Human civilization has overtaken human biology.
By this, I mean that the goals of prosperity and fruitfulness do not fully align with the goals of the human body; in some cases they are even at odds. For example, the human body is hardwired to associate reproduction with pleasure, despite a staggering overpopulation problem due to being the now-dominant species on the planet. Conversely, the human body is not programmed to deliver endorphin blasts to the brain whenever it decides to recycle or carpool (more research is needed before I can claim this definitively, though).
Barring some cataclysmic disaster, human civilization doesn't show any signs of retreating or devolving back to a level where it is on par with human biology. Similary, it doesn't appear that the X-men are going to show up anytime soon with really handy mutations like "alternative energy ray" or "anti-bigot beams."
Are we fated to just ride out this incompatability like the children of a home where mom really like boning the mailman and dad's catholic upbringing means he doesn't believe in divorce so they "stay together for the kids?"
I was really just fishing for a discussion to get ideas for a story, but now I've gone and made myself sad...
Discuss!
The only way to save the planet is for everyone to be gay or take out their uterus and donate it to charity.
Religion will continue to do its damage for a few thousand more years until someone invents a new savior.
We will have to go back to living in caves and teepees eventually.
Mom can bone whoever she wants, that is her right as a woman!
Mom can bone whoever she wants, that is her right as a woman!
YES! Just... get a damn IUD.
I don't know why people think there's any sort of over-population problem. We only take up about 10% of the livable space on the planet. Food and crops go to waste in uncalculable amounts, farmers are paid to not grow crops. They're getting salt water into drinkable water done easier and easier.
The problem isn't with population, it's with logistics of getting the food to people.
Then we need to put more McDonalds in Africa.
The problem isn't with logistics either. It's with capitalism. There just isn't any money to be made spending thousands of dollars to a place that can't do anything for them. The people either need to find their own way to live in a world where the people with the money will be coming after any natural resource they have. Very Avatar, but it is true to a certain extent. At the same time I believe that capitalism is good for any economy to a certain extent. I feel like I'm chasing my tail here. Dammit. Fail.
How will we ever be able to evolve into a better version of ourselves if we do not cut out the weak links in the chain? I understand it is cold-hearted, but I practice what I preach now. I will not be procreating in this life time.
Awww, I want to see a little JF Diaz running around.
Seriously though--I wrote a paper on this for a class, it's about sustainable crops for each culture. Sadly the same thing that mires down certain cultures in poverty also links them to drug trafficking and terrorism because they can make more money selling opium or cocaine than they ever could selling corn and potatoes. So then you have a culture of drugs, death, terrorism and prostitution. All while people still go hungry. It's kind of sad and pathetic when a family will sell their daughter into sexual slavery just so they can eat. Meanwhile, we get pink slime in our hamburgers at Mcdonalds so apparently it evens out??!!! Yes, this was a real thing on the news. Bleargh! Basically they were putting beef trimmings in their burgers, stuff which usually goes in cat and dog food.
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2012/02/01/mcdonalds-announces-end-to-pink-slime-in-burgers/
Have you seen how much the world population has grown in just a few years?
It's insane.
Most of the drinking water is filled with a bunch of chemicals that our bodies can't digest. Along with all the food we're being fed.
Btw, mountain spring water is the way to go. You can kill any bacteria in the water by letting ultraviolet rays kill them or you can put it in your fridge. Use a glass pitcher.
I can sound preachy, but just read up the articles about the meat McDonald's had been selling. You can just look at the ingredients in your food. Research them, you'll be surprised.
It's nothing but substitutes.
I'm just going to sound like I'm ranting so I'll stop.
Whatever, ignore me. Carry on.
No, it's true, what we are being fed is disgusting. The hormones and the preservatives, things taste more and more chemically altered as the years go by. Plus the quality of the food gets worse and more generic.
I am slowly trying to change my diet but it is hard because you get addicted to crap. Your body becomes used to the poison. Although some of my eating habits have changed since I was younger. Doritos taste weird to me now. I can only eat the baked potato chips. I hate cottage cheese. My taste buds have altered.
I think we are all talking about the same thing, but we will not be able to come to a solution if we keep slamming at the moles in the game. There are so many things that are wrong that even R.E.M.'s The End of the World and Billy Joel's I forget the name couldn't even begin to cover all of it. If you socialize everything and save all the children then what is the point of living. We all live, eat, sleep, poop, procreate, and die. Where is the chance to become something better than what we are. If we keep on in the system that we have we will split the world into classes that it might as well be slavery. Throw in education, politics, religion, racism, sexism, drug control, hunger...that I feel like going to sleep and never waking up until it is dealt with.
All these issues are one of the major reasons I started to write. It helps me try and make sense of how people and me try and deal with this in our everyday lives.
I used to eat nothing but junk. Once I changed my diet it was easier.
If I try to eat really fatty foods I get disgusted in myself and my stomach gets angry at me.
Have you tried kettle cooked chips?
I don't know. I used to internship at many hospitals/care centers.
Once you see diabetic patients with gangreen and amputations it really changes your perspective. You see how people who dump their parents in those homes deteriorate. They can be in there for five months and they'll look like they have been there for years. Also turning a 300lb patient hurts your back.
I think people just shove so many chemicals in their body without questioning them. Health is vital, but people take it for granted.
I've been in the medical field for over 13 years. I've had to deal with treating patients in some of the worst conditions possible. I've dealt with wartime casualties, hospital ward care, VA care, and field medicine. What you put into your body is absolutely key to being healthy, but you must follow it up with exercise.
Those patients who get gangreen and have amputations get that because they refuse to monitor their blood sugar and do as they please even after every doctor in the world tells them to start caring for themselves better. They just don't care. If they want to survive they need to start with giving a shit.
@parker - There is a lot more to over population then food production, like you said just getting it to hungrey folks is a problem.
That's true, but some lack the resources and knowledge.
You find me a person who can't get insulin, a steady diet, and do exercise and I will find at least 3 places near them they could receive assistance. The resources are there, they just need to take advantage of them.
I'm not saying they can't get these things. But when you have people who aren't from this country, barely speak the language, and don't even know these resources existed how would can you blame them? Not only that sticking to a regiment isn't always easy. It requires discipline. Not all people have this.
Are you speaking of illegal aliens? Because if you are...
I actually wouldn't know. They could have been just people with barely any income. Some were just picked up off the street.
We humans are just more similar to rats and pigeons than any other species. And we basically think like a virus. Let's come to terms with that.
Jfdiaz, do you have an issue with illegal aliens? Arent we all aliens?
"In the first place we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile...We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language...and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."
-Theodore Roosevelt
Simple, you're either in or out. Don't take the good if you have no intention of staying for the bad.
We may have been aliens, but we have found our home in America.
Flamina is hitting at the core of my premise--that human biology is geared toward propagation of the species (like vermin spreading). Now that we've reached the top rung, that mindset doesn't serve the new goal of prosperity.
This isn't a new idea, either. Look at biblical sins--most of them revolve around the rift between self and group. Urges that prioritize the individual--not contributing but reaping rewards (lying/sloth), taking more than your share (stealing/greed/gluttony), and to a lesser extent upsetting the harmony of living together by being a dick (pride/wrath)--are labeled evil or wrong once the common good becomes an issue. Before the invention of civilization, it was a pretty damn good idea to look out for #1 and dick over anybody that stood in your way.
We've seen time and again that communism doesn't work because the ideal of equality stifles creativity and incentive and also seems to go against the human nature. While I'm certainly not advocating we all try to make communism work, I can't help but wonder how much human nature is standing in the way of human progress. Once again, this isn't anything new; go read Nietzsche.
So if we, as Flamina suggested, accept the fact that we think like a virus...if we are truly programmed biologically to do so...is there merit to the idea of taking our destiny into our own hands and poking around to alter or remove those parts of ourselves? I guess I'm talking about something like genetic bio-politics (that's not a real term) where we etch our goals onto our genetic structure. If we want people to have orgasms when they teach a kid to read instead of when they bang a drunk chick, we go fiddle with that part of the brain until we have people whose eyes roll back when they hear The Little Engine That Could. Is that really so monstrous?
Meachman, that is a very interesting argument. Are we not already attempting to continue on infecting other places with ourselves as viruses do? Hunting out new planets that may be suitable to our needs to continue on with our existence. We are evolving like HIV to become better suited to branch out and expand our hold on this place we call the Milky-way galaxy. When will it stop? Must we keep pushing until we have touched every part of the universe? Will we ever be happy with where we are? I think not, we must push or change everything that we are as a species. Perhaps a giant leap forward in evolution is not far behind.
we are cyborgs collectively - most people globally live in urban centres, where biology meets technology. Try to live off the grid in a city, or by the cycles of the moon (if you can even see it), or by foraging, or growing your own food & getting everywhere on foot. It's possible, but near impossible.
it's a combination of human population, dietary demands (we don't need meat, right?), and lifestyle demands (we don't need cars, right?) that contribute to our current situation.
We don't need meat, you're right.
It's not really monstruos. Oncolytic viruses can be used to treat cancer. Viruses in general carry genetic diversity and we all know diversity is the key to evolution, don't we?
I still like to think I can take my destiny in my own hands though. For my own pleasure, and that of the people I love. Possibly for everybody, but I ain't got that power.
I think the experiment in free-will is coming to an end..
You are all scaring me with your big ideas.
don't worry, alien, when the end comes, you won't feel a thing - just the gentle gnawing on your brain.
As long as there are pretty lights.
I feel that this thread was started after reading What Technology Wants, and if it wasn't you should read it.
never heard of it...though I did read Machine Man not too long ago...
okay, after googling What Technology Wants, it seems like a neat idea. thanks for the recommendation.
I just read No Word for Time which may be the antithesis. I'll take a look though.
Oh, the post-humanity!
Linton, you remind me of Ernest Hemingway. I mean without that whole dead thing.
And I'm working on that.
Is there any way to merge this thread with Kitt's butt hurt activism thread?
We could ask Kirk.
We should discuss why it's okay to torture animals and eat them, Laurance is all about that.
Danny is a pedophile.
I am not! That boy said he was 14! He had a permission slip from his Mom that said we could have sex.
Well, I told you I was only 13 back then. Hiding behind your legal stature of limitations is no excuse.
But your body was so pink and smooth, how could I say no? You just kept begging for me to hurt you. Then there were the candles and the voices kept saying that I could smell your blood and it was all over.
Meachman, this may be the most poignant issue of our time. I've often struggled with this topic and have found it a giant I could not tackle. I pray that you can.
"butt hurt "
@Matt - why do you keep saying this? I feel like you might be some sort of catch phrase bot.
The irony is all the butt hurt about the butt hurt.
My click was saying "but hurt" in 1999, so it's not something that he just came up with last week.
Think locally not globally. Your brain will hurt less.
I'd lick those muffins.
