- Sanyu Nagenda
- Santa Monica, CA
- United States
This conversation is closed.
Is anyone else deeply confused by the "we're all animals" argument?
I, for one, do not see how the "survival of the fittest" and the "animal nature" arguments apply to our species as dominant theories.
Let's take a look at the most BASIC nature of animals vs. our species:
1. Do animals kill more than they need to eat and feed their kin? NO
2. Do animals kill unless they or their offspring are directly threatened? NO
3. Do animals destroy their natural habitat? NO
1. Does our species kill more than it needs for each of us to eat and feed one another? YES
2. Does our species kill even if not directly threatened? YES
3. Does our species destroy our natural habitat? YES
I understand that people like to paint us all as "beasts of convenience;" AKA we're beasts when it's convenient and we're an intelligent species when it's convenient, but I just feel it is necessary to point out the contradictions.
As far as "survival of the fittest" goes, how are we defining fittest? The most brutal? The most selfish? The most oblivious? The most powerful?
The people who I see thriving in today's society are the same people who are dooming society to failure. Does that make them fit in a basic instinct sort of way? Sure. I mean, they could be the last person on Earth if that's their goal and if they can do away with everyone else.
However, somehow I thought the "fittest" people within a social creative species would be people who are contributors. In a social creative species that is aware of its physical mortality, wouldn't the most valued members of the species be people who PROLONG the species' existence?
Or are we an alienated destructive species as opposed to a social creative one? Considering awareness and choice are deciding factors of our species' existence, why would we choose to be alienated and destructive? Particularly when it is apparent that so many people fear being hurt, being alone and dying?
Seems to me that our species suffers from an unhealthy but conscious self-loathing...but that form of self-reflection is a CHOICE!!