Sam Walker

[Cerpin Taxt]

What ARE people supposed to do then. Not drive cars, or have printed currency, and sure as hell not supposed to be denouncing civilizations. We are born into civilized households because we just were the same way a creature can be born a certain way. Now humanity maybe 3 million years old and civilization only a couple thousand, but both are a small fractions on the timeline of living organisms. Evolution and adaptation happen and population grows, thats why people became civilized. Also somewhere along the line we figured out we could communicate fairly effectively with languages. Maybe Cromagnon man was supposed to be a loner but modern man is not. Now quit being such a homo erectus

[Jordan311]

hey I'm just trying to be uncivilized here. Isn't that how it's supposed to be??


Later

[wbrycew]

What ARE people supposed to do then.

That is an excellent question. Ask yourself what a deer is supposed to do.

Live.

Don't forget that we're just an animal. Just because our brain is bigger giving us the ability to communicate better than other animals doesn't change that fact.

There is no other answer. Our jobs, our currency, our government, our country, these are all just fabrications. There is no reason that any of them need to exist. For millions of years, they did not.

Evolution and adaptation happen and population grows, thats why people became civilized.

No, this is not correct. This is the common assumption, but incorrect.

Civilization is not a product of population growth. It's actually the exact opposite. The human population on earth was stabilized at an estimated 10 million, for MILLIONS of years. Literally, for millions of years the human population on earth was just a few million people. It wasn't until after civilization started taking over that the human population started growing. And it didn't just start growing a little, it started growing exponentially.

The reason for this is the agricultural revolution which coincides with the beginning of civilization. I'll go into more detail if you want.

[Cerpin Taxt]

theres no need. the easy answer is; unlike other creatures, people create things when they need it. necessity is the mother of invention. they needed food so they started growing it and less people starved. but seriously man has come a long way in 50 years. youre gonna tell me we should be the same that we were 3 million years ago, living in incestuous clans and having no concept of life itself, hogwash.

[wbrycew]

theres no need. the easy answer is; unlike other creatures, people create things when they need it. necessity is the mother of invention. they needed food so they started growing it and less people starved.

Again, no. This isn't correct.

It didn't go:
more people -> grow food to feed them

It went:
grow food -> population growth due to an abundance of food that mankind has never seen

Man didn't begin the agricultural revolution out of necessity by any means. Not at all. There was plenty of food to hunt and to gather.

but seriously man has come a long way in 50 years. youre gonna tell me we should be the same that we were 3 million years ago, living in incestuous clans and having no concept of life itself, hogwash.

No, I'm not saying we should be the same as our tribal ancestors. I think I made it pretty clear that it's basically impossible for us to go back to that lifestyle. I'm only introducing a thought experiment.

What you're pointing out here is the major dilemma of my beliefs. I don't know what we could do about it. Probably nothing other than to understand that our way of life isn't the way it's meant to be.

The assumption that your lifestyle is correct is what leads to war. It's what causes conflict. It's what separates people.

[$lmjimy311]

the definition of civilized changes over time. back in the cave man days, they were civilized by their standards. a million years from now, they'll look back at us and consider us uncivilized

[$ayzak]

Government isn't the actual problem at all. Government exists to keep civilization intact. That is the problem. The fact that civilization has overrun the planet is the problem. The fact that humans are not meant to exist in civilization, but we're born into without a choice is the problem.

Humans are tribal creatures and any system we have in place to attempt to override that will ultimately fail. Civilization is a crazy concept that began conquering the world starting roughly 10,000 years ago, and it has finally conquered nearly every tribe left on the earth. It either killed or converted all people in it's path. Nobody had a choice; either join, become a slave, or die. We aren't meant to live like this, but we have no choice. We don't choose civilization, it is chosen for us simply because we were born within the imaginary lines of civilization.

So, this is why I disagree with people that are anti-government. You're missing the root problem. Civilization is the problem. Government is simply a program to keep civilization alive.

The sad thing about this problem is that it's almost impossible to resolve. We can't go back now. Tribal life isn't an option for us. Civilization is so ingrained into our brains from birth that most people today don't realize that they're no different from the tribes of humans that wandered the earth for millions of years before civilization took over. We go as far as creating fairly tales to tell our children about how none of that ever happened, and man was created as a civilized creature, and all other animals of the world are beneath us. For this reason, religion is like government. Just another tool to keep civilization alive.

Think about the term "uncivilized". It's considered an insult. That's just ridiculous.

Here's my 2 and a half cents:

Your disposition about what humans are "supposed" to do may be wrong. I used to think the same way that you do about humanity and civilization. And any time anything inconvenienced me I would ask myself, "Why do I bother doing this? A caveman wouldn't need to do this!" Whether it was getting up at exactly 6 in the morning to sit in a boring classroom, or drive a vehicle 10 miles to some store and trade my services as a "salesman" for little green pieces of paper; It all seemed so unnecessary to me, too. I thought that way until college, actually. And it was my English teacher of all people who had us read an article (which I no longer have) that eased my mind and gave me a sense of pride that I never had before to be part of all this.

Yes, we are animals. We are occasionally slaves to our instincts and desires, just like animals. We have some major weaknesses, especially to cold or extreme heat, just like animals. We are just like animals in almost every single way. But we have one major difference.

At some point in our evolution, our choices began to be affected by what could happen. We became dependent on our imagination (not merely our environment) to put us in a situation to not only survive, but thrive.

Think about an early caveman family living in a desert. The woman is pregnant, and their first child is too young to hunt. They're all starving, and the weather is changing fast. If the man doesn't find food right now, that whole family will die. This is no different than a regular animal. Here's what separates us: We cared too much about living, and about our family, to let that happen. We didn't want to feel the sorrow of seeing our family die of starvation. We imagined that scenario and we were not willing to have it. We imagined another scenario: What if my family didn't die? What if I figured out a way to kill an elephant all by myself? What if I was able to communicate this idea to other people?

Determined and motivated the way only an imaginative being with relatively deep emotions could be, the man set out to find elephants, study their migrating patterns, use the environment the best he could to trap the elephant, push a bolder over a cliff and crush it, and use some kind of tool to bring the food back to his family. Food for a month. Other caveman see this and ideas are passed along. That's early civilization. And since it required that imagination to survive, at least for awhile, only the most imaginative would reproduce.

It's true that we're born into this, and maybe it's not the world we would have chosen to live in. But right there is the paradox of being a human. If we weren't human we wouldn't be consciously aware of the unnatural circumstance of civilization. Because we're human we understand why we are not satisfied, and we have the ability to not only imagine, but use our imagination to make our world better. Whether you like it or not, most of civilization is a product of that naturally occurring ability that we have, that other animals don't. Anybody still living in a tribe is flat out denying their humanity because they are ignoring what other human beings can do. For any animal of a species to deny what they are is almost certain death. It's like a cat deciding not to use it's claws (it's most useful tool) until other cats come along and say, "Are you crazy!?". And every animal has it's safe haven, whether its a forest, or the south pole. Ours is Civilization it's self.

Here's one more thing to consider: No matter the design of the body, or the ability of the body, the body's sole purpose on every animal is exactly the same: To preserve the mind, and to experience the world somehow. Look at a spider: All these tools sprout from it's mind. Look at a cat: Tools sprouting from it's mind. And then there's us: When our tools weren't enough, our mind took over responsibility. That's pretty fucking cool.

[$nipe]

jesus christ, obama is a democrat, not a fucking socialist. get it through your heads

No, he's more like a socialist. I think he'd be happier in a socialist government, as long as he were the leader.

Sigh. First of all, people are not socialist or capitalists. Those are ECONOMIC SYSTEMS --yes, repeat after me--rather than denominations. Now, I don't know much about your governments but there must be a legislative and judicial government backing up Obama's presidency. Etc. (I just get bored of talking about politics sometimes, so I like to keep them short).

By the way, speaking of socialism, it's pretty harsh that as usual, only like three countries voted against an overwhealming mayority asking to remove the Cuban embargo, a socialist country. Maybe the whole WORLD is socialist nowadays, you know.

[$ayzak]

jesus christ, obama is a democrat, not a fucking socialist. get it through your heads

No, he's more like a socialist. I think he'd be happier in a socialist government, as long as he were the leader.

Sigh. First of all, people are not socialist or capitalists. Those are ECONOMIC SYSTEMS --yes, repeat after me--rather than denominations. Now, I don't know much about your governments but there must be a legislative and judicial government backing up Obama's presidency. Etc. (I just get bored of talking about politics sometimes, so I like to keep them short).

By the way, speaking of socialism, it's pretty harsh that as usual, only like three countries voted against an overwhealming mayority asking to remove the Cuban embargo, a socialist country. Maybe the whole WORLD is socialist nowadays, you know.

Semantics, dude. People are not Democrats, either. They're human. Actually they're not even human, they're animals. Actually they're not even animals, they're really a bunch of atoms that... ah fuck it.

The world is turning more socialist than it's not, that's for sure.

[$nipe]

Now, this talk about civilization is pretty cool, especially because you like to discuss things that have already been discussed, and believe me, they have no answer whatsoever right now. Many notions from politics, economics and other social sciences are based on the idea that the man is a social being by nature. And also, you need to ask yourself whether or not Locke is right: Are humans good by nature? Do they seek others well-being? We really may have answers, but they can't be proven as universal laws that can withstand any experiment and isolation of single variables. That's why you see having so many neuroscience experts, psychologists, sociologists and others making weird experiments that involve money or decision-making.

Anyway, civilizations through their governmental systems such as politics or economics are just means to put these social interactions at work, by giving people what they need. They are not perfect, and most importantly, they do not seem to answer the beforementioned questions. They are like having a machine that just seems to work but nobody understands how. People don't really seem to understand it completely. And you have to be aware that when it comes to systems with people involved in them, experimentations are made at the expense of people's integrity and lives. That's what made of the whole neoliberalism experiment such a wrong thing, for example, which made the gap from rich and poor so big that many countries now are desperate to redeem people from their state of extreme poverty.

They're all theories, but they can only be answered right after the real questions involving the nature of the human being. Anarchism is a lack of government, and it's based on the premise that people are good people by nature. Good people don't need to be told what to do, because they will help each others as long as they live peacefully. Think of it as The Pirate Bay. Socialism believes that people can get rid of their comparative-greed if everyone has the same standard of life, but there must exist a ratio-enforcing entity that grants an equilibrium between seeders and leechers. Myself, I believe that even if I love to think that we can have good people in this world, the change must be gradual enough for people to embrace it.

[wbrycew]

the definition of civilized changes over time. back in the cave man days, they were civilized by their standards. a million years from now, they'll look back at us and consider us uncivilized

I get what you're trying to say, but technically, no. Civilization has a specific definition, and it doesn't include our tribal ancestors. The civilization I'm referring to is a group of people with a complex social system including things like money/barter, jobs, government, etc.

According to the definition of civilization, there would be no reason for a guy in 2245 to look back at 2009 and say we were uncivilized. We have the complex social system that denotes civilization, therefore we're civilized. Humans from thousands of years ago didn't have that, therefore they aren't civilized.

I take it that you're saying that civilized basically means "a group of people that is living by the most current notion of what society is supposed to be". In that way, a caveman would be civilized for caveman times, a 21st century man would be for his times, etc. That's not what I'm talking about. If that's what you're saying, then I guess neanderthals were civilized for their time, as were homo erectus. Clearly the term can't be applied in this manner.

[wbrycew]

Here's my 2 and a half cents:

Your disposition about what humans are "supposed" to do may be wrong.

Well, that's the thing. I don't think we're 'supposed' to do anything but live, form bonds with our tribes (family/close friends), and reproduce. Everything else is just a product of civilization.

I have two main problems.

1) We work harder and longer to have basic life essentials (food, water, and shelter) than any group of humans in the history of this planet (obviously not counting slaves).

The hunter gatherer lifestyle did not equal 40 hours of work per week. Like you said, you could hunt one elephant and eat for a month. That could amount to an hour of work for a month of food. It also was meaningful, because the work you did was in direct correlation with your livelihood. Work harder, eat more. Work less, eat less. It's up to you.

Compare that to today's man. We work long shifts doing boring menial tasks, so that we have enough money not just to eat and have shelter, but also to pay for a bunch of useless toys, and the transportation to get to the job, and the utilities, and to pay the government for keeping civilization afloat.

2) The reason for this, is because we follow a failed system (civilization) that the vast majority of the world feels is the way it's meant to be. Those last three words are what really irks me: meant to be.

We don't realize it's a problem, because we accept the idea that civilization is how man is meant to be. This is an absurd notion, to think that we're supposed to be civilized. Civilized man is such a tiny blip on the overall timeline of our species.

We're left with a system that creates, but can't support, a massive overpopulation of our species. The human population isn't in equilibrium. We used to be, but that was thousands of years ago. We defy nature, and we pay for it with droughts, famines, natural disasters in overpopulated areas, diseases, and so on.



Now, away from hypothetical and back to reality.

I'm sitting here at a laptop powered by electricity sending a post to a forum through a broadband internet connection. I just finished an iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts. Clearly I'm not acting on my beliefs in any way. The overpowering rule of civilization has the same grasp on me that it has on everybody else. I just try to remember that it doesn't have to be this way. I don't feel like it will ever change, unless an apocalyptic disaster occurs and life starts from scratch, or humanity allows itself the freedom to step outside of civilization and test the waters.

So this brings me back to the point. Sure, you can yell about how government is corrupt, or evil, or too socialist for your liking, or too democratic for your liking, or whatever it is, but that's not the problem. Alex Jones hates the government, Obama is a communist, Bush is a reptilian shapeshifter in disguise, yadda yadda yadda, whatever.

Of course government isn't going to be satisfying, and of course you won't agree with it, because it maintains this civilized system that our instincts are at odds with. Is anyone ever truly happy with government?


And onto a separate point. I'm not anti-technology, and I'm not about stifling human ingenuity and intellectual progress. I'm not saying that the tribal guys had it right (and I don't think there's such a thing as 'right' in the first place), and I'm not saying we should go back to living in caves. I'm not saying we need to abandon what we've learned.

What I am saying is that the system of civilization that we have in place isn't a system that can hold up, and basically goes against our very nature. Ideally I'd wish for human population to stop increasing at such a crazy rate and get back to a stable equilibrium over time, and for humanity in general to take a more grassroots approach at life. I think we need less governmental responsibility and more individual responsibility.


BTW, good posts Sayzak and Snipe.

[Nate]

Not reading this.

[John Michael]

lol jimmy do you really think obama and bush are two different people with different ideas and goals??

do you really think bush acted alone?

same people who funded obama to be elected funded bush,

its mcdonalds and burger king, same fucking thing. obama is sending more troops to afghanistan and bombing sites in pakistan killing civilians

also america never declared war. this war is a crime, and obama is the new boss.

thats bullshit...mc donalds chicken sandwiches ain't got shit on the king

[wrjones311]

With a last name like walker, I'd move to Texas.

edit- I'll actually contribute to this eventually but I have a lot of catching up to do first lol... this topic got long fast.

[Shiny]

Do yall think that Obama is actually Jesus Christ?

[$ayzak]

I have two main problems.

1) We work harder and longer to have basic life essentials (food, water, and shelter) than any group of humans in the history of this planet (obviously not counting slaves).

The hunter gatherer lifestyle did not equal 40 hours of work per week. Like you said, you could hunt one elephant and eat for a month. That could amount to an hour of work for a month of food. It also was meaningful, because the work you did was in direct correlation with your livelihood. Work harder, eat more. Work less, eat less. It's up to you.

Compare that to today's man. We work long shifts doing boring menial tasks, so that we have enough money not just to eat and have shelter, but also to pay for a bunch of useless toys, and the transportation to get to the job, and the utilities, and to pay the government for keeping civilization afloat.

I think a caveman would take offense to that notion. It's easy for us to sit in our weather-proof homes, eating canned food, in a sanitary environment, and complain about the fact that we have to sacrifice 40 hours of our time doing some monotonous "job" in order to afford those luxuries. But if you think about it, 40 hours isn't a bad deal at all. A caveman has to stay alert at all times, prepared to fight off intruders. A caveman has to hunt if not all day, at least regularly enough that his family can eat daily. I am glad that early in our history one caveman who had a skill in "building" said to another caveman who was really big and strong, "urgh muck doo gong ho" (which is caveman for, you protect our homes from predators, I build you one). And I'm even more glad that a caveman predator came long with bad intentions only to find a more efficient system than crime; where two cavemen with two skills worked together to make life easier for each other, and chose to become a positive member of their budding community.

2) The reason for this, is because we follow a failed system (civilization) that the vast majority of the world feels is the way it's meant to be. Those last three words are what really irks me: meant to be.

We don't realize it's a problem, because we accept the idea that civilization is how man is meant to be. This is an absurd notion, to think that we're supposed to be civilized. Civilized man is such a tiny blip on the overall timeline of our species.

We're left with a system that creates, but can't support, a massive overpopulation of our species. The human population isn't in equilibrium. We used to be, but that was thousands of years ago. We defy nature, and we pay for it with droughts, famines, natural disasters in overpopulated areas, diseases, and so on.

I don't think man is supposed to be civilized anymore than they are not supposed to be civilized. It just so happens that we only exist now because we have the tool to be civilized, therefor civilization is a natural consequence of that tool. I agree that we are not balanced, but I blame that on our intellects and impulses which are constantly at war with eachother. We have allowed ourselves to take it all for granted, and created one, if not two generations now that think they're simply entitled to this. They forget, or never knew, that it took hard work to build this, and that early on everyone played a role. There are literally cultures within our civilization that think they have a natural right to other people's labor without having to give anything in return. That is why our civilization is in decay.

Now, away from hypothetical and back to reality.

I'm sitting here at a laptop powered by electricity sending a post to a forum through a broadband internet connection. I just finished an iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts. Clearly I'm not acting on my beliefs in any way. The overpowering rule of civilization has the same grasp on me that it has on everybody else. I just try to remember that it doesn't have to be this way. I don't feel like it will ever change, unless an apocalyptic disaster occurs and life starts from scratch, or humanity allows itself the freedom to step outside of civilization and test the waters.

So this brings me back to the point. Sure, you can yell about how government is corrupt, or evil, or too socialist for your liking, or too democratic for your liking, or whatever it is, but that's not the problem. Alex Jones hates the government, Obama is a communist, Bush is a reptilian shapeshifter in disguise, yadda yadda yadda, whatever.

Of course government isn't going to be satisfying, and of course you won't agree with it, because it maintains this civilized system that our instincts are at odds with. Is anyone ever truly happy with government?

Civilization only masks human nature. People are still good and/or evil. I would argue that the government is a safe haven for evil people to satisfy their indulgences more than any other institution. The government is a cesspool of corruption because they're all looking for ways to legislate how they're going to take advantage of you for their own personal gain. They're not smarter than you or I (who aren't so selfish), they're just more motivated. They never stop thinking of ways to get what they want.

And onto a separate point. I'm not anti-technology, and I'm not about stifling human ingenuity and intellectual progress. I'm not saying that the tribal guys had it right (and I don't think there's such a thing as 'right' in the first place), and I'm not saying we should go back to living in caves. I'm not saying we need to abandon what we've learned.

What I am saying is that the system of civilization that we have in place isn't a system that can hold up, and basically goes against our very nature. Ideally I'd wish for human population to stop increasing at such a crazy rate and get back to a stable equilibrium over time, and for humanity in general to take a more grassroots approach at life. I think we need less governmental responsibility and more individual responsibility.

I don't think civilization is against our nature, because I believe that civilization is a consequence of a naturally occurring tool that we have, and other animals don't; our amazing imagination. But I agree that civilization sets us up for failure because we become domesticated, naive, and weak. We allow our greatest tool (which we needed to get here in the first place) to rot while we arbitrarily complete tasks and let other people tell us how to act, think, and live. It seems the more "civilized" we are, the more docile, and sheep-like we become. I want to combat that. I want people to be more socratic with how they approach their choices in life. And I want us (as a species) to never forget how we got here. Or we won't deserve to be here anymore.

BTW, good posts Sayzak and Snipe.

Indeed. This was a fun thread.