Politics and evolution

And as a side note, there is no such thing as "social Darwinism" either, as the historian Robert Bannister argued in his 1978 book Social Darwinism: Science and Myth. Instead, he says, and backs up with historical documentation, it is a term used to demonize one's opponents. And this is what is happening here, I suspect.

Thank you for a good and well-reasoned commentary. I quite agree, by the way, that the 2 American parties are near right and far right, and that is why I tried to define my terms the way I did - to include European social democrats as "liberals." I realize that "liberal" elsewhere has a different meaning, but here in the US, where there is no functioning left wing, people who might have been considered moderate conservatives before the 1970's or 80's are now called liberals. If you don't believe me, try to remember the last time you heard the term, "liberal Republican." You don't hear it any more because they are now called "Democrats."

I did not mean to imply that biology is everything - just that it matters. The rational decision you think you are making is colored by your deep-held emotions. I think it was Robert Wright, in The Moral Animal, who practically despaired of deciding who's right because of the wide gulf between different people's starting points. The left is not immune from self-interest, but I still think that the far right has a hypertrophied self-interest and fails to recognize the needs of, for example, wage earners. The first step in overcoming your self-interest is recognizing it.

"Impressionism" (in painting) was initially a derisive term coined by the enemies of impressionism. Therefore there is no such thing as impressionism? I think not. Likewise social Darwinism.

"Social Darwinism" always evaulates as a justification, used by those in positions of advantage, to justify those positions. One never finds those currently among the have-nots attributing their situation to inferiority of any kind except temporary misfortune. Nor is there any persuasive evidence that disadvantage is either permanent or biological. There are political and cultural structures that impose class systems, but "lower class" individuals and families relocated to more socially mobile societies do not long remain particularly low. I read that in the US, the bottom 20% economically experiences a turnover of over 90% every five years. So disadvantage is NOT a biological side-effect. It's cultural.

Hopefully most people here have learned the lesson Gould's Mismeasure of Man taught so clearly -- any biological differences between members of different political persuasions are artifacts of a measurement methodology created to find such differences, whether or not they exist. There's no indication they exist, and fairly clear indications that they do not. Individuals tend to become more conservative (in Matt Young's terms) as they age, but not because of organic changes in the brain, but because of changes in economic circumstances.

Perhaps Matt Young is indeed young, and the day will come when he has an epiphany, and suddenly realizes that conservatives have an essential insight he wasn't yet ready to see. Perhaps that insight is that one's goal is not to "overcome" one's self interest, but to implement it!

Flint writes,

<< Perhaps that insight is that one's goal is not to "overcome" one's self interest, but to implement it! >>

Flint, you might consider the prognostications easily available to anyone who reads the news, such as in this article (partially quoted) here. At this rate, self-interest is going to destroy those interested only in self as well as the rest of us:

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/10/22/plundered.planet.ap/index.html

GENEVA, Switzerland (AP) -- Humanity's reliance on fossil fuels, the spread of cities, the destruction of natural habitats for farmland and over-exploitation of the oceans are destroying Earth's ability to sustain life, the environmental group WWF warned in a new report Thursday.

The biggest consumers of nonrenewable natural resources are the United Arab Emirates, the United States, Kuwait, Australia and Sweden, who leave the biggest "ecological footprint," the World Wildlife Fund said in its regular Living Planet Report.

Humans currently consume 20 percent more natural resources than the Earth can produce, the report said.

"We are spending nature's capital faster than it can regenerate," said WWF chief Claude Martin, releasing the 40-page study. "We are running up an ecological debt which we won't be able to pay off unless governments restore the balance between our consumption of natural resources and the Earth's ability to renew them."

Fiona here again. For my part, I started to make sacrifices years ago. I conserve water to an extent that shocks houseguests, I gave up driving and started walking, I refused to have children and adopt stray animals instead, I donate money I can barely afford to ecological charities, and on and on.

How about you, Flint? What are you doing for the future of the planet?

Fiona

Humanity's reliance on fossil fuels, the spread of cities, the destruction of natural habitats for farmland and over-exploitation of the oceans are destroying Earth's ability to sustain life

For my part, I started to make sacrifices years ago. I conserve water to an extent that shocks houseguests, I gave up driving and started walking, I refused to have children and adopt stray animals instead, I donate money I can barely afford to ecological charities, and on and on.

And in so doing, you are making a better world for everyone, right? I hope you understand that those this blog works so hard to combat tend to share your values. For them, evolution is mostly a symbol of humankind's loss of those values, and our consequent fall into the immoral and short-sighted errors that True Christianity prevents. Because we have been victimized by atheistic humanism, we have forgotten how to make the noble sacrifices you have rediscovered. Bless you ever so much.

— Flint

What a totally crazy series of posts.

Flint: Self-interest is the way to go.
Fiona: I do things to help other people. Do you?
Flint: By improving things you're just making things worse. And you want to rub it in my face.

Steve:

I think you are missing the nuances here. In this context, there is simply no objective standard against which the notion of "improvement" can be measured. We DO know that most well-meaning behaviors tend to have effects quite different from the original intent, and sometimes the exact opposite. The "liberal" (in the sense we've been using the term) seeks to extend community (that is, tax-based) support to children of single parents who can't do a proper job of raising them otherwise. The "conservative" (in our sense) sees government as *purchasing* illegitimate children by offering cash bonuses to whoever breeds one.

Or consider the well-intended practice of shipping food to people who are starving because of increasing desertification, which in turn results most directly from overpopulation. Are we doing these people any net favor by enabling the very behavior that causes their misfortune?

Consider the war against drugs, which has the effect (as opposed to the intent) of enriching the very people we seek to put out of business. Drug usage remains unaffected.

Or consider...well, I hope you get the idea. Our grasp of the long-term self-interest of OTHER people is notoriously lousy. So I suggest that a better goal is to work toward as enlightened a notion of our personal self-interest as we can, and hopefully get more enlightened as experience permits. The goal of "overcoming" your self interest can only be described as perverse. There is no other word that fits.

I do not mean to say that the attitudes that are classed by some as "social Darwinism" do not exist - of course they do. And they always have. Similar ideas existed in the early renaissance, in the middle ages, in the classical period (think: Spartans) and in classical philosophy. What does not exist, though, is the tradition of social Darwinism. There was one social Darwinian - Sumner. Spencer's political views were established before Darwin wrote, and owe more to Malthus and Smith (and the anti-Poor Law movement of the 1830s) than to Darwin, and as Bannister argues, his views were not unalloyed "social Darwinism" either, as neither were the so-called "robber barons", nor even Adam Smith. They all restricted their laissez faire economics with a social conscience of a kind.

Or consider the well-intended practice of shipping food to people who are starving because of increasing desertification, which in turn results most directly from overpopulation. Are we doing these people any net favor by enabling the very behavior that causes their misfortune?

Or consider . . . well, I hope you get the idea. Our grasp of the long-term self-interest of OTHER people is notoriously lousy. So I suggest that a better goal is to work toward as enlightened a notion of our personal self-interest as we can, and hopefully get more enlightened as experience permits. The goal of "overcoming" your self interest can only be described as perverse. There is no other word that fits.

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

I didn't miss that the law of unintended consequences can apply, but if there's an actual problem, that doesn't justify inaction. She asked if you did anything to help, and all you said was what she did might backfire. Then you accused her of having personality defects, which if you knew her (I do), you'd know she didn't. It was more like a Bill O'Reilly, or Rush Limbaugh, exchange, than a TPT discussion.

The thought that politics and temperament are somehow related apparently occurs to nearly every one of us at some point, and is not entirely unfounded. However, at the very least, a great deal of evidence gathered in political science shows the relationship between temperament and political orientation to be extremely complex, and varying with various kinds of circumstances, not the least of which is the varying composition of each of the various historical parties. I'm not the first to notice with some irony that in the U.S. for example the party of Lincoln is also the party of Limbaugh.

Yet there are different ways that people think about the same issues, ways that can be reasonably linked to ideological vantage points. Different ways of defining such central abstractions as personhood, loyalty, fairness, justice, and human nature.

It seems likely to me that these are distinct traditions or styles of reasoning that are each coherent to their practitioners, the people that interact with each other using the same kind of reasoning. Political party leaders are people who rely paerticularly heavily on the abstractions of one style of reasoning and are motivated to avoid engaging different ones.

For most of us outside of politics, that is usually not the case. We are less politically polarized because we are less reliant on and immersed in a particular tradition of reasoning, although we may still tend to think more from a particular tradition most of the time when forced to make choices related to the relevant abstracts.

The challenge for intellectuals seems to me not to be to pick a tradition of political or moral reasoning and argue for it, but to recognize what each is talking about and translate it into common terms as far as possible so that more universal criteria of value can be applied to the reasoning. What it seems to take is to enter into a particular way of reasoning by interacting with people who reason in that way and picking up on the way they treat the various important abstractions.

This is an activity that probably cannot take place within the context of politics because political activism is neccessarily ideological and neccessarily dependent upon garnering a broad base of support, which requires a single coherent way of framing the "issues."

We need to keep reminding ourselves that polarized thinking within each tradition of reasoning seems perfectly logical within each tradition, but is based on different ways of defining abstractions and thus distorts understanding of the underlying reality.

There need to be intellectuals and journalists who can translate between the different ways of thinking and help us see what each is saying, in order to make more intelligent choices between them rather than being driven mostly by fear mongering or radical idealism.

That is, if the ideal of intelligent civic responsibility is still worthwhile.

kind regards,

Todd

Given that our interest is in helping those starving,

Flint's argument shows we ought to couple food aid with long term developmental aid, birth control programs, and (ideally) more liberal immigration programs for economic refugees.

But to suggest that we don't really help the starving by sending them food is both callous and specious.

giving the benefit of others a value in the same ball park as that which you give to your own benefit is not perverse.

you accused her of having personality defects, which if you knew her (I do), you'd know she didn't.

I think that the actions she described could rather easily be considered to derive from a personality defect.

I am NOT willing to grant carte-blanche that her behavior is guaranteed to lead to the greatest good for the greatest number.

Let's say for the sake of discussion that what I do for a living is develop more powerful and sophisticated weapons systems. Is my contribution positive or negative?

Steve:

I see no reason to insult you. I don't know what you mean by "this time" since I haven't insulted you in the past either. But in my case:

1) ACLU supporter
2) Computer firmware geek; graduate degree in government
3) Libertarian
4) Thinks Bush is irrational
5) Macs are fine by me. Whatever tool best does the job at hand and all that.

Why should this be a given, rather than something to be seriously evaluated and debated?

All you are suggesting, then, is that the exact same problems should be spread over a greater territory. More liberal immigration programs are closely analogous to relocating organisms to the next valley. Long term developmental aid does not increase our global supply of arable land. Do you suppose there IS a theoretical carrying capacity of the planet for humans? If not, why not?

So just how enlightened about long-term impacts should we be? How probable does a scenario need to be before we should consider it worth acting on? Should our personal values always override our best-fit population and economic models? These questions aren't addressed by dismissing them as specious.

While I agree, this is not what was said. What was said was that we should "overcome our self-interest." What you are saying is that the golden rule works well. It does. I argue that following the golden rule as well as we can is strongly in our enlightened self-interest. So once again, our self-interest isn't something to be "overcome" but rather to be understood as accurately as possible. If a properly understood self interest is implemented, everyone gains.

If you have those positive qualities, you'd get along with Fiona. She's very cool and not at all self-righteous.

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Wow! What a wonderful argument and exchange of ideas. We have covered Social Darwinism, Evolution, Politics, Left, Right, Middle and uninformed. All of which constitutes arguments specifically related to our "Civilized Culture". Are we in fact civilized? What does that actually mean? We once lived in a "Garden of Eden" for lack of a better term, where the food was free for the taking and denied to no one. It seems we have set a situation in progress where the food is now under tight control. It is now under lock and key and you don't get any unless you pay for it. To do that we have to work at a job which may be likable but most often is not. Then we acquire the little pieces of paper we can bring to the lock-up and release some food for our families. This is pretty much the basis of our "Civilization".

Now we have areas of peoples who for some reason cannot produce enough food for themselves. Either through lack of education or Political situations these people are denied what used to be free but is now tightly controlled. What are we to do? Of course we send them food. We have plenty of it. We produce more than we need so why not? It's an altruistic gesture that is sure to be appreciated. Unfortunately we are what we eat. Don't try to deny this because it's very simple. Given a population of, oh, rats would suffice, if you only supply the same amount of food for sustenance that would support 100 of the specious then there number will remain at about 100 without any other artificial means to sustain them. Therefore giving starving people just enough food to keep them reproducing and starving does no help whatsoever. I know you are probably thinking what a hard ass I must be. I don't care if people live or die. The truth is that people live and die every day depending on their particular situations. When did we become the "Almighty" who would say who would live and who would die?

We are now in a position to destroy the world for all species. This is what our "Civilization" has produced. You argue politics as if it was the most important thing to us but I assure you it is very low on the survival list. Politics is a by-product of "Civilization" by which I mean the total denial of who we are as belonging to this planet as apposed to conquering it. We are in the process of killing off the very things we need to survive. It won't be much longer before we cannot sustain our population. If you think I am wrong then just do the math. Where will the population be in your lifetime and who is going to support it? We won't have surplus food supplies in the very near future. You altruistic types won't have anything to give soon.

So once again it comes down to we are what we eat. It's all too simple. You have enough food or not. Your population depends on it. Of course we are running out of space, but that is another argument. When does the population start interfering with the growing space? Hmmmmmmmm . . . . . . . . .

But this argument is still unsound on several grounds. First, it only goes through if all policies to help the starving will result in more people starving in future. I have never seen this established, or even particularly argued for.

that feeding the hungry may result in more hungry mouths in future may give us reason to modify how we feed the hungry today, but it does not give us reason to not feed the hungry today.

There is no theoretical limit (for practical purposes).

This is not practical policy because the West will not give up its steaks in this manner. But it highlights the point that the fundamental policy constraints come from value choices, not from biological limits.

The best-fit economic models assume a set of values will be acted on.

The only way a concept of rationality can rule Hitler's interests as contradictory of his "self interest" is by imposing a pre-existing value, and that is, of course to impose a value system on the discussion.

Rather, the limit for such "interests" would be to impose the Golden Rule on everyone except yourself. The Golden Rule only becomes your ethic when you recognise that it, and your self interests go different ways

I'm not the expert you are in biology, but I read Darwin as saying that one of the canonical presumptions underlying natural selection is that all species overbreed, thus setting up selection pressures required for natural selection to do anything.

You are jumping ahead of yourself here by phrasing the issue backwards. We aren't looking for a reason NOT to feed the hungry, but rather a reason why we should do so. What do we gain? It's important to answer this question well, because the answer shapes the resulting program. I could go into detail about the politics of starvation, but in this context it's a tangent. I argue that we cannot conclude that we uniquely have no limits to population growth, simply because we don't know where those limits lie. And further, that assuming there are no such limits leads to policy positions which may well be based on a false assumption. The loss we risk is possible (if not likely) widespread unnecessary misery and reduced average lifespan among the affected population. The gain we guarantee ourselves is, it makes us feel good. We have behaved altruistically and been morally sound.

Tom Curtis:

I wrote "I'm deeply suspicious of the claim that if everyone adopts a personal policy of self-sacrifice, then everyone will be somehow better off. I doubt getting people to follow this policy would even be possible, and I doubt that it would have anything resembling your anticipated outcome even if it were possible."

I understand that you share neither my suspicions nor my doubts. You may be right, but I see no compelling evidence in that direction. In order to be right, we would need some truly powerful cultural and political changes. I admit that I consider Fiona's behavior to be a perverse form of self-gratification, and we disagree about that as well. But let's presume just for grins that she is correct, and that if everyone (or enough people) adopt similar practices, our population can grow without any effective limit, while everone remains well fed and happy as clams. Now, how can we get this to happen? Maybe through religion? But then, we'd need to convert everyone to the One True Religion, whatever it takes. Some people are already doing this (albeit perhaps for somewhat different policy goals). Had you noticed? Maybe as a first step we should, after all, abandon evolution and join hands in Christ in the interests of enlightened charity?

In any case, what you are doing is stacking the deck (with your own suspicions and doubts) by painting a context in which your peferred behaviors would (in your opinion) lead to results you think would be best for others in the long run as well as the short run. Then, you declare that this approach makes you so much more sympathetic than those whose understanding of how the world wobbles differs, that everyone else might as well throw in the towel. You have cornered the market on sympathy, if you do say so yourself.

But I hope our discussion has shown that in order to claim the Stanley Cup of Sympathy, it was necessary for you to construct a fairly dubious argument about carrying capacities, future technological developments, continued cheap energy, favorable climates (which you assumed without mentioning it, but it IS required), etc. The conservative's harsh selfishness becomes less an attribute of character than a set of bad predictions. Or at least an incompetent analysis of cause and effect.

I wrote "I'm deeply suspicious of the claim that if everyone adopts a personal policy of self-sacrifice, then everyone will be somehow better off. I doubt getting people to follow this policy would even be possible, and I doubt that it would have anything resembling your anticipated outcome even if it were possible."

In any case, what you are doing is stacking the deck (with your own suspicions and doubts) by painting a context in which your peferred behaviors would (in your opinion) lead to results you think would be best for others in the long run as well as the short run.

Flint:

I feel that I have been dismissed as unworthy. I am not as well educated in politics as you seem to be and I have never been a person who has held interest in such studies. I was not trying to put forth the notion that politics is without merit or important but that it is a natural tendency of all humans or any species for that matter that have evolved to the point of self awareness as individuals. Politics have been with us a very long time but, as with many things, have evolved within our particular culture of agrarianism to the point of being an artificial means of creating an environment that allows us to live in relative harmony. (To me it is obvious that this is not working. The history of civilization is rife with warfare.) This was once done in a more natural way that didn't impose restrictions for human behavior but instead allowed for it. Humans are creatures with many faults and have always been such but for thousands of years we have flourished on this planet. We were successful as a species because no laws were written to prevent normal human tendencies but instead we were allowed to be human. We had no "Thou Shalt Nots" but instead we had "If you do" to deal with the traits that inevitably cause friction between any individuals. There are still people who live with this system (although their numbers are dwindling fast) and they have no need for lawyers, psychiatrists, schools, washing machines or almost everything that our culture finds necessary. Why is that? We are witnessing the final gasps of a failed experiment that started about ten thousand years ago. That was the start of our agrarian civilization. From that point we set up a system that would ensure the continued growth of our population while systematically reducing and often eliminating those who would not comply with our way of thinking. We are now in the position, if we continue in this direction, to destroy ourselves and all other forms of life on our planet. Are politics important? Of course, but it is not the only answer to our impending problems.

Tom said: "However, Darwin's view of nature does not directly apply to humans in one important respect. The major determinant of the human biological situation is culture."

This is a good example of the belief system we set in place long ago, that we are exempt from the laws of nature because of our culture. We are no more exempt from these laws than we are from the laws of physics.

If you'll look back, you'll see that Flint distorted everyone's arguments. So don't be too upset, it's apparently not personal.

Apart from the contextual and extremely local division of political views into "liberal" and "conservative" based on the American major parties, which in the rest of the world is regarded as a division between moderate conservatism and slightly less moderate conservatism, the idea there is some kind of psychological underpinning to such views is, to speak frankly, silly.

— John Wilkins

Flint, I think you are exaggerating my position to defend yours. While I do think "Love your neighbour as yourself" is the correct ethical rule, I do not intend to impose morality by law

you appear to accuse me of prescribing that level of self sacrifice as policy. If you look at what I have actually recomended, however, it has been that Westerners halve their food intake and forgo grain fed meat. That you donate some money for starving people, and reduce your meat budget to do so. That you get a fuel/electric hybrid car instead of a standard gas guzzler. These are not big sacrifices.

But those changes will not occur while people keep telling themselves (or are told) that trying to help the poor only makes them worse of in the long run. It is, I admit a wonderfully comforting doctrine if you are not much inclined to help the poor. However you were unable to support it when challenged.

My claim was that population growth needs to be checked, but that giving food aid gives a breathing space to solve food problems and check population growth before it becomes disastrous.

Imagine yourself in complete ignorance of the long term consequences for good or ill of giving aid. What then should you do? The only basis of making a decision at that point is whether you think alleviating short term suffering is a good thing, or not. IE, whether you are sympathetic, or not.

If they believed what they preached, their correct response to that charge is, "So what. Sympathy is not a virtue." Alternatively, if they want to maintain a belief that they are sympathetic people, while not acting from sympathy either in policy or in private, they are simply decieving themselves.

I was not trying to put forth the notion that politics is without merit or important but that it is a natural tendency of all humans or any species for that matter that have evolved to the point of self awareness as individuals.

Politics have been with us a very long time but, as with many things, have evolved within our particular culture of agrarianism to the point of being an artificial means of creating an environment that allows us to live in relative harmony.

To me it is obvious that this is not working. The history of civilization is rife with warfare.

This was once done in a more natural way that didn't impose restrictions for human behavior but instead allowed for it.

We were successful as a species because no laws were written to prevent normal human tendencies but instead we were allowed to be human.

We had no "Thou Shalt Nots" but instead we had "If you do" to deal with the traits that inevitably cause friction between any individuals.

There are still people who live with this system (although their numbers are dwindling fast) and they have no need for lawyers, psychiatrists, schools, washing machines or almost everything that our culture finds necessary. Why is that?

We are witnessing the final gasps of a failed experiment that started about ten thousand years ago. That was the start of our agrarian civilization. From that point we set up a system that would ensure the continued growth of our population while systematically reducing and often eliminating those who would not comply with our way of thinking. We are now in the position, if we continue in this direction, to destroy ourselves and all other forms of life on our planet.

Are politics important? Of course, but it is not the only answer to our impending problems.

This is a good example of the belief system we set in place long ago, that we are exempt from the laws of nature because of our culture. We are no more exempt from these laws than we are from the laws of physics.

We wanted to talk about science, and they wanted us to do Sunday school. The final episode paints a picture that the only critics of Darwinian theory are these guitar-strumming hillbillies in Kentucky who are creationists, and that's just not true. We're glad we're not part of that stereotype.

Flint,

Thank you for responding to my post. It would seem that Tom and yourself are far more educated in the sociopolitical sciences than I. Nevertheless I have what I believe to be compelling arguments addressing the nature of our culture and the possible outcomes of our future as a species. My basic premise is that we went terribly wrong when we decided to alter our relationship with nature. We now seem to believe that we are the masters of our domain. This is an allusion. We cannot master nature no matter how technologically advanced we get. As I said, there are natural laws that are as compelling as physical laws. Yes we fly but it is not by ignoring physics it is by understanding it. We do not seem to understand the natural laws at all. Our history of flight is full of failed experiments as is our history of civilization. The Anisazi disappeared because there experiment failed. They didn't die off they just gave it up as a dead end and were able to return to a more successful way of life. They moved on. Some of the Mayan cultures exhausted their resources to create the white lime to build their structures, which were demanded by their rulers. They eventually had to give it up to survive as a species and willingly did so.

"I'm not sure what your point is here. Politics generally is a process by which every member of the polity (those involved in the struggle) seeks a situation of better advantage. If done well, conflict is minimized and cooperation is maximized. There is such a thing as healty competition as well. None of this relates to self awareness in my mind."

I thank you for the definition. I truly need them sometimes. Yes politics is always about advantage. No argument there but what you ascribe as political behavior is tainted with your own biases of it. You are aware of only our particular brand of politics. Some of what you presume is politics is in fact instinct for survival that has been tested and refined over eons of time. This would include the pecking order of chickens.

"I don't think politics relates to agrarianism in any way. Nor are politics artificial; even chickens have pecking orders. I think a case could be built that a general moral sense has evolved biologically (based on the cross-cultural ubiquity of basic moral precepts). At the very least, humans are a gregarious species, and all such species have rules that let groups work as groups."

I don't think that biological evolvement is even remotely connected to morality. Morality is specifically our own cultures invention. I don't see any evidence of a morality-based society anywhere but with humans and only with those humans who have adopted our specific way of living. I would say that the ancient hunter-gatherers had a system of morality but it in no way resembled our own. This is where our laws (politics) become artificial. We suppress the very nature of humanness with laws of technology. There were no prisons before civilization. As for agrarianism, I meant our specific type. It's true that there were agrarian societies in the distant past but they would still move on as requirements for fresh land dictated. Still, they didn't destroy the land they simply cycled their growing through different areas.

"You draw a line where I don't. War is a political tool."

War as a tool. That is a tough one. Battles between tribes were a tool, which allowed for strengthening of any particular groups and also as a means to keep the gene pool from becoming polluted. Very seldom did one group try to annihilate another for this was not in their best interest. They had their territory, skirmished from time to time and pretty much left each other in peace. They would no more think of eliminating their neighbors as we would.

"I don't know what to make of this. We've been successful as a species for many reasons, probably primary among them being our ability to control our environment. There are always "laws" (although you might want to call them customs, traditions, or social structure). Social structures don't "allow us to be human" but rather inform our behavior in ways that permit the community to function. I think you're right that requirements contrary to "human nature" fail sooner or later. And this is part of what Tom Curtis and I are discussing."

This is an important point. We were successful as a species before we had the illusion that we could control our environment. We cannot control it. You cannot defy the laws of gravity and you cannot defy the laws of nature. We cannot stop volcanoes or typhoons or meteors. We do not have the final say on how we are to survive but only a basis to live within these given parameters. It seems we have chosen one that defies the very qualities of not only our planet but ourselves.

"Wanna bet? Social cohesion is built on limits to behavior - thou canst use thy own judgement provided Thou Shalt Not violate specified prohibitions. No community can possibly exist without such strict prohibitions."

Many communities have succeeded without such strict guidelines. You are referring to the social cohesion of our society not of the many that came before. Yes some of them had prohibitions but most did not. Most had rules governing the after affects of any given indiscretion. These rules were designed to make said indiscretions tolerable to the parties involved. How many parties involved in our present court system are satisfied?

"This is an illusion. Even the most primitive tribes teach their children carefully, deal with interpersonal conflicts, appeal to community authorities and their rules, plead extenuating fact situations (there are no one-size-fits-all laws). A community MUST have these functions. The washing machines are something different - technology can be readily adopted without changing cultural rituals or values, nor political practices."

I agree on one point, that we can be technologically advanced and still live within the laws of nature. As for primitive tribes teaching their children the fundamentals of tribal society and life itself is a major difference from what we do in our civilization. We hold our children back from learning what they need to know to survive. Our school system is set up to restrain rather than teach. Of course being one of the largest consumer groups in this culture it wouldn't do to have them released to early into their careers. The primitive child knows enough to survive within the first seven years of life. He/She has the support of the whole clan as opposed to being thrust into the arms of strangers so that their parents can go to work to earn money and unlock some food for them.

My Apologies. I am tired and getting a little fussy headed. I would have tried to refute some of your other statements but I think you get my point. We, as humans, are not faulty. We don't need fixing. Our civilization, which is based on faulty premises, is the culprit. We need to apply our formidable creative abilities to change our direction to one that is in sync with our environment. I am certain this is possible.

bob

The Anisazi disappeared because there experiment failed. They didn't die off they just gave it up as a dead end and were able to return to a more successful way of life. They moved on. Some of the Mayan cultures exhausted their resources to create the white lime to build their structures, which were demanded by their rulers. They eventually had to give it up to survive as a species and willingly did so.

Some of what you presume is politics is in fact instinct for survival that has been tested and refined over eons of time. This would include the pecking order of chickens.

I don't think that biological evolvement is even remotely connected to morality. Morality is specifically our own cultures invention. I don't see any evidence of a morality-based society anywhere but with humans and only with those humans who have adopted our specific way of living. I would say that the ancient hunter-gatherers had a system of morality but it in no way resembled our own.

There were no prisons before civilization.

It's true that there were agrarian societies in the distant past but they would still move on as requirements for fresh land dictated. Still, they didn't destroy the land they simply cycled their growing through different areas.

Battles between tribes were a tool, which allowed for strengthening of any particular groups and also as a means to keep the gene pool from becoming polluted.

Very seldom did one group try to annihilate another for this was not in their best interest. They had their territory, skirmished from time to time and pretty much left each other in peace. They would no more think of eliminating their neighbors as we would.

We were successful as a species before we had the illusion that we could control our environment. We cannot control it.

Many communities have succeeded without such strict guidelines.

Most had rules governing the after affects of any given indiscretion. These rules were designed to make said indiscretions tolerable to the parties involved.[\quote] So let's see here. I decide I don't like your child, so I kill it. The society has a rule "designed to make this tolerable" to you. Uh, ok, what rule would do this? How about a rule that says I must be killed in return? But if this rule exists, it's absolutely no different from a pre-existing rule decreeing the death penalty for murder. And if that isn't a strict Thou Shalt Not, then there's no such thing. How many parties involved in our present court system are satisfied?

As for primitive tribes teaching their children the fundamentals of tribal society and life itself is a major difference from what we do in our civilization.

We hold our children back from learning what they need to know to survive.

Our school system is set up to restrain rather than teach.

Of course being one of the largest consumer groups in this culture it wouldn't do to have them released to early into their careers. The primitive child knows enough to survive within the first seven years of life. He/She has the support of the whole clan as opposed to being thrust into the arms of strangers so that their parents can go to work to earn money and unlock some food for them.

Our civilization, which is based on faulty premises, is the culprit. We need to apply our formidable creative abilities to change our direction to one that is in sync with our environment. I am certain this is possible.

However, I think there is definitely a psychological underpinning to people's attitudes about each party (or ideology) and which one they identify with.

— Steve Reuland

Tom Curtis:

I'm sure your grasp of ecology exceeds mine; it's not my area of expertise at all. I quite agree with your assessment of what we need to sustain current (and still growing!) global population levels. My reading is that the signs are everywhere, from the discouraging amount of seawater being pumped into Middle Eastern oil fields to flush out the remaining oil, to the great windrows of death stretching across the Pacific Ocean, to the global deforestation now past 50% of "original" forest and accelerating, to the dwindling effectiveness of pesticides and fertilizers to keep boosting crop yields on ever-decreasing acreage of arable land, and on ad nauseum. As David Suzuki says, we are burning medieval masterpieces to cook tonights meal, borrowing madly from tomorrow at ever increasing rates. Some days I get depressed.

But I don't really expect a catastrophic crash. What I expect to happen is that things will get more expensive, some things faster than others, and people will generally reallocate their resources accordingly. Politicially, this puts me in an uncomfortable middle - the conservative side wishes to avoid contributing to future problems, seeing the do-gooder as a poker player staying in a hand he can't stand to lose, in the hopes of drawing to an inside straight. The liberal side agrees that helping others is a good way to buy time, provided that the time in turn is being spent fixing what's wrong, rather than just making it worse. I don't want to see anyone starve today. It's hard to convince myself that I'm not just trading a bad situation now for a worse one later.

As I wrote earlier, most starvation is currently political. Contrary to Robert Domingue's appealing fantasies, what African tribes have is age-old animosities held in check by logistical limitations that American aid suddenly unbalances. The result is often genocide. Who gets into power and gets the aid (which is weapons directly or indirectly) gets to exterminate the hereditary enemy. Food aid rots on the docks controlled by the tribe in political power, because those starving are of the enemy tribe and feeding THEM would be sheer insanity! The world can still feed everyone fairly easily, assuming some workable distribution mechanism. I think a fairly free market would work fine, if it were allowed to operate despite tribal antipathies.

And yet, desertification is happening, and efforts to pump ever more water out of draining aquifers is failing. If God doesn't hie Himself down here and start magicking pretty damn soon, His worshipers are going to start breeding at below replacement levels. Whether they like it or not.

What's your best prospective new technology to avoid these difficulties? Fusion power? Beamed solar power from big orbital collectors? Abiotic oil discoveries? Running turbins from creationist hot air?

What's your best prospective new technology to avoid these difficulties? Fusion power? Beamed solar power from big orbital collectors? Abiotic oil discoveries? Running turbins from creationist hot air?