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I'll admit that I'm pretty young compared to alot of the folks on these boards. I have less then a couple years in the army and I know that there are guys around here who really have been there and done that. But I'd like you to take a look at what I have to say anyways and tell me if I'm right, or just right out've 'er. I'd also like to see a thread going that gets outside of our current politics.
I'm having trouble seeing things in black and white these days. In both the political left and right people want to condemn certain groups, and are usually called evil in return. But that just doesn't fly with me. Evil is not an absolute truth. It changes with the times and the culture. The spanish inquisition, the suppression of Native Americans, the slave trade, and the exploitation of Africa are all things that seem pretty mean and nasty by today's standards, but at the time it was all just fine. So who's to say that 300 years down the road people won't look back and talk about how barbaric we all are? This even holds true within different cultures today. We look at the value your average Somali puts on life and think he's totally backward in his thinking, but I'm sure there are parts of the world I'd be hated for the poster of Britney Spears up on my wall. With these in mind, I can't bring myself to believe that good an evil is any more then a general philosophy that lets us get along with those in our immediate surroundings.
But when you're talking about deep stuff like this you need to look at the big picture. What do all humans have in common? Well, its definatly not self preservation. How many guys around here are willing to give their lives for their buddies? It could be that we all need food, or money to buy food, or stuff to sell in order to buy food. But why do we need food if self-preservation is not the lowest common denominator for the reason of existance. In my opinion, more important then anything else, is the need to procreate. We are willing to put the lives of our community ahead of ours, so that the community will live on. A mother will give up her last morsel of food to feed her child. The most powerfull of human emotions - love, is geared towards procreation. Its not only something that all humans have in common. Its something that all living things have in common, plants and animals. I'd imagine that any species that didn't put procreation on the top of its to-do list, would probably have died out already. So maybe that is the only "universal good", because all other things we normally think of as good (not to be confused with entertainment) are designed to promote procreation in one way or another.
So take that a step farther and consider war. Is it wrong for one country to invade another over farmland? Is it wrong to ensure that your offspring has an edge over someone else's? How is it different from a bear who kills another bear over territory? When animals go to war over resources, its called nature taking its course. How is that so different from human nature taking it's course? I don't buy the whole "we're so much smarter then animals, we should be above that" argument. Time and time again mankind has proved that it can just as cruel, if not crueler then any animal. Would it be right to redestribute all wealth in the world evenly, to give everyone a fair chance and having successfull offspring? Maybe, but if its all about survival of the fittest maybe not. Maybe seeking out the "universal good" involves taking what you can get to ensure that your own offspring lives on. But you can take that too far and it becomes Nazism (not that I really know that much about Nazis). The smart guy in the movie "A Beautiful Mind" said that whats best for the individual is whats best for the community. This train of thought makes alot more sense to me, because if my child were the last person on earth, he'd have a hard time procreating. By ensuring the survival of those around you, you increase the chances of surviving yourself.
So where do you draw the line between "your community" and "not your community". I wouldn't draw it at family, because inbreeding just doesn't work. I wouldn't draw it at your city, because thats still a reletivly small group of people. But I wouldn't draw the line at the world either, because if everyone in the world had an equal chance of surviving their genes you'd be back at square one fending for yourself again. Even at country level, you can't make everyone equal. The communists tried it, but there were the corrupted few in power who ensured that their genes would make it through natural selection.
And thats where I'm stumped.
So far it looks like this:
1) The mainstream understanding of Good and Evil is seriously flawed
2) Mankind's first job and the only "Universal Good" is to procreate.
3) Its human nature to ensure that YOUR genes survive natural selection
4) Natural Selection requires that a line to be drawn between the "haves" and "have nots" so the week can be weeded out.
So where do you draw the line between your community that you're willing to work with, and the folks you're willing to get an edge over in order to be in the group that survives?
I'm having trouble seeing things in black and white these days. In both the political left and right people want to condemn certain groups, and are usually called evil in return. But that just doesn't fly with me. Evil is not an absolute truth. It changes with the times and the culture. The spanish inquisition, the suppression of Native Americans, the slave trade, and the exploitation of Africa are all things that seem pretty mean and nasty by today's standards, but at the time it was all just fine. So who's to say that 300 years down the road people won't look back and talk about how barbaric we all are? This even holds true within different cultures today. We look at the value your average Somali puts on life and think he's totally backward in his thinking, but I'm sure there are parts of the world I'd be hated for the poster of Britney Spears up on my wall. With these in mind, I can't bring myself to believe that good an evil is any more then a general philosophy that lets us get along with those in our immediate surroundings.
But when you're talking about deep stuff like this you need to look at the big picture. What do all humans have in common? Well, its definatly not self preservation. How many guys around here are willing to give their lives for their buddies? It could be that we all need food, or money to buy food, or stuff to sell in order to buy food. But why do we need food if self-preservation is not the lowest common denominator for the reason of existance. In my opinion, more important then anything else, is the need to procreate. We are willing to put the lives of our community ahead of ours, so that the community will live on. A mother will give up her last morsel of food to feed her child. The most powerfull of human emotions - love, is geared towards procreation. Its not only something that all humans have in common. Its something that all living things have in common, plants and animals. I'd imagine that any species that didn't put procreation on the top of its to-do list, would probably have died out already. So maybe that is the only "universal good", because all other things we normally think of as good (not to be confused with entertainment) are designed to promote procreation in one way or another.
So take that a step farther and consider war. Is it wrong for one country to invade another over farmland? Is it wrong to ensure that your offspring has an edge over someone else's? How is it different from a bear who kills another bear over territory? When animals go to war over resources, its called nature taking its course. How is that so different from human nature taking it's course? I don't buy the whole "we're so much smarter then animals, we should be above that" argument. Time and time again mankind has proved that it can just as cruel, if not crueler then any animal. Would it be right to redestribute all wealth in the world evenly, to give everyone a fair chance and having successfull offspring? Maybe, but if its all about survival of the fittest maybe not. Maybe seeking out the "universal good" involves taking what you can get to ensure that your own offspring lives on. But you can take that too far and it becomes Nazism (not that I really know that much about Nazis). The smart guy in the movie "A Beautiful Mind" said that whats best for the individual is whats best for the community. This train of thought makes alot more sense to me, because if my child were the last person on earth, he'd have a hard time procreating. By ensuring the survival of those around you, you increase the chances of surviving yourself.
So where do you draw the line between "your community" and "not your community". I wouldn't draw it at family, because inbreeding just doesn't work. I wouldn't draw it at your city, because thats still a reletivly small group of people. But I wouldn't draw the line at the world either, because if everyone in the world had an equal chance of surviving their genes you'd be back at square one fending for yourself again. Even at country level, you can't make everyone equal. The communists tried it, but there were the corrupted few in power who ensured that their genes would make it through natural selection.
And thats where I'm stumped.
So far it looks like this:
1) The mainstream understanding of Good and Evil is seriously flawed
2) Mankind's first job and the only "Universal Good" is to procreate.
3) Its human nature to ensure that YOUR genes survive natural selection
4) Natural Selection requires that a line to be drawn between the "haves" and "have nots" so the week can be weeded out.
So where do you draw the line between your community that you're willing to work with, and the folks you're willing to get an edge over in order to be in the group that survives?