

Would you say that a bum has equal value to a medical researcher. The bum just lives off the expense of others while the medical researcher live to improve the lives of others.

So what happens when some young journalist writes an article about that bum, tells his story, and creates a self-help movement that ends up turning thousands of depressed people back into productive members of society?

There isn't some mythical equation that someone plugged the numbers into and decided that every life was equal. It's never been about that. It's about being CREATED equal. It's all about potential.

Forget judging people to find out if there lives have meant anything to this point. Do you want to try to judge what someone is worth the second they are born? You can't do it, at least not in countries where people have the chance to better their situations, regardless of what they start with.

Edit: Also, what happens when that medical researcher turns out to be the next Dr. Mengele? Potential swings both ways.

This is a BIG BIG if. the constant will remain that the Medical researcher will creat something that could be useful to society. Even if you disagreed with what the medical researcher is working on he is still trying to create something which is far more than what could be said about the bum.

 

[Oldmanwillow]

For the love of god i am not saying through all the stupid people in death camps to get rid of there genes. I saying that a stupid person will be less likely to get a job to allow him the ability to have the means to procreate. If they did procreate it shouldn't be many children it should be one or two.

 

[ryai458]

You know what this sounds alot like Natzism. Hmm very similar. Or it can be just me (which i know its not)

Lets go kill the weak and make sure the genes dont get passed down because they are inferior (Jews).

im just saying this sounds alot like he wants an aryan race.

killing off the weaker people is wrong letting them die isnt (ok not so much) what I think he is saying is the best way to improve humanity is to allow the idiots to die off let them fall into to poverty just fall away from the public eye, like what the spartans did if the child is weak deformed well it gets drowned it sucks but there civilization was fairly pure

Im not saying this isnt brutal but if we want a great human culture brutality is key if you cant survive you dont deserve to live..