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Author Topic:   Morality! Thorn in Darwin's side or not?
dronestar
Member
Posts: 1407
From: usa
Joined: 11-19-2008


Message 31 of 438 (504543)
03-30-2009 4:34 PM
Reply to: Message 28 by kuresu
03-30-2009 9:10 AM


We have just gotten better at protecting lives from deaths.
Yes, but humanity has also gotten better at causing death. Much, much better. In pre-WWI days, how many men would have taken to destroy 100,000 people of Hiroshima. Now, it only requires a few handful of very smart ones? This is the reason why I think we should discount just death counts to track aggression in today's world.
Either way, increasing or decreasing aggression may be too complex a subject to generalize. But I kinda agree with Oni, when circumstances involve fear or survival, man will be moved to be more aggressive. If true, man hasn't changed much at all, has he?
This is one of my most favorites quotes. I wish all potential servicemen considering a military career would read it carefully:
Why of course the people don't want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally the common people don't want war neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.
Hermann Goering

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Replies to this message:
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SammyJean
Member (Idle past 4073 days)
Posts: 87
From: Fremont, CA, USA
Joined: 03-28-2009


Message 32 of 438 (504547)
03-30-2009 5:09 PM
Reply to: Message 22 by Cedre
03-30-2009 3:34 AM


Re: Conscious Evolution
Hi Cedre,
Here is an excellent 14 minute video from Nova that explains mirror neurons...
Mirror Neurons | NOVA | PBS
Enjoy!

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Stagamancer
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 174
From: Oregon
Joined: 12-28-2008


Message 33 of 438 (504550)
03-30-2009 7:09 PM
Reply to: Message 18 by onifre
03-30-2009 12:26 AM


Would you not agree that those who have these traits and pass it on to their offspring will have a better success rate than those who do not have these traits? - In other words, would a society that was not altruistic survive for a long period of time given todays more modern standards of living?
I would argue that they would not, as shown by our current rate of success in altruistic societies vs. non-altruistic socities.
That all depends on how you define success. There have been plenty of "successful" belligerent societies. Granted, the dominant societies of today tend to be more peaceful (within their borders, the US has fought plenty of wars in other peoples' lands) but this was not always so. The dominant societies throughout history have often been the ones that expand through warfare, and given that no society lasts forever, there's no way to definitively say that their downfall was due to violence.

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

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kuresu
Member (Idle past 2513 days)
Posts: 2544
From: boulder, colorado
Joined: 03-24-2006


Message 34 of 438 (504554)
03-30-2009 8:02 PM
Reply to: Message 31 by dronestar
03-30-2009 4:34 PM


But I kinda agree with Oni, when circumstances involve fear or survival, man will be moved to be more aggressive. If true, man hasn't changed much at all, has he?
Um, I never really disagreed with this point Oni made. He just didn't make that to begin with. I disagreed with his premise that we are becoming less aggressive, which while true in certain circumstances doesn't hold up over all (no wars in the US, for example, but a hell of a lot fought by us; we are less aggressive inwardly than outwardly; there are more wars and conflicts this century than the last, and it's been growing for several centuries)
And yes, we've gotten a lot better at killing people in wars, but our ability to save lives from war-deaths has improved more (as well as non war-deaths), or else the 200 million plus dead would have quite possibly put a dent in the population growth (similar perhaps to the bubonic plague?). As well, we would see a lot more deaths if we hadn't gotten so good at repairing the body. In the civil war, you were more likely to die of disease than battle. Today, it's the opposite. In the civil war, losing a limb very possible meant losing your life. Today, you can lose a lot of your body and somehow survive. Imagine if we fought those 200 plus conflicts without modern medicine, how many would be dead. Actually, I think we might not have seen so many conflicts, because there's wouldn't have been enough people to fight!
In pre-WWI days, how many men would have taken to destroy 100,000 people of Hiroshima
And how many times has the atomic bomb been used in war? Twice. So yes, it can kill a lot of people at once, but most other cases of mass-death are of the dumb tech variety. I don't think those 450,000+ dead in sudan died of smart weapons, but a bunch of people raping and pillaging, with support from the government in materials and supplies (I'm counting aircraft as dumb tech, simply because flying is easy compared to building a nuclear weapon or a so-called smart bomb). We can kill a lot of people with the old techniques just fine; the smart weapons allow us to do it more efficiently, and some smart weapons just aren't used fortunately.
So I think we can certainly use the number of dead as a gauge for how violent and aggressive we are, so long as we keep in mind that the total population has exploded in the last 60 years alone (so when comparing the causalities of the civil war, of which there are roughly 1 million, to the casualties of the iraq war, of which there are roughly 35,000 US casualties, we should keep in mind the US population in 1860 was 31.4 million and today is close to 300 million).
This is the reason why I think we should discount just death counts to track aggression in today's world.
You know, I made mention of the 200+ conflicts of the last century. That's independent of the number of deaths. So even if those conflicts all caused very few deaths, that's still a huge number of conflicts, essentially unprecedented.
Can we perhaps get back to the topic, which you know, is morality and evolution?

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Taz
Member (Idle past 3291 days)
Posts: 5069
From: Zerus
Joined: 07-18-2006


Message 35 of 438 (504565)
03-31-2009 3:43 AM
Reply to: Message 34 by kuresu
03-30-2009 8:02 PM


kuresu writes:
I disagreed with his premise that we are becoming less aggressive
I don't think this is what he was trying to convey. Let me break it down and see if I got it right.
According to Oni...
(1) The natural tendency for a sociaty is to trie to progress
(2) Progres leeds two better living conditions
(3) Better living conditions lead to better social value for human lyfe
(4) Better social value for human life leads to less quarrels
(5) Less corals lead to less agresion
I don't think he's saying people over all are getting less aggressive. I think he's saying natural selection favors societies that are more prosperous because of the reasons I outlined above.

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Cedre
Member (Idle past 1490 days)
Posts: 350
From: Russia
Joined: 01-30-2009


Message 36 of 438 (504568)
03-31-2009 4:03 AM
Reply to: Message 24 by Granny Magda
03-30-2009 8:27 AM


Re: Conscious Evolution
Granny Magda writes:
No we don't. That is simply not true. Take my rabbit example. Will the rabbit with the best genes always be the one who spots the predator? Clearly not. The rabbit with the lousiest genes in the group might be the one who spots it. Any rabbit that spots a predator will drum out a warning, not just those with the "best genes".
In the statement this reply is directed at I wasn’t necessarily making reference to alarming the population of imminent danger, I was rather referring to those instances characterized by a physical confrontation with the intruder or aggressor where lives are on the line, such as in pride takeover attempts.
In prides the male and female lions both defend the pride against intruders, but this burden usually falls onto the younger males and or the male populace in general, this is due to the reason that they are almost certainly the strongest members of the pride, the young are not bothered with this task and so are the old and fading.
The same thing happens in Hyena populations and societies. Border patrols are occasionally conducted by groups of resident males. But in general, females are more likely to lead border patrol, clan wars, and are more willing to take more risks in territorial defense than males, for the reason that they are stronger larger and much more aggressive than the males.
Cheetahs also exhibit this trend the stronger males in coalitions, according to Wikipedia will attempt to kill any intruders and fights result in serious injury or death. Where defense is required and it isn’t necessarily a shared burden the stronger and fitter individuals will normally take on that duty.
Granny Magda writes:
Let's not assume that. It's a terrible example and it is extremely unrealistic. My rabbit example happens every day. In your example, all but one squirrel is doomed, so the whole group is doomed anyway.
It would only seem extremely unrealistic if viewed with a closed mind, but extremely unlikely events happen as well and no one who believes in beneficial mutations will dispute this statement.
Granny Magda writes:
Just to reiterate, this is not the case. Also, "fitter" in an evolutionary sense need not mean "stronger". I think you are already aware of this, but none the less.
That is why you saw me use both words and not just one of them to mean both. But note that the average predator typically goes for the weakest members of the population, this are the most unfit individuals in the given circumstance as they draw the greatest predation. And in other words the stronger members should then be defined as the fittest because they draw the least predation and are most likely to survive in terms of predation.
Granny Magda writes:
The very fact that many creatures display co-operative behaviour is enough to prove that selfish individualism is not always the best way; sometimes it is simply more effective to co-operate.
Example; African hunting dogs. Theses are social animals. They live in family groups/packs. They live socially and hunt co-operatively. Indeed, they could hardly do otherwise, since a lone dog makes a poor hunter. They depend upon each other to survive. Exiles from the pack would be doomed.
An agreeable response. But not a true one for the most part. Firstly let me caution that we not to stray too far from the matter under discussion here which is morality. But also let me inform you that I agree with you when you say that selfish individualism is not always the best way, it is not always because some individuals thrive better individually. But returning to the purpose of this thread. How does showing that animals can co-operate demonstrate that they are somehow being moral or unselfish? To be sure co-operative behavior cannot be equaled to morality or even altruism. For the mere fact that selfishness can still exist in co-operations and it does and I will give you two prime examples of this.
Members of co-operations join co-operations to get something out and not needful to help others, that is group members join groups only if what they desired was involved. Hardly will a satiated lion join a pack hunt. In plain English members don’t use co-operations to help others but use others in co-operations to help themselves. This is still selfishness and by no means altruism. My example of this would be the hyenas:
“Studies strongly suggest convergent evolution in hyena and primate intelligence. Spotted hyena societies are more complex than those of other carnivorous mammals, and have been reported to be remarkably similar to those of cercopithecine primates in respect to group size, structure, competition and cooperation.” Wikipedia in their article on the spotted hyena
Apart from this spotted hyenas are successful pack hunters as well. They are good co-operations at least until it comes to enjoying their triumphs and loots. They often squabble over the spoils, either among themselves or with other powerful animals like lions. Female hyenas and their young will however eat ahead of all males in the group, and mothers at times will not share with even their children.
Lions are my second example:
Lions will share their kills, yes but males have a tendency of dominating the kill after it has been brought in by the lionesses. In fact they are most likely to share the kill with cubs as opposed to the females since this way they’ll end up having the lion’s share. To boot male lions rarely share the food they kill. What’s more kills aren’t always dragged to the pride location but are devoured at the hunt site in greed. And lions will more willingly share the larger kills and be a little greedy with the smaller ones. If this isn’t selfishness than I don’t know what is?
Granny Magda writes:
Absolutely not. This is completely wrong. All you need for natural selection to take place is a genetically varied population and an environment that has changing requirements. The environment need not be especially harsh.
You’re just describing what I’ve described already using less detail. An environment that has changing that has changing requirements is exactly one with either novel dangers novel limitations or new challenges or both. Whichever the case is one is given reason to adapt. The less fit individuals will yield to the evils of selection and the survivors will experience its joys.
Granny Magda writes:
Have you read the news lately? Selfishness and greed are what has caused a global frickin' recession! Ask Bernie Madoff's investors if they are pleased about how greedy he was.
The business world is a poor metaphor for natural selection in my opinion
This is in fact survival of fittest in full swing, mother business is reading the world of business for its next evolutionary leap, who will survive by adapting and who will fade away. Let the best man survive.
A final point that I would like to call to mind is this. There is this thing among scientist, they attribute whatever is present to natural selection because it is present, this is a smart argument and hard to invalidate not due to the evidence that supports it but just because it’s not falsifiable, so in essence it is a jerry-built notion. It’s like saying stones for example are an example of natural selection because they exists the same for everything else in the world. But know the questioned is begged is natural selection the best explanation yet for the existence of morality or altruism. Hardly biblical creationism can also give a good answer to this question, morality exist in humans and both in nature if it did because a good moral God wouldn’t create an amoral world but a moral one.
Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.
Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.
Edited by Cedre, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 24 by Granny Magda, posted 03-30-2009 8:27 AM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
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anglagard
Member (Idle past 836 days)
Posts: 2339
From: Socorro, New Mexico USA
Joined: 03-18-2006


Message 37 of 438 (504570)
03-31-2009 4:32 AM
Reply to: Message 35 by Taz
03-31-2009 3:43 AM


I Call BS, Plain and Simple
Taz writes:
I don't think this is what he was trying to convey. Let me break it down and see if I got it right.
According to Oni...
(1) The natural tendency for a sociaty is to trie to progress
(2) Progres leeds two better living conditions
(3) Better living conditions lead to better social value for human lyfe
(4) Better social value for human life leads to less quarrels
(5) Less corals lead to less agresion
I don't think he's saying people over all are getting less aggressive. I think he's saying natural selection favors societies that are more prosperous because of the reasons I outlined above.
You sure make it difficult to agree with when you intentionally misspell. But I realize from your previous posts, there is some difficulty in conveying when to be taken lightly and when to be taken seriously.
I completely disagree with those who say modern humans, as opposed to their ancient or medieval counterparts, are somehow less moral and more aggressive, particularly when it refers to democracies.
Since it is obvious that in this pseudo-argument, no side can actually click on a highlighted web site ala creationist fanatics, I will offer it again in a less mistakable format.
Death toll - Wikipedia
Please take note that while WW2 is #1 and WW1 is #6, the An Shi Rebellion, Mongol conquests, the Manchu takeover, and the Taiping rebellion are #2-5.
And even given Greek democracies and Roman Republics, how many were slaves?
All this talk about how modern humans are somehow 'more evil' than their ancient counterparts is simple bullshit that probably comes from residual effects of self-hate preached by false interpretations of religion and apparently, and unconsciously, continued by false interpretations of history among some so-called atheists.
Edited by anglagard, : a few well placed commas (whether Taz likes it or not )
Edited by anglagard, : add some to so-called since not all atheists are clueless when it comes to history

Read not to contradict and confute, not to believe and take for granted, not to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider - Francis Bacon
The more we understand particular things, the more we understand God - Spinoza

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kuresu
Member (Idle past 2513 days)
Posts: 2544
From: boulder, colorado
Joined: 03-24-2006


Message 38 of 438 (504574)
03-31-2009 6:24 AM
Reply to: Message 37 by anglagard
03-31-2009 4:32 AM


Re: I Call BS, Plain and Simple
All this talk about how modern humans are somehow 'more evil' than their ancient counterparts is simple bullshit that probably comes from residual effects of self-hate preached by false interpretations of religion and apparently, and unconsciously, continued by false interpretations of history among some so-called atheists.
Who's said this?
I'm only aware of stating that if anything we (the world) are becoming more aggressive. I'm not aware of equating aggressiveness
with evil.
abe: I figured the death rate by taking the midpoint between the low and high estimate of deaths, with some rough rounding. I don't think I rounded all that consistently, either.
If I have, please point it out.
As to whether or not democracies are being just as aggressive or more aggressive, I surely don't need to show you a list of the wars the US has been in since 1775, right? Of course, no political scientist would classify the early US as a modern democracy (I don't think that really happens until the 19th amendment, if not later thanks to voter-discrimination).
Of the death list, 10 out of 18 are from before 1900. 7 from before 1800. Maybe I'm just interpreting it wrong, but that suggests to me that even if, say, the Taiping rebellion, the An Shi rebellion, the mongol conquests, and the manchu conquest of China a ton of people, the 20th century into today has been a more consistent and quicker killer. Those 10 conflicts are spread over 1680 years, or 1478 if you remove the 1800s deaths. The remaining 8-11 (including the 1800s) are from 95 years to 205 years.
So pre 1900, such massive conflicts arose every 168 years. Pre 1800, every 211 years. Post 1800, every 19 years. Post 1900, every 12 years. So maybe we're simply killing less per war/conflict, just having them more often?
What are the death rates?
An Shi took 7 years to kill 33-36 million people. ~5,000,000 dead/year.
Mongol conquest: 265 years to kill 30-60 million people. ~170,000 dead/year.
Manchu conquest: 46 years, 25,000,000 dead. ~540,000 dead/year.
Taiping rebellion: 13 years, 20-30+ million dead. ~1,930,000 dead/year.
Conquest of Timur: 36 years, 7-20 million dead. ~375,000 dead/year.
Napoleonic Wars: 11 years to kill 3.5-16 million. ~900,000 dead/year.
Thirty Years War: 30 years to kill 3-11.5 million. ~242,000 dead/year.
Yellow Turban Rebellion: 21 years to kill between 3 and 7 million.
~240,000 dead/year.
French Wars of Religion: 36 years to kill 2-4 million. ~84,000 dead/year.
Shaka's conquest: 12 years, 2 million dead. ~167,000 dead/year.
That finishes out all the non-20th or 21st century conflicts. What's the death rate for us?
WWII: 6 years, 40-70 million dead. ~9,300,000 dead/year.
WWI: 4 years, 19-59 million dead (why does it include the spanish flu?). ~9,750,000 dead/year.
Russian civil war: 4 years, 5-9 million dead. ~1,750,000 dead/year.
Second Congo War: 5 years, 3.8-5.4 million dead. ~920,000 dead/year.
Korean War: 3 years, 2.5-3.5 million dead. ~1,000,000 dead/year.
Vietnam War: 16 years, 2.495-5.02 million dead. ~235,000 dead/year.
Afghan Civil War: 30 years, 1.5-2 million dead. ~58,000 dead/year.
Iraq War: 6 years, ~91,000 to 1.2 million dead. ~108,000 dead/year.
So who are the most efficient killers?
WWI
WWII
An Shi Rebellion
Taiping Rebellion
Russian Civil War
Korean War
Second Congo War
Napoleonic Wars
Manchu Conquest
Conquest of Timur
Thirty Years War
Yellow Turban Rebellion
Vietnam War
Mongol Conquest
Shaka's Conquests
Iraq War
French Wars of Religion
Afghan Civil War.
Of the top 5, 2 happened before 1900.
Of the top 10, 5 happened before 1900 (4 before 1800).
It doesn't seem as if we're killing more people per year in each individual conflict than what's outside of historical norm. So we're killing the same number of people, just doing it more often. Maybe this is possible because there are more of us that can be killed.
Edited by kuresu, : No reason given.

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Granny Magda
Member
Posts: 2462
From: UK
Joined: 11-12-2007
Member Rating: 4.0


Message 39 of 438 (504575)
03-31-2009 8:33 AM
Reply to: Message 36 by Cedre
03-31-2009 4:03 AM


Defining Altruism
quote:
In the statement this reply is directed at I wasn’t necessarily making reference to alarming the population of imminent danger, I was rather referring to those instances characterized by a physical confrontation with the intruder or aggressor where lives are on the line, such as in pride takeover attempts.
And yet later in your message, you characterise lion and hyena behaviour as essentially selfish. Is defence of the social group altruistic in your view? If not, is there any animal behaviour that you do agree is altruistic? What about the rabbit example, is that altruistic? It seems that way to me.
quote:
It would only seem extremely unrealistic if viewed with a closed mind
Oh, I see, it's my fault that you chose an example with no basis in reality. How closed minded of me. I am not the only person to describe your squirrel anecdote as inappropriate. It's a bad example. Deal with it.
quote:
And in other words the stronger members should then be defined as the fittest because they draw the least predation and are most likely to survive in terms of predation.
But you were originally talking about an individual with immunity to a specific disease. That has absolutely nothing to do with the ability to avoid predators.
Remember, in rabbits, all individuals display the warning behaviour, not just the stronger ones. In this scenario (which is after all, a real process which occurs every day) the weaker individuals will protect the stronger and the stronger protect the weaker. The individual giving the warning places itself at slightly higher risk, in order to protect the group. That is altruism in action.
quote:
How does showing that animals can co-operate demonstrate that they are somehow being moral or unselfish?
Are you kidding me? In what way is looking after a wounded pack member not altruistic? Think about it. The selfish thing to do would be to abandon the wounded dog. The altruistic course of action is to help stay in the pack and share food with it. How is that not an example of altruism?
quote:
members don’t use co-operations to help others but use others in co-operations to help themselves. This is still selfishness and by no means altruism.
The thing is that in the real world, motivations are rarely simple. Most actions are motivated by a mixture of altruism and selfishness. If I donate money to charity, that is altruistic. But I still gain by it. I get to feel an emotional reward for my actions. I get thanked by the charity. I may be better thought of by those around me. It might be tax deductible.
You are never going to find an altruistic act, in humans or animals, that cannot have a selfish motive attached to it. This is, in fact, a prime reason why altruism does not violate evolutionary principles.
quote:
This is in fact survival of fittest in full swing, mother business is reading the world of business for its next evolutionary leap, who will survive by adapting and who will fade away. Let the best man survive.
Nonsense. If survival of the fittest were applied to the financial sector, the governments of the world would not be propping up failed banks.
quote:
But know the questioned is begged is natural selection the best explanation yet for the existence of morality or altruism.
With the wide range of altruistic behaviours observed in the animal kingdom the answer would appear to be yes. No other explanation comes close to providing a serious model for the development of altruism.
quote:
Hardly biblical creationism can also give a good answer to this question, morality exist in humans and both in nature if it did because a good moral God wouldn’t create an amoral world but a moral one.
Well then, that must prove creationism false, since the world we live in is full of amorality and even immorality.
PS - Have you read The Selfish Gene yet? There's no point talking to me about it. If you are really interested in the evolution of morality, read a book on the subject.
Mutate and Survive

"The Bible is like a person, and if you torture it long enough, you can get it to say almost anything you'd like it to say." -- Rev. Dr. Francis H. Wade

This message is a reply to:
 Message 36 by Cedre, posted 03-31-2009 4:03 AM Cedre has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 42 by Cedre, posted 03-31-2009 10:10 AM Granny Magda has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22392
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.3


Message 40 of 438 (504577)
03-31-2009 8:46 AM
Reply to: Message 36 by Cedre
03-31-2009 4:03 AM


Re: Conscious Evolution
Cedre writes:
It would only seem extremely unrealistic if viewed with a closed mind, but extremely unlikely events happen as well and no one who believes in beneficial mutations will dispute this statement.
To repeat what has already been explained about your squirrel example, it requires that the population be struck by disease in the very same generation that the resistant gene first appears. Not impossible, just very unlikely.
You're seeking examples of altruistic behavior that result in the removal of the altruistic gene from the population. Obviously that can happen, but as your squirrel example illustrates, it requires rather unique circumstances.
You also seem to be seeking examples of behaviors that run counter to altruism, and there will be no shortage of them. But that's not because there's no such thing as altruism. It's that altruism is just one of many different behavioral tendencies. Which behaviors are expressed at any given time will be dependent upon a host of factors.
--Percy

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dronestar
Member
Posts: 1407
From: usa
Joined: 11-19-2008


Message 41 of 438 (504580)
03-31-2009 9:27 AM


Back to the topic of morality and evolution
Besides Richard Dawkin's book "the Selfish Gene" . . .
The Semai: A Nonviolent People of Malaya - Robert Knox Denton
Not sure how available this book is, but one of my professors from college did research on violent/nonvoilent societies. From my memory, living in a remote jungle environment in mainland Malasia (in the 60s?), he learned why the egalitarian tribe of Semai embraced non-aggression living. They rather adopted the "flight" method over "fight "method. It reminds me a little of SouthEast Asia's unique "face-saving" society. Anyone ever been to Thailand? They bend over backwards to not offend.
Mind the Gap, by Richard G. Wilkinson.
Another book I HIGHLY recommend is Mind the Gap, by Richard G. Wilkinson. I liked it so much, it was one of the few books I kept from college. It is a Darwinian approach to violence and aggression. The book describes earliest hunter/gatherer tribe's egalitarian and altruistic behaviors. Then as man starts to live in early city-states he becomes more heirarchal and a "gap" of haves and have-nots develops. Through different examples, such as the vast economic differences in the US and the stress that it causes, it shows how violence and aggression is fueled.
I think reading these books in combination helps to understand how man, at its roots, may really be an altruistic animal. It is the modern day stresses (whether in a democratic or communistic society) that pushes his aggression.
Great topic/thread!
Edited by dronester, : clarify

  
Cedre
Member (Idle past 1490 days)
Posts: 350
From: Russia
Joined: 01-30-2009


Message 42 of 438 (504584)
03-31-2009 10:10 AM
Reply to: Message 39 by Granny Magda
03-31-2009 8:33 AM


Re: Defining Altruism
Granny Magda:
And yet later in your message, you characterise lion and hyena behaviour as essentially selfish.
Yes I did but not first without giving you good examples, with the examples I provided I have shown that these creatures are in fact selfish at heart. If you want to invalidate my conclusion mere trying to reason it away won't be of much use. You'll have to present me with counter examples wherein a hyena or a lion is observed giving away an entire carcass to a weaker or less significant member of the group out of compassion or love.
Granny Magda:
Is defence of the social group altruistic in your view?
Not in the slightest. These animals especially male lions are lousy hunters, they are clumsy, overheat fast due to that heavy mane, and they don't exactly boast A+ stamina. This is an animal that is made for partnerships, individualism simply isn't its sort of thing. And in this case wouldn't they commit their lives to maintaining this partnership lest they be scattered.
The tendency of a species to form into societies is considered to be caused by the influence of natural selection not altruism. During the process of natural selection, individual animals of a particular species that formed into societies like lions or hyenas were more likely to survive than those animals that remained isolated from one another.
So A lion if he wants to proliferate has to stick to other lions. So you see protecting your pride isn't actually altruistic just like in a war the soldiers aren't just laying their lives down but actually have their best interest in heart as well, like their freedom.
Granny Magda:
But you were originally talking about an individual with immunity to a specific disease.
This was an independent example and was never intended to represent my entire position in this area of my argument.
Granny Magda:
Are you kidding me? In what way is looking after a wounded pack member not altruistic? Think about it. The selfish thing to do would be to abandon the wounded dog. The altruistic course of action is to help stay in the pack and share food with it. How is that not an example of altruism?
This was not a part of the behaviors that I concluded is not altruistic if you read me carefully I made sure I didn't include this in my argument. But as for the rabbit scenerio, I wouldn't let it easily slight as an example of altruism. As altruism has to be a conscious choice by the doer, it is not something that should be automated by instinct, which is what the rabbit behavior seems like an instinct that all rabbits will respond by in times of danger. It's almost as if the rabbit has no control over its altruism this is better described an in born behavior.
Genuine morality is a choice because it is a choice we have moral people and immoral/amoral people existing at the same time, proving that our altruism isn't instinct based like is the case with the rabbits in your example.
Therefore before we can say that any behavior is altruism in action we need to determine if the individual displaying it has the capability not to display it at will, and also if the act is squeezed out of the individual. Remember God describes love as a choice, that is why he didn't create us like programmed robots who would follow his every command.
Granny Magda:
You are never going to find an altruistic act, in humans or animals, that cannot have a selfish motive attached to it.
I'll just take it that you didn't think ahead before making this grand pretentious claim. First of all morality can exist devoid of egocentricity. A few examples will show this to be true. Imagine a mother and her three children not babies, living on a farm, this mother isn't really in the spotlight perse and by taking care of her children will not really be rewarded for being good to her children she could just as well be an evil mom.
But lets get back to your original example of giving out alms to the poor.
In normal human situations people don't usually get rewarded for tossing a dollar in someone's hat or basket, in fact the people who were around to witness the above charity act may probably not meet this person in hi/her future to reward them for what they did back then. In fact the bible urges us to perform charitable acts not to draw attention to ourselves but to humble ourselves rather.
And in fact when somebody that you've helped returns the favor we usually decline with the excuse that they need it more, thus denying our would have been reward, adding to our list of charitable acts.
Granny Magda:
Nonsense. If survival of the fittest were applied to the financial sector, the governments of the world would not be propping up failed banks.
This may well be because humans have some goodness in them being made in God's image to sacrifice their survival in order to maintain somebody else'. Or Or it may just be selfishness again, the government of the world profits immensely from banks so they would only make sure that (banks) continue on, think of a symbiotic relationship.
Granny Magda:
With the wide range of altruistic behaviors observed in the animal kingdom the answer would appear to be yes. No other explanation comes close to providing a serious model for the development of altruism.
Mention this range. What about the explanation given by the bible certainly it shouldn't be ignored as a viable explanation, seeing that the bible on the whole has been successful at satisfying millions already with its answers on not just this issue but many more other issues.
Granny Magda:
Well then, that must prove creationism false, since the world we live in is full of amorality and even immorality.
Does the mention of Satan ring a bell? Knew it would.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 39 by Granny Magda, posted 03-31-2009 8:33 AM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 44 by SammyJean, posted 03-31-2009 1:15 PM Cedre has not replied
 Message 45 by PaulK, posted 03-31-2009 1:20 PM Cedre has not replied
 Message 51 by Granny Magda, posted 03-31-2009 7:37 PM Cedre has replied

  
Blue Jay
Member (Idle past 2698 days)
Posts: 2843
From: You couldn't pronounce it with your mouthparts
Joined: 02-04-2008


Message 43 of 438 (504592)
03-31-2009 10:56 AM
Reply to: Message 23 by Cedre
03-30-2009 4:04 AM


Re: Conscious Evolution
Hi, Cedre.
Cedre writes:
Bluejay writes:
Evolution is not a conscious process. Altruism need not be, either.
The fact that you aren't consciously thinking about the future when you do something good doesn't really prove anything about your reason for doing it. You need not be aware of the evolutionary benefit of something in order for it to have an evolutionary benefit.
You have missed the point of that statement...
Perhaps you should reread what you wrote, because my statement spoke directly to that. Here are your words:
Cedre, OP writes:
many times when we are good to others almost never do we think about the future much less about our selfish futures we in fact try to concentrate on the present and how we can best help the person who is in need
If your point was not that our conscious thoughts prove that there is no evolutionary benefit, then perhaps you should have restrained from writing that our conscious thoughts prove that there is no evolutionary benefit; rather than writing it and then criticizing me for responding to it.
I say again: that you do not consciously think of the evolutionary benefits of your actions does not prove that your actions do not have evolutionary benefits.
Let me try another angle of attack:
You cannot explain evolution with single, special-case scenarios as you have been doing. There is no such thing as a behavior that is 100% successful and beneficial in every scenario. Therefore, natural selection favors patterns of behavior that generally result in greater self benefit. If a certain behavior turns an evolutionary profit more often than it imposes an evolutionary deficit, it will be favored by natural selection.
Does the incredible speed of a cheetah guarantee its success in capturing a meal? No: it is probably only successful in half of its hunts. Furthermore, due to its slender build and small size (necessary for its speed), it loses many of its kills to bigger, meaner predators (hyenas, lions, etc.). So, it probably ends up with 20--30% of its hunts resulting in a meal.
Likewise, if you have a behavioral pattern of altruistically helping others, you may end up doing countless unrequited good deeds. However, some of those good deeds will certainly be returned, especially if the rest of your society also has a behavioral pattern of altruism. So, where everybody is altruistic, nearly everybody gains some measure of benefit at some point in time. Thus, the pattern of altruism, if it is genetic in nature, persists.
-----
Cedre writes:
Bluejay writes:
There is no need for evolution to be stingy. Bees visit flowers to get nectar and pollen for food. But, it inadvertantly helps the flower propagate itself. Thus, there is clearly no need for an action to completely deny benefits to all but ones own self. Furthermore, designing such an action such that nobody else could benefit from it would probably require more forethought than selfish altruism."
Again you have missed the mark with this one, Evolution has to be stingy in order to be effective. Bees are attracted to the brightest sweetest smelling flowers aren't they. If your a dull little tiny scentless flower in the shadow of your bigger flower neighbors, your chances of having a bee land on you are meager compared to you brighter larger counterparts, in this way the flowers also compete to be more attractive and they may also find new ways of disseminating their pollen or fertilization.
So, is it your argument that bees and flowers do not both benefit from pollination?
You do realize that, if both bees and flowers benefit from pollination, your argument that evolution must be stingy fails, right?

-Bluejay/Mantis/Thylacosmilus
Darwin loves you.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by Cedre, posted 03-30-2009 4:04 AM Cedre has not replied

  
SammyJean
Member (Idle past 4073 days)
Posts: 87
From: Fremont, CA, USA
Joined: 03-28-2009


Message 44 of 438 (504606)
03-31-2009 1:15 PM
Reply to: Message 42 by Cedre
03-31-2009 10:10 AM


Waiting...
Hi Cedre,
I'm still waiting for an answer to my question I asked in message 30. Please prove to me that that humans are altruistic because we are made in gods image and god is good and that's why we do good. Please show me how the answer is not because we have evolved with large amounts of mirror neurons that have given humans the ability to mirror others behavior, given us the ability to put ourselves in another persons shoes and given us the ability to feel each others pain, feel empathy because we can imagine how it feels ourselves???
...and I still want to know how you came to the conclusion that researcher are baffled by human altruism???

This message is a reply to:
 Message 42 by Cedre, posted 03-31-2009 10:10 AM Cedre has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 45 of 438 (504607)
03-31-2009 1:20 PM
Reply to: Message 42 by Cedre
03-31-2009 10:10 AM


Cedre Concedes
quote:
Genuine morality is a choice because it is a choice we have moral people and immoral/amoral people existing at the same time, proving that our altruism isn't instinct based like is the case with the rabbits in your example.
Evolution can only dictate our instincts - whether they come as automatic behaviour or tendencies.
By making the statement quoted above you have removed even the possibility of morality as such posing a problem for Darwin.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 42 by Cedre, posted 03-31-2009 10:10 AM Cedre has not replied

  
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