'Fittest' means 'friendliest,' not 'most aggressive

[ruby sparks]

Interestingly, fictional stories (books, short stories etc) about hypothetical female-only worlds (usually written by women) are a lot more common than fiction about male-only worlds.

What this tells us is that men tend to love and appreciate women so much that they don't like to think of a world without them, and conversely that women thinking they'd like to be rid of men is not that uncommon.

So, which sex is the most compassionate and co-operative, eh?

 

[fromderinside]

Looked at with an objective blinkered view there is no difference between dominating (defending from seen threat) and defending (aggressing against seen threat). The one defending feels the one aggressing is trying to dominate and the one aggressing thinks the one she trying to suppress is a threat. In most cases these views are both reasonable. Eye of the beholder.

It'd only when values or perceived differences clash do distinctions in motive arise. A child is worth fighting to protect or have. An ideology is worth defending or suppressing.

Through the looking glass?

Lastly, as I've pointed out we are a very, very, social species. Social value holding follow from social structure properties. Just as I pointed out to rousseau elsewhere top down is the direction of value establishment. Influence drives values.The US isn't a nation of selfish people it's a nation lead by selfish people at present.

FIXT.

Dominating/aggression is, as being used here (and in general) implying that one is the initiator of violence/bullying. Defending is reacting to those actions or perceived actions.

I realize this may be hard for a few people to understand, but where are you on that spectrum? I ask because I may need to adjust my responses if that's the case.

Kind of asking whether one is acting isn't it? Putting a 're' in front of it doesn't change the transaction. Force upon another for whatever reason is an aggressive act. As I pointed out above individuals in most societies are guided by top down rules. So if manifest destiny, male dominance are sources for motivation there one rule set likely to arise. If service and female caring are sources for motivation another rule set is formed. We've explored these and many other social motivations arriving at bad conclusions from all of them like with "Lord of the Flies", "1984", "Peyton Place", etc. and the very most famous "Inferno".

I think my 'objective' is as good as any thank you very much.

MY critique isn't in what you write it's in how you frame your argument. Within your narrow personal perspective it's a nice 'coffee table' sort of discussion having little real sociological value. Unless one takes in to account the players in society, their predispositions, their genetic heritage, and their societal mechanics, a coffee table shiny object is all that one can attain. Great for a 'moral' debate among cumquat sharing friends but useless for and understanding the dynamics of directed physical social intercourse.

You might have heard of  Kurt Lewin. He developed a theory of directed social mechanics based on the flawed approach you are taking here.

 

[fromderinside]

Interestingly, fictional stories (books, short stories etc) about hypothetical female-only worlds (usually written by women) are a lot more common than fiction about male-only worlds.

What this tells us is that men tend to love and appreciate women so much that they don't like to think of a world without them, and conversely that women thinking they'd like to be rid of men is not that uncommon.

So, which sex is the most compassionate and co-operative, eh?

You really need to learn how to use scissors to put curls into your bows. Makes the whole package look a lot better.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Interestingly, fictional stories (books, short stories etc) about hypothetical female-only worlds (usually written by women) are a lot more common than fiction about male-only worlds.

What this tells us is that men tend to love and appreciate women so much that they don't like to think of a world without them, and conversely that women thinking they'd like to be rid of men is not that uncommon.

So, which sex is the most compassionate and co-operative, eh?

A world where women can open jars all by themselves is truly science-fiction. Aren't we men lucky, that'll never happen and we can go on being the agressive arses women so lovingly put up with

 

[Angry Floof]

Looked at with an objective blinkered view there is no difference between dominating (defending from seen threat) and defending (aggressing against seen threat). The one defending feels the one aggressing is trying to dominate and the one aggressing thinks the one she trying to suppress is a threat. In most cases these views are both reasonable. Eye of the beholder.

It'd only when values or perceived differences clash do distinctions in motive arise. A child is worth fighting to protect or have. An ideology is worth defending or suppressing.

Through the looking glass?

Lastly, as I've pointed out we are a very, very, social species. Social value holding follow from social structure properties. Just as I pointed out to rousseau elsewhere top down is the direction of value establishment. Influence drives values.The US isn't a nation of selfish people it's a nation lead by selfish people at present.

FIXT.

Dominating/aggression is, as being used here (and in general) implying that one is the initiator of violence/bullying. Defending is reacting to those actions or perceived actions.

I realize this may be hard for a few people to understand, but where are you on that spectrum? I ask because I may need to adjust my responses if that's the case.

Recent times have shown me that there are people in the world who can't distinguish between aggression and defense. They could see a kid being bullied day after day, but when the kid hits back, then "violence is never the answer" and "both sides are the same." They literally can't tell. They don't know. And honestly, I am not only pitying of those people but wary of them. They are cement blocks on the feet of humanity. Thank goodness chances are extremely good that we will progress with or without them.

This explains a lot about why so many people, overwhelmingly male, use aggression for dominance and not defense, and why so many people, overwhelmingly male, can't or won't stand up to abusers.

But this thread isn't about why the male half of humankind is so viscerally determined to carry on violent animal brain reflexes while using their new brain to make up justifications and excuses for it. This thread is about the fact that humankind is generally cooperative and friendly in spite of its vestigial male aggression and tribalism. This thread is about the fact that humanity has inched forward bit by bit over eons toward an ever more friendly and less hostile world on the strength of our peaceful side in spite of our aggressive tendencies, and will most likely to continue to inch forward.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Looked at with an objective blinkered view there is no difference between dominating (defending from seen threat) and defending (aggressing against seen threat). The one defending feels the one aggressing is trying to dominate and the one aggressing thinks the one she trying to suppress is a threat. In most cases these views are both reasonable. Eye of the beholder.

It'd only when values or perceived differences clash do distinctions in motive arise. A child is worth fighting to protect or have. An ideology is worth defending or suppressing.

Through the looking glass?

Lastly, as I've pointed out we are a very, very, social species. Social value holding follow from social structure properties. Just as I pointed out to rousseau elsewhere top down is the direction of value establishment. Influence drives values.The US isn't a nation of selfish people it's a nation lead by selfish people at present.

FIXT.

Dominating/aggression is, as being used here (and in general) implying that one is the initiator of violence/bullying. Defending is reacting to those actions or perceived actions.

I realize this may be hard for a few people to understand, but where are you on that spectrum? I ask because I may need to adjust my responses if that's the case.

Recent times have shown me that there are people in the world who can't distinguish between aggression and defense. They could see a kid being bullied day after day, but when the kid hits back, then "violence is never the answer" and "both sides are the same." They literally can't tell. They don't know. And honestly, I am not only pitying of those people but wary of them. They are cement blocks on the feet of humanity. Thank goodness chances are extremely good that we will progress with or without them.

But barely anybody can. It's a well known cognitive bias. We downplay the damage we cause others, and exagerate damage others cause us. Everybody, in their own heads, is the victim.

This explains a lot about why so many people, overwhelmingly male, use aggression for dominance and not defense, and why so many people, overwhelmingly male, can't or won't stand up to abusers.

But this thread isn't about why the male half of humankind is so viscerally determined to carry on violent animal brain reflexes while using their new brain to make up justifications and excuses for it. This thread is about the fact that humankind is generally cooperative and friendly in spite of its vestigial male aggression and tribalism. This thread is about the fact that humanity has inched forward bit by bit over eons toward an ever more friendly and less hostile world on the strength of our peaceful side in spite of our aggressive tendencies, and will most likely to continue to inch forward.

It's interesting how you've so completely left out psychological harm. I don't, for a second, buy that women are the more cooperative and friendly gender. Women just user politics to hurt rather than physical force. Anybody who has been around teenage girls have witnessed just how cruel girls can be to one another, to degrees that no man comes close to. If women would be in charge of the world's countries, I highly doubt it would be any more peaceful nor loving.

Our instincts exist for a reason. It's to make us win in the battle for much needed resources that are in short supply. By necessity men and women must have lived in the exact same environment as men, or there would be no babies to keep our species going. So we know that both genders must put about the same focus on acquiring resources. It's the same evolutionary pressures on them. We don't lay our hands on coveted resources by being nice.

The dichotomy where men is the angry aggressive species and women is the peaceful and friendly one, is dumb. The differences between the genders is only one of chosen tactics, not the nature of the behaviour.

 

[Angry Floof]

Recent times have shown me that there are people in the world who can't distinguish between aggression and defense. They could see a kid being bullied day after day, but when the kid hits back, then "violence is never the answer" and "both sides are the same." They literally can't tell. They don't know. And honestly, I am not only pitying of those people but wary of them. They are cement blocks on the feet of humanity. Thank goodness chances are extremely good that we will progress with or without them.

But barely anybody can. It's a well known cognitive bias. We downplay the damage we cause others, and exagerate damage others cause us. Everybody, in their own heads, is the victim.

This explains a lot about why so many people, overwhelmingly male, use aggression for dominance and not defense, and why so many people, overwhelmingly male, can't or won't stand up to abusers.

But this thread isn't about why the male half of humankind is so viscerally determined to carry on violent animal brain reflexes while using their new brain to make up justifications and excuses for it. This thread is about the fact that humankind is generally cooperative and friendly in spite of its vestigial male aggression and tribalism. This thread is about the fact that humanity has inched forward bit by bit over eons toward an ever more friendly and less hostile world on the strength of our peaceful side in spite of our aggressive tendencies, and will most likely to continue to inch forward.

It's interesting how you've so completely left out psychological harm. I don't, for a second, buy that women are the more cooperative and friendly gender. Women just user politics to hurt rather than physical force. Anybody who has been around teenage girls have witnessed just how cruel girls can be to one another, to degrees that no man comes close to. If women would be in charge of the world's countries, I highly doubt it would be any more peaceful nor loving.

Our instincts exist for a reason. It's to make us win in the battle for much needed resources that are in short supply. By necessity men and women must have lived in the exact same environment as men, or there would be no babies to keep our species going. So we know that both genders must put about the same focus on acquiring resources. It's the same evolutionary pressures on them. We don't lay our hands on coveted resources by being nice.

The dichotomy where men is the angry aggressive species and women is the peaceful and friendly one, is dumb. The differences between the genders is only one of chosen tactics, not the nature of the behaviour.

Our new brains exist for a reason, too.

We don't need to lay our hands on coveted resources when prosperity is no longer a zero sum game. Tribalism is not sustainable. The tribe that wins just breaks into more tribes and continues the animal brain aggression as long as they don't know any better. It's a good thing that we have the capacity to know better, and that is precisely why the vast majority of human beings do not live to violently dominate or defend themselves against violent dominators.

Another well known cognitive bias, as I've mentioned before, is negativity bias. Anything that hurts or scares you will impinge deeply on your nervous system. Pain leaves deeper marks on neural pathways than pleasure. The scientists who research this say we focus about five times as much attention on the negative as the positive. This means your newer, sapient brain must be exercised to mitigate the perceptive distortions it causes so you can get a more realistic understanding of your environment. This takes purposeful, conscious thought, in opposition to reflexive instinct.

And we have created now an almost alien environment that humans did not evolve in. We didn't evolve in a tribe of seven billion or in an information rich world that constantly presents us with negative messages and images. It's tempting and easy to just believe violence is our base nature. And yet, again, here we are, globally better off than ever before overall. More peaceful overall, more cooperative overall, more innovative overall, longer life spans, broader literacy, etc. We're even finding that population controls itself as we progress

So maybe the current state of humanity is a sort of crossroads. Do our animal brain reflexes win or our mad neuroplasticity skills? The farthest I will concede on this question of cooperation and adaptability versus urge to dominate and blind instinct is that no one knows. As I said before, over the eons of our evolution, we have never lived in a world like the modern one we've created for ourselves. We all might speak confidently on this topic, but the truth is that no one has a clue how things will turn out for us.

I choose to err on the side of what has actually been working the best so far: our strengths of cooperation and neuroplasticity.

 

[skepticalbip]

... snip ...

It's interesting how you've so completely left out psychological harm. I don't, for a second, buy that women are the more cooperative and friendly gender. Women just user politics to hurt rather than physical force. Anybody who has been around teenage girls have witnessed just how cruel girls can be to one another, to degrees that no man comes close to.

Undeniable. Anyone who believes otherwise is in denial.

If women would be in charge of the world's countries, I highly doubt it would be any more peaceful nor loving.

History tends to support this. Catherine the Great expanded Russia through a great deal of conquests of neighboring areas. Queen Victoria spread the English empire around the world through conquest. Benazir Bhutto, Prime Minister of Pakistan, saw to the development of nuclear weapons and armed conflicts with India. Margaret Thatcher kicked Argentina's butt. etc.

The dichotomy where men is the angry aggressive species and women is the peaceful and friendly one, is dumb. The differences between the genders is only one of chosen tactics, not the nature of the behaviour.

Yes. Women are, in general, more passive-aggressive and men, in general, more direct and overt.

 

[bigfield]

Another well known cognitive bias, as I've mentioned before, is negativity bias. Anything that hurts or scares you will impinge deeply on your nervous system. Pain leaves deeper marks on neural pathways than pleasure. The scientists who research this say we focus about five times as much attention on the negative as the positive. This means your newer, sapient brain must be exercised to mitigate the perceptive distortions it causes so you can get a more realistic understanding of your environment. This takes purposeful, conscious thought, in opposition to reflexive instinct.

And we have created now an almost alien environment that humans did not evolve in. We didn't evolve in a tribe of seven billion or in an information rich world that constantly presents us with negative messages and images. It's tempting and easy to just believe violence is our base nature. And yet, again, here we are, globally better off than ever before overall. More peaceful overall, more cooperative overall, more innovative overall, longer life spans, broader literacy, etc. We're even finding that population controls itself as we progress

This is very similar to the argument Pinker makes in Enlightenment Now. Negativity bias causes us to be pessimistic: there are, after all, many ways things could go wrong, and the news tells us about all of them. Problems abound, yet we keep solving them.

Our instincts exist for a reason. It's to make us win in the battle for much needed resources that are in short supply. By necessity men and women must have lived in the exact same environment as men, or there would be no babies to keep our species going. So we know that both genders must put about the same focus on acquiring resources. It's the same evolutionary pressures on them. We don't lay our hands on coveted resources by being nice.

Firstly, lots of people--I'd say most people--are nice. They don't use violence or aggression to secure resources, nor do they dominate anyone; they work peaceful jobs, virtually always as a specialist in some large organisation or supply chain.

Secondly, we have examples where resources are shared, not competed for. Universal healthcare, for instance, is an example of a resource that no-one has to win from others.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Our new brains exist for a reason, too.

We don't need to lay our hands on coveted resources when prosperity is no longer a zero sum game. Tribalism is not sustainable.

What do you mean not sustainable? Tribalism is the social order that sustained humans for 60 000 years (or 3 000 000) and also saw to us spreading into every habitat on Earth. No other human social order has been sustained for as long. So I'm not sure what you're comparing with. It obviously works just fine.

The tribe that wins just breaks into more tribes and continues the animal brain aggression as long as they don't know any better. It's a good thing that we have the capacity to know better, and that is precisely why the vast majority of human beings do not live to violently dominate or defend themselves against violent dominators.

I'm sorry, but this is the brain we've got. It evolved for tribalism. For good and for bad. When we entered into the last ice age I'm pretty sure access to food often was a zero sum game. That's how we killed the Neanderthals. We starved them to death, by nabbing the food, rather than beating them to death.

Another well known cognitive bias, as I've mentioned before, is negativity bias. Anything that hurts or scares you will impinge deeply on your nervous system. Pain leaves deeper marks on neural pathways than pleasure. The scientists who research this say we focus about five times as much attention on the negative as the positive. This means your newer, sapient brain must be exercised to mitigate the perceptive distortions it causes so you can get a more realistic understanding of your environment. This takes purposeful, conscious thought, in opposition to reflexive instinct.

And it clearly served to keep our ancestors alive just fine. I think that the people who didn't have as strong negativity bias died out. I think it's functional. While annoying for modern humans.

And we have created now an almost alien environment that humans did not evolve in. We didn't evolve in a tribe of seven billion or in an information rich world that constantly presents us with negative messages and images. It's tempting and easy to just believe violence is our base nature. And yet, again, here we are, globally better off than ever before overall. More peaceful overall, more cooperative overall, more innovative overall, longer life spans, broader literacy, etc. We're even finding that population controls itself as we progress

What progress? Our brains are the same now as they were 70 000 years ago. Nothing has happened. We're probably slightly dumber (based on memory research on hunter/gatherers of Papua New Guinnea) but otherwise we have the same brains.

We are discussing human behaviour. Not the evolution of society. Society has evolved for the better. But not our brains.

Yes, we live in an alien environment that prevents us to live out our true violent nature. We have the police to perpetually threaten us if we misbehave. The army to prevent the same behaviours on national scales.

So maybe the current state of humanity is a sort of crossroads. Do our animal brain reflexes win or our mad neuroplasticity skills? The farthest I will concede on this question of cooperation and adaptability versus urge to dominate and blind instinct is that no one knows. As I said before, over the eons of our evolution, we have never lived in a world like the modern one we've created for ourselves. We all might speak confidently on this topic, but the truth is that no one has a clue how things will turn out for us.

I choose to err on the side of what has actually been working the best so far: our strengths of cooperation and neuroplasticity.

I don't think you understand what neuroplasticity means. What you are saying is that you believe in Lamarckian evolution. It doesn't work. Our brains can't evolve that way. If you want humans to evolve into a more peaceful creature you're going to have to use Nazi type selective breeding and get rid of the unwanted ones in gas chambers and mass graves. Unless women stop falling in love with sexy muscle bound brutes we're not going to breed this behaviour out.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamarckism

Yes, cooperation is what has worked in the past. An understanding, by those in power, that we're savage animals and that it's best for all involved if we keep a lid on it, to the best of our abilities. So we cooperate. Those in power put straight jackets on us, and we accept the straight jackets.

I don't think we're any more at a crossroads than any other previous time in human history. Societies are constantly at crossroads. Those that took a wrong turn somewhere are now lost in history.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Our instincts exist for a reason. It's to make us win in the battle for much needed resources that are in short supply. By necessity men and women must have lived in the exact same environment as men, or there would be no babies to keep our species going. So we know that both genders must put about the same focus on acquiring resources. It's the same evolutionary pressures on them. We don't lay our hands on coveted resources by being nice.

Firstly, lots of people--I'd say most people--are nice. They don't use violence or aggression to secure resources, nor do they dominate anyone; they work peaceful jobs, virtually always as a specialist in some large organisation or supply chain.

Most major revolutions (French revolution, Russian revolution etc) were sparked off by a shortage of food. Yes, people are very nice. Will put up with all manner of discomfort, as long as they feel safe. The moment we feel threatened or our family is threatened things get ugly fast. We live today with an abundance of food. Let's pray that state of the world continues. Or it'll just go back to the way it was.

Secondly, we have examples where resources are shared, not competed for. Universal healthcare, for instance, is an example of a resource that no-one has to win from others.

I think that's too abstract for humans to comprehend properly. While humans are capable of rational thought. We're mostly goverened by our emotions. Our emotions regarding universal healthcare will only get triggered via proxys. Stuff like universal healthcare means death panels, or that I will be cared for no matter if I lose my job. People are dumb. Or rather, we often behave stupidly even when we're not and should know better.

No matter the major political decision being taken in society I think all humans map it to something resembling the complexity of Star Wars and decide who is the bad guy, and flush all nuance down the toilet. Because our tribal brains just can't comprehend anything more advanced.

 

[Jokodo]

What do you mean not sustainable? Tribalism is the social order that sustained humans for 60 000 years (or 3 000 000) and also saw to us spreading into every habitat on Earth. No other human social order has been sustained for as long. So I'm not sure what you're comparing with. It obviously works just fine.



I'm sorry, but this is the brain we've got. It evolved for tribalism. For good and for bad. When we entered into the last ice age I'm pretty sure access to food often was a zero sum game. That's how we killed the Neanderthals. We starved them to death, by nabbing the food, rather than beating them to death.

Another well known cognitive bias, as I've mentioned before, is negativity bias. Anything that hurts or scares you will impinge deeply on your nervous system. Pain leaves deeper marks on neural pathways than pleasure. The scientists who research this say we focus about five times as much attention on the negative as the positive. This means your newer, sapient brain must be exercised to mitigate the perceptive distortions it causes so you can get a more realistic understanding of your environment. This takes purposeful, conscious thought, in opposition to reflexive instinct.

And it clearly served to keep our ancestors alive just fine. I think that the people who didn't have as strong negativity bias died out. I think it's functional. While annoying for modern humans.

And we have created now an almost alien environment that humans did not evolve in. We didn't evolve in a tribe of seven billion or in an information rich world that constantly presents us with negative messages and images. It's tempting and easy to just believe violence is our base nature. And yet, again, here we are, globally better off than ever before overall. More peaceful overall, more cooperative overall, more innovative overall, longer life spans, broader literacy, etc. We're even finding that population controls itself as we progress

What progress? Our brains are the same now as they were 70 000 years ago. Nothing has happened. We're probably slightly dumber (based on memory research on hunter/gatherers of Papua New Guinnea) but otherwise we have the same brains.

We are discussing human behaviour. Not the evolution of society. Society has evolved for the better. But not our brains.

Yes, we live in an alien environment that prevents us to live out our true violent nature. We have the police to perpetually threaten us if we misbehave. The army to prevent the same behaviours on national scales.

So maybe the current state of humanity is a sort of crossroads. Do our animal brain reflexes win or our mad neuroplasticity skills? The farthest I will concede on this question of cooperation and adaptability versus urge to dominate and blind instinct is that no one knows. As I said before, over the eons of our evolution, we have never lived in a world like the modern one we've created for ourselves. We all might speak confidently on this topic, but the truth is that no one has a clue how things will turn out for us.

I choose to err on the side of what has actually been working the best so far: our strengths of cooperation and neuroplasticity.

I don't think you understand what neuroplasticity means. What you are saying is that you believe in Lamarckian evolution. It doesn't work. Our brains can't evolve that way. If you want humans to evolve into a more peaceful creature you're going to have to use Nazi type selective breeding and get rid of the unwanted ones in gas chambers and mass graves. Unless women stop falling in love with sexy muscle bound brutes we're not going to breed this behaviour out.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamarckism

You must be pretty confident in your mind reading skills, since nothing Angry Floof said her implies or even suggests Lamarckian evolution

 

[bigfield]

Most major revolutions (French revolution, Russian revolution etc) were sparked off by a shortage of food. Yes, people are very nice. Will put up with all manner of discomfort, as long as they feel safe. The moment we feel threatened or our family is threatened things get ugly fast. We live today with an abundance of food. Let's pray that state of the world continues. Or it'll just go back to the way it was.

No argument there. Mind you, the French Revolution occurred in a pre-industrial society, while the Russian Revolution occurred when the country's economy was engaged in total war. While modern developed nations are risking ecosystem collapse, most of the scenarios are probably still far better for the average citizen than the conditions that let to those revolutions. So while we are always one major logistical failure away from barbarism, the odds of that collapse are low.

Secondly, we have examples where resources are shared, not competed for. Universal healthcare, for instance, is an example of a resource that no-one has to win from others.

I think that's too abstract for humans to comprehend properly. While humans are capable of rational thought. We're mostly goverened by our emotions. Our emotions regarding universal healthcare will only get triggered via proxys. Stuff like universal healthcare means death panels, or that I will be cared for no matter if I lose my job. People are dumb. Or rather, we often behave stupidly even when we're not and should know better.

I see the rhetoric about death panels etc. in the US, but you won't see that in countries that already have universal healthcare, because people like it and support it. Similarly, lots of countries have welfare for the unemployed (and the unemployable), and it's generally supported. People don't need to think about these things as "sharing resources", and it's best that they don't, lest they discover how nice the government is being.

One of the most common rhetorical tactics I see among right wing politicians--mostly in my own country since that's what I follow--is that we don't have enough resources to share. The country has to "tighten its belt" and end "entitlements". But the thing is...it's a big lie. Progressive governments can and have redistributed money, and I think it's obvious that it has led to overwhelming social benefits.

When I look at the debacles that are US healthcare and welfare, I don't worry that countries with superior system will end up regressing to an Americanised system; I wonder when, not if, the US will finally catch up to more civilised countries.

No matter the major political decision being taken in society I think all humans map it to something resembling the complexity of Star Wars and decide who is the bad guy, and flush all nuance down the toilet. Because our tribal brains just can't comprehend anything more advanced.

I'm certainly guilty of that, largely because I picked my political side (my "lesser evil" if I'm being cynical) a while time ago and now I just want them to be in government. I save the nuance and depth for private conversations in meatspace, where it feels rewarding.

 

[bigfield]

I don't think you understand what neuroplasticity means. What you are saying is that you believe in Lamarckian evolution. It doesn't work. Our brains can't evolve that way. If you want humans to evolve into a more peaceful creature you're going to have to use Nazi type selective breeding and get rid of the unwanted ones in gas chambers and mass graves. Unless women stop falling in love with sexy muscle bound brutes we're not going to breed this behaviour out.

I'm seeing Floof's argument much differently.

Humans brains are highly malleable even without changing genetically. Our brains not only go through an extraordinarily long developmental phase, they remain highly adaptable throughout our lives. According to David Eagleman, we go through two phases, one in childhood and one in adolescence, where our brains develop excessive cross-linking between neurons. In childhood this primes us to learn a language, among other things. In adolescence this makes us impulse and insecure, but as time goes by, we reinforce pathways for healthy social behaviour. We tend to blame teenagers' hormones, but that's a bit like putting the cart before the horse.

This means that, the way we choose to socialise children and teens has a huge influence on who they become as adults. As tragic as it is, some of the best evidence of this comes from the children in the child protection system, who are often extremely slow in achieving the same neurodevelopmental milestones as children who are nurtured, loved and socialised. These delays aren't just a epigenetic thing caused by malnutrition or a perpetual state or fight-or-flight, but also a lack of conversation, a lack of plain old affection, and isolation from other people. Even for normal children from harmonious households, early childhood socialisation has changed significantly over the last couple of generations: it wasn't that long ago that childcare was for the wealthy, but now it is the norm for most households, at least where I live. That's going to significantly shift the nature of our society once those children become adults.

All this is really saying is that we can make (and are making) more peaceful people without a eugenics program.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I don't think you understand what neuroplasticity means. What you are saying is that you believe in Lamarckian evolution. It doesn't work. Our brains can't evolve that way. If you want humans to evolve into a more peaceful creature you're going to have to use Nazi type selective breeding and get rid of the unwanted ones in gas chambers and mass graves. Unless women stop falling in love with sexy muscle bound brutes we're not going to breed this behaviour out.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamarckism

You must be pretty confident in your mind reading skills, since nothing Angry Floof said her implies or even suggests Lamarckian evolution

Ok, I'm listening. What do you interpret as the selection mechanic by which we've been breeding for friendliness?

 

[DrZoidberg]

I don't think you understand what neuroplasticity means. What you are saying is that you believe in Lamarckian evolution. It doesn't work. Our brains can't evolve that way. If you want humans to evolve into a more peaceful creature you're going to have to use Nazi type selective breeding and get rid of the unwanted ones in gas chambers and mass graves. Unless women stop falling in love with sexy muscle bound brutes we're not going to breed this behaviour out.

I'm seeing Floof's argument much differently.

Humans brains are highly malleable even without changing genetically. Our brains not only go through an extraordinarily long developmental phase, they remain highly adaptable throughout our lives. According to David Eagleman, we go through two phases, one in childhood and one in adolescence, where our brains develop excessive cross-linking between neurons. In childhood this primes us to learn a language, among other things. In adolescence this makes us impulse and insecure, but as time goes by, we reinforce pathways for healthy social behaviour. We tend to blame teenagers' hormones, but that's a bit like putting the cart before the horse.

This means that, the way we choose to socialise children and teens has a huge influence on who they become as adults. As tragic as it is, some of the best evidence of this comes from the children in the child protection system, who are often extremely slow in achieving the same neurodevelopmental milestones as children who are nurtured, loved and socialised. These delays aren't just a epigenetic thing caused by malnutrition or a perpetual state or fight-or-flight, but also a lack of conversation, a lack of plain old affection, and isolation from other people. Even for normal children from harmonious households, early childhood socialisation has changed significantly over the last couple of generations: it wasn't that long ago that childcare was for the wealthy, but now it is the norm for most households, at least where I live. That's going to significantly shift the nature of our society once those children become adults.

All this is really saying is that we can make (and are making) more peaceful people without a eugenics program.

Ok, that's more interesting. Let's drop the term "neuroplasticity", because it's the wrong word for this context.

I agree. To a point. But it requires very little for humans to revert back into being savages. As human behaviour in wartime has proven. Civilisation and civilised behaviour is a thin varnish that easily cracks and falls apart. Mental illness and shit parenting will ensure that our modern societies will receive a steady stream of maladapted and dangerous people. I'm personally convinved that the reason Scandinavian countries are so low on violent crime is down to our very generous welfare system and free education. We're basically paying off those who aren't behaviouraly adapted to modern civilisation. We give them a sense of security which acts to keep them peaceful.

But it's an ongoing project that will never end. That's social evolution. Not evolution of our brains. We will never outgrow the need to have police.

 

[Jokodo]

What do you mean not sustainable? Tribalism is the social order that sustained humans for 60 000 years (or 3 000 000) and also saw to us spreading into every habitat on Earth. No other human social order has been sustained for as long. So I'm not sure what you're comparing with. It obviously works just fine.



I'm sorry, but this is the brain we've got. It evolved for tribalism. For good and for bad. When we entered into the last ice age I'm pretty sure access to food often was a zero sum game. That's how we killed the Neanderthals. We starved them to death, by nabbing the food, rather than beating them to death.

Another well known cognitive bias, as I've mentioned before, is negativity bias. Anything that hurts or scares you will impinge deeply on your nervous system. Pain leaves deeper marks on neural pathways than pleasure. The scientists who research this say we focus about five times as much attention on the negative as the positive. This means your newer, sapient brain must be exercised to mitigate the perceptive distortions it causes so you can get a more realistic understanding of your environment. This takes purposeful, conscious thought, in opposition to reflexive instinct.

And it clearly served to keep our ancestors alive just fine. I think that the peoplecritters who didn't have as strong negativity bias died out. I think it's functional. While annoying for modern humans.

I think what you two call "negativity bias" is way older than humans, or even vertebrates. At the basic level, it's an optimization for recall (avoidance of false negatives) over precision (avoidance of false positives). The cost of wrongly getting startled and jumping at a branch (half a food calorie and a bit of embarrassment) is simply much lower than the cost of wrongly not reacting to a snake, and the same was true for many other potential threats long before there were snakes.

If you think it played a major role in the evolution of humans specifically, i.e. in the last 3 million years of our evolution as opposed to the 600 million years that came before, you haven't presented your argument.

And we have created now an almost alien environment that humans did not evolve in. We didn't evolve in a tribe of seven billion or in an information rich world that constantly presents us with negative messages and images. It's tempting and easy to just believe violence is our base nature. And yet, again, here we are, globally better off than ever before overall. More peaceful overall, more cooperative overall, more innovative overall, longer life spans, broader literacy, etc. We're even finding that population controls itself as we progress

What progress? Our brains are the same now as they were 70 000 years ago. Nothing has happened. We're probably slightly dumber (based on memory research on hunter/gatherers of Papua New Guinnea) but otherwise we have the same brains.

We are discussing human behaviour. Not the evolution of society. Society has evolved for the better. But not our brains.

Yes, we live in an alien environment that prevents us to live out our true violent nature. We have the police to perpetually threaten us if we misbehave. The army to prevent the same behaviours on national scales.

Well, there's the thing. "our true violent nature" is to some extent just a myth. Children as young as 14 months spontaneously offer help to adult strangers in experimental conditions. When an adult accidentally drops a pen and is unable to reach it, children that age hand it to them 40% of the time. And it's not just because the pen is interesting in itself - when the adult experimenter intentionally drops it and makes no attempt to retrieve it, less then 10% of kids will hand it to them. So very young infants not only (a) understand others' goals but also (b) attempt to help them bring about those goals. That's in stark contrast to other apes (juveniles or adults): chimpanzees (or for that matter bonobos) are good at (a) but unmotivated for (b) - if anything, the experimenters' interest for the object will motivate them to retrieve and keep it for themselves, as if it suggested that the object was more valuable than it looks like at first sight.
https://www.eva.mpg.de/documents/Wiley-Blackwell/Warneken_Helping_Infancy_2007_1554773.pdf

Do you seriously believe 14-month-olds are motivated by fear of the police?

 

[Jokodo]

I don't think you understand what neuroplasticity means. What you are saying is that you believe in Lamarckian evolution. It doesn't work. Our brains can't evolve that way. If you want humans to evolve into a more peaceful creature you're going to have to use Nazi type selective breeding and get rid of the unwanted ones in gas chambers and mass graves. Unless women stop falling in love with sexy muscle bound brutes we're not going to breed this behaviour out.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamarckism

You must be pretty confident in your mind reading skills, since nothing Angry Floof said her implies or even suggests Lamarckian evolution

Ok, I'm listening. What do you interpret as the selection mechanic by which we've been breeding for friendliness?

Which part of Angry Floof's post claims that we have been breeding for friendliness at historical timescales?

It is a fact that humans (as a whole, not just in particular cultures, though of course there are plenty cultural influences) are spontaneously more helpful than other apes (see my last post; there's plenty of literature on this topic). That fact is perfectly explicable with Darwinian evolution, and if your interpretion of it doesn't allow for this fact, your interpretation is demonstrably, empirically, wrong.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Well, there's the thing. "our true violent nature" is to some extent just a myth. Children as young as 14 spontaneously offer help to adult strangers in experimental conditions. When an adult accidentally drops a pen and is unable to reach it, children that age hand it to them 40% of the time. And it's not just because the pen is interesting in itself - when the adult experimenter intentionally drops it and makes no attempt to retrieve it, less then 10% of kids will hand it to them. So very young infants not only (a) understand others' goals but also (b) attempt to help them bring about those goals. That's in stark contrast to other apes (juveniles or adults): chimpanzees (or for that matter bonobos) are good at (a) but unmotivated for (b) - if anything, the experimenters' interest for the object will motivate them to retrieve and keep it for themselves, as if it suggested that the object was more valuable than it looks like at first sight.
https://www.eva.mpg.de/documents/Wiley-Blackwell/Warneken_Helping_Infancy_2007_1554773.pdf

Do you seriously believe 14-month-olds are motivated by fear of the police?

This is a black and white fallacy ie a human is sometimes cooperative and friendly, therefore all humans are cooperative and friendly all the time.

Humans are cooperative and friendly when it's in our best interest. Since humans have evolved for tribalism a child might as well any human they encounter will be part of their tribe. It's the safest bet. And therefore have a vested interest to make friends. This is why humans are super nice to complete strangers all the time. Mostly. Unless they feel they're in a superior position and will risk nothing when violent = violence.

The violence is always there, under the surface. Ready to explode at any moment. If the man (it's in 9 our of 10 cases a man) feels backed into a corner and threatened = violence. Our world has all the evidence you need. The prevalence of domestic violence alone is all the evidence you need. Men often turn to violence in their relationships for stupid reasons.

The books on the Gulag system and Concentration camps tells us what happens when one class of humans are able to commit acts of violence against another group and don't risk repercussions. What happens is that women become as violent as the men, and the violence spins out of control.

It's not a pretty picture. The Gulags and Concentration camp system wasn't that long ago. To think our socities have evolved out of this behaviour in any major way is delusional IMHO.

 

[Jokodo]

Well, there's the thing. "our true violent nature" is to some extent just a myth. Children as young as 14 spontaneously offer help to adult strangers in experimental conditions. When an adult accidentally drops a pen and is unable to reach it, children that age hand it to them 40% of the time. And it's not just because the pen is interesting in itself - when the adult experimenter intentionally drops it and makes no attempt to retrieve it, less then 10% of kids will hand it to them. So very young infants not only (a) understand others' goals but also (b) attempt to help them bring about those goals. That's in stark contrast to other apes (juveniles or adults): chimpanzees (or for that matter bonobos) are good at (a) but unmotivated for (b) - if anything, the experimenters' interest for the object will motivate them to retrieve and keep it for themselves, as if it suggested that the object was more valuable than it looks like at first sight.
https://www.eva.mpg.de/documents/Wiley-Blackwell/Warneken_Helping_Infancy_2007_1554773.pdf

Do you seriously believe 14-month-olds are motivated by fear of the police?

This is a black and white fallacy ie a human is sometimes cooperative and friendly, therefore all humans are cooperative and friendly all the time.

I don't think anyone said that humans are cooperative and friendly all the time. Only that they have an evolved capacity to be cooperative and friendly that's unique among apes and rare among mammals in general.

If someone has fallen prey to the black and white fallacy, it's you and your "our true violent nature" (which is a direct quote).

Humans are cooperative and friendly when it's in our best interest.

That's not how instincts work. We don't rent a super-computer to calculate the probability that being cooperative and friendly in a particular interaction is going to be in our best interest, and then consciously decide on whether or not to be cooperative and friendly. Evolution just doesn't work like that, it uses heuristics, cheap tricks, all over the place: We are emotionally drawn towards being cooperative and helpful in situations that contain certain triggers, where the triggers have been selected based on that they used to be moderately well correlated with situations where being cooperative and friendly tended to benefit our ancestors.

Since humans have evolved for tribalism a child might as well any human they encounter will be part of their tribe. It's the safest bet. And therefore have a vested interest to make friends. This is why humans are super nice to complete strangers all the time. Mostly. Unless they feel they're in a superior position and will risk nothing when violent = violence.

The violence is always there, under the surface. Ready to explode at any moment. If the man (it's in 9 our of 10 cases a man) feels backed into a corner and threatened = violence. Our world has all the evidence you need. The prevalence of domestic violence alone is all the evidence you need. Men often turn to violence in their relationships for stupid reasons.

The books on the Gulag system and Concentration camps tells us what happens when one class of humans are able to commit acts of violence against another group and don't risk repercussions. What happens is that women become as violent as the men, and the violence spins out of control.

It's not a pretty picture. The Gulags and Concentration camp system wasn't that long ago. To think our socities have evolved out of this behaviour in any major way is delusional IMHO.

How, exactly, does the fact that certain extreme conditions bring more violent aspects of our behavioral repertoire to the fore than others make those aspects "our true nature"?

You are not making a rational argument at all here, let alone responding to what people are saying.