Friday, February 22, 2002
lol, i think trip fell onto a key point, it all matters on your definition :D
i looked up altruism on dictionary.com, and they had the zoological term that noted self sacrifice for the good of the species. i still don't buy that for some reason. i buy it with bees, to some degree, but i'm not sure still that it is altruism. with bees, it is still a quest to pass on ones genes. the only way bees pass on their genes is through the queen. the rest are just mindless drones that are basically genetic duplicates of one another. so, they are still focusing on propigation, because the only way to ensure that their genes are passed on is to protect the queen.
i guess it comes down to my definition of altruism. altruism is doing something with a complete, utter lack of thought for oneself. something so purely selfless, that it can only be described as altruistic. this gets into a fuzzy area with me. i am more or less convinced that there is no such thing as perfection. when things start becoming complete, or pure, or perfect, i more or less automatically throw the definition out, or at least find a way to add an exception or 50 to it. nothing can ever be perfect, in my opinion. thus, nothing can ever be truely altruistic.
i believe that things can be loosely altruistic. if i loosen my definition of altruism, then humans can definitely show altruistic traits. i dunno, sometimes i am a contradiction, because i tend to be vague and gloss over a lot of things, but then be a stickler for nice firm definitions.
i have been thinking, and i don't believe that pure altruism exists anywhere. i do believe that humans can be loosely altruistic. i believe that at this juncture, humans are the only thing that we know of that have the capability of being loosely altruistic. i believe that someday, another animal, such as a dolphin or a chimp, some mammal that continues to disprove theories about the seperation between humans and the rest of nature will show altruistic traits. of course, not truely altruistic, but we will see some chimp going up to another hurt chimp, and carrying it up into a tree and let it sleep on its little branch or whatever while it watches over it. of course all the other chimps will be watching on, and this chimp will now be respected. this is the real reason the chimp did it, because he knew he was in full view of the other chimps, and he wanted to impress them.
physical evolution can only take things so far. there is only so much a body can be tweaked to have it make enough difference to actually dictate survival. eventually mental evolution comes into play. those that are smarter begin to survive as well. this evolution takes things to a point... the next phase in evolution is the point at which the species begins to have an understanding of nature, and more importantly an understanding of evolution. at this point, they can begin to manipulate nature, and more specifically, manipulate evolution. i haven't really though about it beyond this, because i can't observe beyond this. humans are in this third stage of evolution. i don't believe that we can actually step out of evolution. just, we can step out of the evolutionary tracts we have observed up to this point....
dammit, now i'm not going to be able to sleep. i'm going to be postulating theorys to define the evolutionary tract we have managed to rail ourselves into now...
i looked up altruism on dictionary.com, and they had the zoological term that noted self sacrifice for the good of the species. i still don't buy that for some reason. i buy it with bees, to some degree, but i'm not sure still that it is altruism. with bees, it is still a quest to pass on ones genes. the only way bees pass on their genes is through the queen. the rest are just mindless drones that are basically genetic duplicates of one another. so, they are still focusing on propigation, because the only way to ensure that their genes are passed on is to protect the queen.
i guess it comes down to my definition of altruism. altruism is doing something with a complete, utter lack of thought for oneself. something so purely selfless, that it can only be described as altruistic. this gets into a fuzzy area with me. i am more or less convinced that there is no such thing as perfection. when things start becoming complete, or pure, or perfect, i more or less automatically throw the definition out, or at least find a way to add an exception or 50 to it. nothing can ever be perfect, in my opinion. thus, nothing can ever be truely altruistic.
i believe that things can be loosely altruistic. if i loosen my definition of altruism, then humans can definitely show altruistic traits. i dunno, sometimes i am a contradiction, because i tend to be vague and gloss over a lot of things, but then be a stickler for nice firm definitions.
i have been thinking, and i don't believe that pure altruism exists anywhere. i do believe that humans can be loosely altruistic. i believe that at this juncture, humans are the only thing that we know of that have the capability of being loosely altruistic. i believe that someday, another animal, such as a dolphin or a chimp, some mammal that continues to disprove theories about the seperation between humans and the rest of nature will show altruistic traits. of course, not truely altruistic, but we will see some chimp going up to another hurt chimp, and carrying it up into a tree and let it sleep on its little branch or whatever while it watches over it. of course all the other chimps will be watching on, and this chimp will now be respected. this is the real reason the chimp did it, because he knew he was in full view of the other chimps, and he wanted to impress them.
physical evolution can only take things so far. there is only so much a body can be tweaked to have it make enough difference to actually dictate survival. eventually mental evolution comes into play. those that are smarter begin to survive as well. this evolution takes things to a point... the next phase in evolution is the point at which the species begins to have an understanding of nature, and more importantly an understanding of evolution. at this point, they can begin to manipulate nature, and more specifically, manipulate evolution. i haven't really though about it beyond this, because i can't observe beyond this. humans are in this third stage of evolution. i don't believe that we can actually step out of evolution. just, we can step out of the evolutionary tracts we have observed up to this point....
dammit, now i'm not going to be able to sleep. i'm going to be postulating theorys to define the evolutionary tract we have managed to rail ourselves into now...
