this post was submitted on 27 Jul 2023
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I'll get more basic than everyone else here:
Unless the human brain collectively evolves in a very short period to function differently than it has since we first started throwing shit at other hominids, no. We, collectively, as a society, can aspire to be better than our animal nature but that hardware is still there and it will never, ever, stop pushing people to tribalism, selfishness, and aggression.
We can't fix us. We can only do the best with what we have and keep moving.
So you essentially claim humans are basically "bad" (willing to harm others for unnecessary gain), and maybe there are a few good people but it doesn't matter?
I think you can more accurately say that human nature is to cooperate and share and there are a few psychopaths that fuck things up when allowed to gain power (and implement their extractive tooling like capitalism).
https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-dawn-of-everything-a-new-history-of-humanity-david-graeber/15873078
That's a bit of a reductive take on the parent comment.
Human nature to cooperate and share is not mutually exclusive with forming in-groups and out-groups.
Isn't the internet wild?
The product of literally 1000 generations worth of human cooperation, asking if humans will ever transcend tribalism on what is arguably humanity's most collaborative innovation?
Depends how we define 'overcome' really. I mean, if cooperation is evidence of overcoming it then the question doesn't need to be asked.
If we're talking about our biological instinct for tribalism, well that's why we're having the conversation isn't it.
Sure, but that was my intention, to distill the essence which I think I did fairly well. Was I wrong?
Agree, but that doesn't mean it isn't in our nature to also cooperate and trade amongst groups rather than default to making enemies. Humans forming groups/tribes etc doesn't imply that those tribes have to have exploitative interactions.
As a maybe silly analogy, thing of two families visiting Disneyland together. They maintain group membership, the parents only buy lunch for their own children, as the other kid's parent's can provide for them fine. But they enjoy the day together, and maybe buy each other treats. Then they go home to their separate homes, to maybe cooperate on another day.
But then think of two families where each has a psychopath that has effectively gained control of the family. Then the Disneyland trip is less likely to happen, especially being fun, even if the rest of the family is the same. Instead, there might distrust, competition, and attempts at exploitation between the families.
Which one of the above scenarios is "human nature"? Both? What's the difference? Resource contention and/or effective psychopaths preventing cooperation IMO (sorry I keep editing).
Yes. Reductive in a crude way, not clarifying. I don't think the parent comment at all implied humans are inherently bad and the occasional good doesn't matter.
Rather inversely, humans are tribalistic but achieve good in spite of tribalism.
Ah, maybe so, I'm definitely not immune to mischaracterizing on occasion.
Ahem, we can champion a culture that teaches us to resist the negative aspects of our nature and embraces the positive aspects. Victory over our nature is celebrated, and when nature wins it is understood and dealt with, but with understanding and reasonable consequences, not vengeful malice.
Some day...