Where are you on the doomer scale?

[UndercoverElephant]

No, I'm not talking about the end times and the battle of Armageddon. I'm talking about overpopulation and ecological destruction, climate change, peak oil and all that stuff.

[fuelair]

Describe the scale or maybe make it a survey with identifiable points.

[UndercoverElephant]

Describe the scale or maybe make it a survey with identifiable points.

The system is silly. It puts up the opening post before you've filled the poll options out....

[Dancing David]

I think it is hard to sasy, it seems some stabalization is population is occuring, if AGW is the real deal, life will get harder for most of us. there is a chance that civilization will collapse back to early industrial, but it seems unlikely to me.

However biological agents that wipe out a large percentage of humans, or the crops or a combination seems more likely.

The end of the world, no
the end of humanity, unlikely but possible
the end of high tech society, still unlikely but more probable.

[seayakin]

This is always an interesting question for me because you when you look at some mortality rates in the developing world and it seems to me you have some population balancing going on already due to poverty, disease, and famine that is a regular occurrence. This is why I tend to to see some regions maintaining a high level of quality of life whereas others may always be stuck in misery and death. The resource limits already impact parts of the world without power but those with power are able to maintain the quality of life by controlling access to resource.

I better stop for fear of creating babble.

[Skeptic Guy]

On Planet X people live longer when it gets real dirty.

[Cynic]

I went what seemed bleak, with 2-3 billion dying before we learn to balance with nature, but I would qualify that as being over a very long time span before everyone finally bothers to.

[theprestige]

What does it mean, to "live in balance with nature"?

If we're asking this question, isn't that evidence that we're out of "balance with nature"?

If we don't know the answer, how can we know if we're out of balance or in balance?

Ants don't know the answer; are they also out of balance?

[UndercoverElephant]

What does it mean, to "live in balance with nature"?


Good question.



If we're asking this question, isn't that evidence that we're out of "balance with nature"?


I suspect so, yes.


If we don't know the answer, how can we know if we're out of balance or in balance?

Ants don't know the answer; are they also out of balance?

Ants are in balance.

Homo Sapiens has always been out of balance with its environment. We evolved down a unique path - that of a generalist with a large brain whose sole survival strategy is to dominate and manipulate its environment in ways that no other animal could ever do. The most primitive societies still in existence - the hunter-gatherers of the Amazon and the Bushmen in Africa - live in semi-permanent settlements. They spend a few weeks in one place, strip the forest of anything they can use, then move on somewhere else. This *IS* our place in the ecosystem. We have no other. Living in balance with the rest of the local ecosystem simply isn't what we evolved to do. So in order to live sustainably, don't we have to try to become something that we aren't, and never have been?

Perhaps expecting to be able to "train" the human race to stop destroying the environment is a bit like expecting to be able to train a jack russell terrier not to chase small animals. It can't be done.

[mhaze]

What does it mean, to "live in balance with nature"?
it's a dialectic, a framing, a polemical approach, a gateway to the biased and prejudical, a sophism ....

It means you being set up, dude.

[PitPat]

No option for a gamma ray burst? Or even an impact event...it could happen, we have a black president now.

[Dancing David]

Good question.




I suspect so, yes.



Ants are in balance.

Homo Sapiens has always been out of balance with its environment. We evolved down a unique path - that of a generalist with a large brain whose sole survival strategy is to dominate and manipulate its environment in ways that no other animal could ever do. The most primitive societies still in existence - the hunter-gatherers of the Amazon and the Bushmen in Africa - live in semi-permanent settlements. They spend a few weeks in one place, strip the forest of anything they can use, then move on somewhere else. This *IS* our place in the ecosystem. We have no other. Living in balance with the rest of the local ecosystem simply isn't what we evolved to do. So in order to live sustainably, don't we have to try to become something that we aren't, and never have been?

Perhaps expecting to be able to "train" the human race to stop destroying the environment is a bit like expecting to be able to train a jack russell terrier not to chase small animals. It can't be done.

That is an interesting view of hunter gathering, I suppose you have a source for your assertions?

Any citations on that?

And humans did not evolve as large brains, theye volved as upright apes, then they got the large brains.

ETA: Um sure about the ants too, this is too much of the 'happy world without humans'. I want to see documentation that ants live in balance, sheesh. I suppose you can demonstrate that they never over populate or strip resources?

[UndercoverElephant]

That is an interesting view of hunter gathering, I suppose you have a source for your assertions?

Any citations on that?


http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5437/is_4_32/ai_n28718892/?tag=content;col1


Limited Wants, Unlimited Means: A Reader on Hunter-Gatherer Economics and the Environment


The above article contains a summary of how our view of hunter-gatherer societies changed over the years. We never were the "noble savage".


And humans did not evolve as large brains, theye volved as upright apes, then they got the large brains.


The process of standing upright was almost certainly well underway long before we left the trees - just look at an oran-utan to see the same sort of behaviour (walking upright-ish along branches). From the moment we abandoned the trees and started wandering around the savannah instead, our brain was our most important survival tool.


ETA: Um sure about the ants too, this is too much of the 'happy world without humans'. I want to see documentation that ants live in balance, sheesh. I suppose you can demonstrate that they never over populate or strip resources?

If ants are running out of resources then they fight for what is available. They have wars. That goes both across species and within species. The article linked to above is really about how and why hunter-gatherer societies had relatively stable population levels. It's partly about conflict, partly about the prevalence of diseases and partly about lower birth rates due to poorer nutrition. If all these failed, and there were two many babies born for them to support, then they turned to infanticide. They also practiced senilicide. They were quite happy to strip the environment of everything available, but since they were/are closer to their environment than us then they were/are much more keenly aware of how many humans their own local environment can support. We in the modern world are completely unaware of this, because we are isolated from the means of production of our food. We only learn about it if we study things like ecology.

[UndercoverElephant]

No option for a gamma ray burst? Or even an impact event...it could happen, we have a black president now.

If we're wiped out by a gamma ray burst then there's nothing we can do about it. Sure, some highly unlikely catastrophe may occur. I'm more interested in the self-generated catastrophes that look highly likely to occur unless we change the ideology by which we live - radically.

[Dancing David]

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5437/is_4_32/ai_n28718892/?tag=content;col1



The above article contains a summary of how our view of hunter-gatherer societies changed over the years. We never were the "noble savage".

Uh huh, and that is philosophical assertion, try making a coherent biological argument.

Words like 'certainty' should be avoided.

I can go first is you want:
What led to larger brains, as a set of likely but un-verifiable paths?

(You do know that 'leaving the trees' is sort of sophomoric don't you?)

Here is one possible scenario to explain increased brain development:
1. Upright gaits is selected for, number of possible factors, the most interesting being that compared to knuckle walking or full quadrapedia, running is about the same energy expense as walking, many other possibilities.
2. Upright gaits lead to narrowing of the pelvis.
3. Narrowing of the pelvis leads to smaller craniums and neotany at birth (babies are farther from self sustaining than before)
4. Neotany and smaller craniums leads to exaggerated growth and development of the brain.
5. Then this trait is selected for.

Now this is all just speculation but it involves rather standard possible evolutionary paths.

BTW How far does an orangutan walk upright and how efficiently?

If ants are running out of resources then they fight for what is available. They have wars.

I think ants pretty much attack anything they can, I have to check, it is not resource dependant. It will take awhile, I will e-mail my ent. friend and he will contact the ant man.

That goes both across species and within species.

Not really, lethal competition between animals is the rule, unless you are a predator eating prey. Do herds of qwildebeast engage in conflict with each other?

Most sexual competition is very non-lethal, I am not aware of 'warfare' amongst predators either.

The article linked to above is really about how and why hunter-gatherer societies had relatively stable population levels.

It is also about how by the time people started writing down stuff the horticultural and aggricultural societies had taken all the high resource biomes.

t's partly about conflict, partly about the prevalence of diseases and partly about lower birth rates due to poorer nutrition. If all these failed, and there were two many babies born for them to support, then they turned to infanticide. They also practiced senilicide. They were quite happy to strip the environment of everything available, but since they were/are closer to their environment than us then they were/are much more keenly aware of how many humans their own local environment can support. We in the modern world are completely unaware of this, because we are isolated from the means of production of our food. We only learn about it if we study things like ecology.
Um, are you sure these are actually cited in the article, infanticide yes, in some populations but not all (hunter gathering were rather limited by the time of recorded records) more frequent were the semi horticultural.

Warfare, warfare, are you sure? (Or was that a statement solely about ants?)

What is the source for that? That requires high populations, exploitable wealth and surplus resources. Do HG groups war with each other or is that more of a horticultural/agricultural thing?

Where should I read in that document?

[Darth Rotor]

I went what seemed bleak, with 2-3 billion dying before we learn to balance with nature, ... snip.
As did I, and the death of 2-3 billion is a certainty. What is unknown is how many will be born while all of that dying is going on. :D Not the world's greatest poll, but one full of opportunity for playing shennanigans. :cool:

[UndercoverElephant]

Uh huh, and that is philosophical assertion, try making a coherent biological argument.


Try reading the article.


Words like 'certainty' should be avoided.

I can go first is you want:
What led to larger brains, as a set of likely but un-verifiable paths?


What led to larger brains was that those individuals with a higher general cognitive ability were much more likely to survive. The length of time it took for the genus Homo to lead to the massive-brained Homo Sapiens was short, in terms of normal evolutionary timescales. Once it had started in earnest, the selection pressure leading to a large brain was very powerful. In other words, the chance of an early hominid succesfully reproducing had more to do with cognitive ability than any other feature. During that period, almost all of the other adaptations which occured were those which better enabled us to maintain an upright posture (free hands) and allowed humans to cope with the side-effects of the massive brain. This process happened so quickly that the rest of our bodies are yet to "catch up". That is why 50% of humans suffer from back problems and why we have the highest natural mortality rate during childbirth of any mammal.


BTW How far does an orangutan walk upright and how efficiently?


http://scienceblogs.com/notrocketscience/2009/03/orang-utan_study_suggests_that_upright_walking_may_have_ star.php


Walking on two legs, or bipedalism, immediately sets us apart form other apes. It frees our arms for using tools and weapons and is a key part of our evolutionary success. Scientists have put forward a few theories to explain how our upright gait evolved, but the 'savannah theory' is by far the most prolific.

Orang-utans can go bipedal and our ancestors may well have done the same in the trees.It's nicely illustrated by this misleading image that has become a mainstay of popular culture. It suggests that our ancestors went from four legs to two via the four-legged knuckle-walking gait of gorillas and chimps. Dwindling forests eventually pushed them from knuckle-walking to a full upright posture. This stance is more efficient over long distances and allowed our ancestors to travel across open savannahs.

But this theory fails in the light of new fossils which push back the first appearance of bipedalism to a time before the forests thinned, and even before our ancestors split from those of chimpanzees. Very early hominins, including Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis) and Millennium Man (Orrorin) certainly ambled along on two legs....



I think ants pretty much attack anything they can, I have to check, it is not resource dependant. It will take awhile, I will e-mail my ent. friend and he will contact the ant man.


Ants engage in what can only be described as warfare. They normally attack only what they want to eat, but many species of ant kill other ant colonies because of disputes over territory and resources, not for food.


Not really, lethal competition between animals is the rule, unless you are a predator eating prey. Do herds of qwildebeast engage in conflict with each other?


No, their numbers are kept in check by the highest concentration of predators of any type of ecosystem. They also have a different sort of behaviour with respect to finding food - they follow the rains.


Most sexual competition is very non-lethal, I am not aware of 'warfare' amongst predators either.


http://www.lions.org/lion-the-animal-more.html


Males defend their territory, be it open woodland or scrub, through urinating to mark the area, roaring to promote fear and literally chasing off any intruders. Their main competition is spotted hyenas that often go for the same prey as lions. These animals will fight and steal each other's food. This warfare goes beyond food; it is also the problem of territorial boundaries being crossed. Lions can be extremely aggressive and have been seen hunting hyenas, killing them and not eating their prey. They dominate and promote fear in other animals, such as cheetahs and leopards, so that they do not prey the same time that lions do.

Basically the male lions defend and protect their territory as females hunt.




Um, are you sure these are actually cited in the article...


Yes.



Warfare, warfare, are you sure? (Or was that a statement solely about ants?)


http://whippersnapper.wordpress.com/2009/06/27/breaking-hunter-gatherer-societies-were-incredibly-violent/


On average, warfare caused 14 per cent of the total deaths in ancient and more recent hunter-gatherers populations.



Where should I read in that document?

Judging by your last post, you should read all of it.

[Darth Rotor]

Homo Sapiens has always been out of balance with its environment. We evolved down a unique path - that of a generalist with a large brain whose sole survival strategy is to dominate and manipulate its environment in ways that no other animal could ever do. The most primitive societies still in existence - the hunter-gatherers of the Amazon and the Bushmen in Africa - live in semi-permanent settlements. They spend a few weeks in one place, strip the forest of anything they can use, then move on somewhere else. This *IS* our place in the ecosystem. We have no other. Living in balance with the rest of the local ecosystem simply isn't what we evolved to do. So in order to live sustainably, don't we have to try to become something that we aren't, and never have been?
Perhaps expecting to be able to "train" the human race to stop destroying the environment is a bit like expecting to be able to train a jack russell terrier not to chase small animals. It can't be done.
One word: stewardship.

Another word: gardening

A concept: crop rotation

While I like the thought you encapsulated up there in bold, it has legs, where you went with it is IMO at odds with the higher brain functions that we call "teaching," "training," "the evolution of ideas," and even "memes." We have indeed taught and learned any number of less wasteful habits than slash and burn. See the agricultural habits of France, over the past millenium, as a single example.

Sustainable farming, a centuries old habit, is a demonstrated training and teaching regimen that points to your slash and burn archetype as being less than universal.

Thus, one might conclude, other patterns of stewardship and resource conservation/utilization, rather than slash and burn, can continue to be spread.

My two shillings.

[quarky]

Super colonies of ants that comprise vast colonies of non-competitive ants, presumably related, have been discovered recently. This changes matters, as per potential models of human civilizations.

[UndercoverElephant]

One word: stewardship.

Another word: gardening

A concept: crop rotation

While I like the thought you encapsulated up there in bold, it has legs, where you went with it is IMO at odds with the higher brain functions that we call "teaching," "training," "the evolution of ideas," and even "memes."


Yes, but teaching and training have their limits. You cannot, for example, train a human being to lead a life of celibacy without it having a severe psychological effect. Just look at the record of the catholic church and the abuse of young boys, for example. I see this as very similar to trying to train a jack russell not to chase small animals. It is a case of trying to use religious "brainwashing" to overcome innate evolved behaviour. Obviously the jack russell can't be subjected to religious brainwashing so we can't even seriously try to train it not to behave in this way, but I'm contrasting it with things like learning that slavery is unacceptable: we do not psychologically suffer because we no longer have slaves, because enslaving other humans is not part of our hard-wired behaviour.

[UndercoverElephant]

Super colonies of ants that comprise vast colonies of non-competitive ants, presumably related, have been discovered recently. This changes matters, as per potential models of human civilizations.

It wasn't me who compared ants to humans. Creatures belonging to the order hymenoptera are in a completely different class of organisms to mammals because of the way their genetics work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplodiploidy

A worker ant is more closely related to her sisters than she would be to her own offspring, should she have any.

[PixyMisa]

Ants are in balance.
Baloney. Ants exist to make more ants.

[Lanzy]

My goal for polls is succeeding; always pick the least popular answer.

[Dancing David]

Try reading the article.



What led to larger brains was that those individuals with a higher general cognitive ability were much more likely to survive. The length of time it took for the genus Homo to lead to the massive-brained Homo Sapiens was short, in terms of normal evolutionary timescales. Once it had started in earnest, the selection pressure leading to a large brain was very powerful.

In other words you don't know much about evolutionary biology, only your philosophical bias. Whatever.
In other words, the chance of an early hominid succesfully reproducing had more to do with cognitive ability than any other feature.

Asserion.

During that period, almost all of the other adaptations which occured were those which better enabled us to maintain an upright posture (free hands) and allowed humans to cope with the side-effects of the massive brain.

then why is Lucy's btrain casee so small. Upright gait first.

This process happened so quickly that the rest of our bodies are yet to "catch up". That is why 50% of humans suffer from back problems and why we have the highest natural mortality rate during childbirth of any mammal.

50% of who has back pain?



http://scienceblogs.com/notrocketscience/2009/03/orang-utan_study_suggests_that_upright_walking_may_have_ star.php

Got any data or just a pop piece?






Ants engage in what can only be described as warfare. They normally attack only what they want to eat, but many species of ant kill other ant colonies because of disputes over territory and resources, not for food.

Wow , anthropomorphise much, git any data?




No, their numbers are kept in check by the highest concentration of predators of any type of ecosystem. They also have a different sort of behaviour with respect to finding food - they follow the rains.



http://www.lions.org/lion-the-animal-more.html

You don't know what warfare is either. Same species for one.







Yes.




http://whippersnapper.wordpress.com/2009/06/27/breaking-hunter-gatherer-societies-were-incredibly-violent/

Sure a citation that cites another source, og my. No way to judge the data, is there. You can get wounds in a fall as well.






Judging by your last post, you should read all of it.

Okay so you can't cite your own sources and then you cite sources citing other sources. Sure whatever, it is Politics after all, lower standards.

the first page of the article contains almost total speculation, you show me which parts to read and I will.

you cite another article that gives no data on how mmucg time orangutan spend in bipedial mode.

whatever.

[Dancing David]

It wasn't me who compared ants to humans. Creatures belonging to the order hymenoptera are in a completely different class of organisms to mammals because of the way their genetics work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplodiploidy

A worker ant is more closely related to her sisters than she would be to her own offspring, should she have any.


No you said theya re in balance and I said hogwash.

You said warfare.

[UndercoverElephant]

Baloney. Ants exist to make more ants.

I can see your ability to comprehend ecology and natural history is on a par with your ability to understand philosophy.

You have completely missed the point of everything I am saying. Ants exist in balance with nature because they have not evolved giant brains and set about the business of using those brains to wipe out all the competition within the ecosystem. Can you see any evidence of a global ant population explosion? No? Then ants are not out of balance with their ecosystem. Of course ants exist to make more ants. The same is true of every species of living organism. Your point was? :rolleyes:

You are the most irritating person I have ever met on the internet. You do not "discuss." You simply turn up in threads and write things like "Baloney", usually having spent no more than about 2 milliseconds thinking about the subject being discussed. You make ZERO effort to understand anything that anybody-else has to say about anything at all. Your teachers at school must have loathed you.

[Dancing David]

Yes, but teaching and training have their limits. You cannot, for example, train a human being to lead a life of celibacy without it having a severe psychological effect. Just look at the record of the catholic church and the abuse of young boys, for example. I see this as very similar to trying to train a jack russell not to chase small animals. It is a case of trying to use religious "brainwashing" to overcome innate evolved behaviour. Obviously the jack russell can't be subjected to religious brainwashing so we can't even seriously try to train it not to behave in this way, but I'm contrasting it with things like learning that slavery is unacceptable: we do not psychologically suffer because we no longer have slaves, because enslaving other humans is not part of our hard-wired behaviour.


DR mentions gardening and farming and you counter with this? Traditions of farming and land use are stable across generations unless there is a technological benefit.

BTW there are no hard wired behaviors in humans after the age of 6 weeks.

How many more myths will you trot out?

[UndercoverElephant]

No you said theya re in balance and I said hogwash.

You said warfare.

And an organised raid on a neighbouring colony with the intent to kill as many of them as possible isn't warfare?

[UndercoverElephant]

DR mentions gardening and farming and you counter with this? Traditions of farming and land use are stable across generations unless there is a technological benefit.

BTW there are no hard wired behaviors in humans after the age of 6 weeks.


You're kidding me, right?


How many more myths will you trot out?

If you think it is a myth that human beings, after the age of 6 weeks, are not hardwired to want food and sex, then there's quite a few more "myths" where they came from.

There is all sorts of hardwired behaviour in adult humans. One is that the presence of an object in the back of the mouth, such as a pair of fingers, causes humans to vomit.

[UndercoverElephant]

DR mentions gardening and farming and you counter with this? Traditions of farming and land use are stable across generations unless there is a technological benefit.

So what? I don't understand what point you are making. I don't understand what gardening has to do with the argument we are having. Why do you think it is relevant? Modern humans grow flowers for pleasure and vegetables for food. And....?

[UndercoverElephant]

My goal for polls is succeeding; always pick the least popular answer.

I'm kinda glad there are people out there who are even more pessimistic than myself. Even if there's not very many of them...

[Darth Rotor]

Yes, but teaching and training have their limits. You cannot, for example, train a human being to lead a life of celibacy without it having a severe psychological effect. Just look at the record of the catholic church and the abuse of young boys, for example.
Are you sure you have data versus "conventional wisdom" here? What percentage of the celibate clergy have in fact not remained celibate?

How do you know this?

I honestly don't know if it's one percent, five percent, fifty percent, or what. While I think it is a mistake for the clergy not to wed -- lead by exemple if nothing else -- ascetic life styles do not by default create psychosis, nor sociopathic behaviors. (Is it the way to bet? I dunno).
I see this as very similar to trying to train a jack russell not to chase small animals. It is a case of trying to use religious "brainwashing" to overcome innate evolved behaviour.
Got it. You just made the connection, that training and education are now equivalent to religious brain washing. Stated on the James Randi Educational Forum. ;) I don't think you mean that.
Obviously the jack russell can't be subjected to religious brainwashing so we can't even seriously try to train it not to behave in this way, but I'm contrasting it with things like learning that slavery is unacceptable: we do not psychologically suffer because we no longer have slaves, because enslaving other humans is not part of our hard-wired behaviour.
It isn't? Huh? Exercising power over others isn't hard wired to our behavior? Are you counting the hits and ignoring the misses here? Pecking orders are established in any collection of humans, with the exercise of that influence and power varying, from benevolent to tyrannical.

Walrus, are you sure you've thought this through?

DR

[UndercoverElephant]

Are you sure you have data versus "conventional wisdom" here? What percentage of the celibate clergy have in fact not remained celibate?

How do you know this?


I have no research to quote. I think it is a historical fact, though, that the catholic church has had a serious problem with supposedly celibate priests being involved in scandals involving underage males. I am making a comparison with other forms of religion here rather than making an absolute claim about the percentage of priests who break their vows or become involved in the aforementioned form of abuse. The problem is certainly far more prevalent in the catholic church than in the CofE, and I think it is also fair to say that the catholic church is stronger on the brainwashing and anti-sexual rules and moralising.



I honestly don't know if it's one percent, five percent, fifty percent, or what.
I see this as very similar to trying to train a jack russell not to chase small animals. It is a case of trying to use religious "brainwashing" to overcome innate evolved behaviour.


Got it. Training and education is equivalent to religious brain washing. Stated on the James Randi Educational Forum. ;)



I am saying that training and education aren't enough to solve this problem. Numerous polls have shown that whilst a large proportion of the population are worried about things like climate change, it is not enough to actually change their behaviour when it comes to their driving habits or choice of holiday destination. In the end, the only thing that caused petrol consumption in the US to fall was a massive hike in the price of oil. Education didn't work. Sticks and carrots are needed.



It isn't? Huh? Exercising power over others isn't hard wired to our behavior?


I don't think so no. Most humans, naturally, are just members of a tribe. Many of them would make rubbish leaders anyway.

[Darth Rotor]

I don't think so no. Most humans, naturally, are just members of a tribe. Many of them would make rubbish leaders anyway.
The rest considered, this last is a whitewash. "Just members of the tribe" includes being subject to those who figure out how to wield and influence power within the tribe, be it large or small. As I stated above, the degree of that influence can range from benevolent to tyrannical, whereas you seem to assume benevolence.

History shows us otherwise.

[UndercoverElephant]

The rest considered, this last is a whitewash. "Just members of the tribe" includes being subject to those who figure out how to wield and influence power within the tribe, be it large or small. As I stated above, the degree of that influence can range from benevolent to tyrannical, whereas you seem to assume benevolence.


What have I said that implies that I assume benevolence? It makes no difference whether they are benevolent or tyrannical, some people just aren't born to lead. All humans are born to eat and nearly all of them want to have sex. The seeking of power is something that has obviously had a big effect on human societies, but it doesn't follow that all humans are naturally power-seekers. It's just that the ones that are tend to have a disproportionate effect on everybody else.

My instincts to eat and have sex are very strong. My instinct to want a personal slave is non-existent.

[Darth Rotor]

My instincts to eat and have sex are very strong. My instinct to want a personal slave is non-existent.
You seem to assume that as instinct, whilst your sentiment is as likely a result of conditioning/rearing/indoctrination/teaching/training.

Nurture AND nature, not either/or.

DR

[Dancing David]

And an organised raid on a neighbouring colony with the intent to kill as many of them as possible isn't warfare?

Oh sure they discuss plans and make coordinated attacks i am sure. have you ever watched an ant raid? Do you really think it is organised?

I don't.

[Dancing David]

You're kidding me, right?

No I am not, sensations are learned and partly hard wired, all behavioral responses to sensation are learned.

Why don't you name an alleged hardwired behavior and we can discussit, I know what I am speaking about. what do you think is a 'hard-wired behaviour'.




If you think it is a myth that human beings, after the age of 6 weeks, are not hardwired to want food and sex, then there's quite a few more "myths" where they came from.

Sensations such as hunger are a hardwired response, however everything else is learned. tell me about the 'hard wired behavior' you are thinking of.


There is all sorts of hardwired behaviour in adult humans. One is that the presence of an object in the back of the mouth, such as a pair of fingers, causes humans to vomit.

the gag reflex is not a behavior involving anything you were talking about and it is not considered a hard wired one because it can be suppresed. I suppose it is autonomic, so name a food behavior or a sexual behavior that is hard wired.

[Dancing David]

So what? I don't understand what point you are making. I don't understand what gardening has to do with the argument we are having. Why do you think it is relevant? Modern humans grow flowers for pleasure and vegetables for food. And....?

And you should really respond to what DR said and not just get all huffy.

[Dancing David]

My instincts to eat and have sex are very strong. My instinct to want a personal slave is non-existent.

Instincts in ethology/biology are hard wired stereotypic reposnes that will always happen in the precense of certain stimuli, humans do not have them after 6 weeks. What you are talking about is all learned behavior. Evem things that peopel consider 'inante' are not they are learned.

Give an example of an instinct to eat or reproduce in humans.(Babies have one called rooting, but it disappears at six weeks.) Yes the sensations are powerful, the behaviors are learned.

[Dancing David]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17255-ancient-warfare-fighting-for-the-greater-good.html


In ancient graves excavated previously, Bowles found that up to 46 per cent of the skeletons from 15 different locations around the world showed signs of a violent death. More recently, war inflicted 30 per cent of deaths among the Ache, a hunter-gatherer population from Eastern Paraguay, 17 per cent among the Hiwi, who live in Venezuela and Colombia, while just 4 per cent among the Anbara in northern Australia.
On average, warfare caused 14 per cent of the total deaths in ancient and more recent hunter-gatherers populations.


Now that is just peachy isn’t , no resources quotes to judge that statement at all.

This is the actual source:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/324/5932/1293?ijkey=bd8368871a238ae24dec8e792ea264aead320b3 3#R17
And the methodology is not as clear cut as the first source would have it, it will take rereading to see what was actually done and how the figures were arrived at, the samples are so small as to be very subject to sample bias.

This part in particular is very important

Ethnographic evidence. Most ethnographic studies of premodern war have concerned populations whose unusually bellicose relations among groups may not reflect conditions of Late Pleistocene hunter-gatherers: horticultural peoples in the highlands of Papua New Guinea and parts of lowland South America, or equestrian hunters or sedentary horticulturalists in North America. Among nonequestrian foragers, detailed accounts provide examples of intergroup conflict of exceptional brutality among Aboriginal Australians, Eskimos, and other groups (3, 26, 27), but most do not allow quantitative estimates of the resulting mortality. In other groups, war is entirely absent from the ethnographic record, but in some of these cases, like the !Kung and other Southern African groups, this absence may be the result of recent state interventions (28, 29). For eight populations, ethnographic studies allow estimates of the deaths due to warfare as a fraction of total mortality (summarized in Table 2). As in the case of archaeological studies, selection bias may lead to an exaggeration of the extent of warfare mortality. Moreover, some populations are not entirely representative of foragers during the Late Pleistocene due to the impact of non–hunter-gatherer influences.

[UndercoverElephant]

Instincts in ethology/biology are hard wired stereotypic reposnes that will always happen in the precense of certain stimuli, humans do not have them after 6 weeks. What you are talking about is all learned behavior.

Do you believe it possible to train a jack russell terrier not to chase small animals?

[UndercoverElephant]

Oh sure they discuss plans and make coordinated attacks i am sure. have you ever watched an ant raid? Do you really think it is organised?

I don't.

Ants NOT ORGANISED?

ANTS???!!!

You are talking about a creature which builds bridges out of its own bodies.

http://www.myrmecos.net/ants/EciBur11.JPG

They are so d*mned organised that some people class a colony of ants as a single organism. They make the Japanese look disorganised.

[UndercoverElephant]

You seem to assume that as instinct, whilst your sentiment is as likely a result of conditioning/rearing/indoctrination/teaching/training.

Nurture AND nature, not either/or.

DR

I think that in many cases it is very, very hard to say for sure what is the result of nature and what is the result of nurture. I am partly asking this question in response to a debate between two environmentalists about the way forward for humanity at this point:

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2009/08/18/should-we-seek-to-save-industrial-civilisation/

Their dispute is not about the seriousness of the problem, but the appropriate reaction. Kingsnorth believes that collapse is inevitable, but that a "saner" world might emerge - that we can change our "founding myths" and build a sustainable civilisation, but only when forced to do so by a massive human catastrophe. Monbiot insists that no good can come of the collapse - that humans will not learn anything from it. It is a complicated and gloomy debate, but I think the situation is even more complicated than it looks from their debate. We have two problems: our ideological heritage (nurture) and our natural psychology, which has been determined by evolution (nature.) I am yet to decide whether we can solve either problem, let alone both of them. I am quite certain that education alone is not enough.

[quarky]

There is something extraordinary about certain ant species' colonies...possibly worth emulating, to post-pone doomsday. The tropical leaf-cutter ants come to mind; the ones that grow fungus underground. Their model is extremely successful, yet they avoid depleting their food source, possibly through subtle feed-back mechanisms and population controls.

It is quite amazing that they have managed to eat the same species of fungus for millions of years through a symbiosis with a single species of bacteria, which they also cultivate for the purpose of protecting themselves from the fungus which they rely on for food.

Not to anthropomorphosize the super organism, but I suspect there is much to learn from them regarding our own models for survival.

[Dancing David]

Do you believe it possible to train a jack russell terrier not to chase small animals?

Do you think humans are Jack Russell terriers?

[Dancing David]

Ants NOT ORGANISED?

ANTS???!!!

You are talking about a creature which builds bridges out of its own bodies.

http://www.myrmecos.net/ants/EciBur11.JPG

They are so d*mned organised that some people class a colony of ants as a single organism. They make the Japanese look disorganised.


Ah, switch the goals posts and change the topic, what makes their attacks organised?

Half the ants go the other way following the scent trails, some go to the battle some to the nest, some to other places. And yes, I had slave maker ants in my yard and watched many a raiding party.

[Dancing David]

I think that in many cases it is very, very hard to say for sure what is the result of nature and what is the result of nurture. I am partly asking this question in response to a debate between two environmentalists about the way forward for humanity at this point:

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2009/08/18/should-we-seek-to-save-industrial-civilisation/

Their dispute is not about the seriousness of the problem, but the appropriate reaction. Kingsnorth believes that collapse is inevitable, but that a "saner" world might emerge - that we can change our "founding myths" and build a sustainable civilisation, but only when forced to do so by a massive human catastrophe. Monbiot insists that no good can come of the collapse - that humans will not learn anything from it. It is a complicated and gloomy debate, but I think the situation is even more complicated than it looks from their debate. We have two problems: our ideological heritage (nurture) and our natural psychology, which has been determined by evolution (nature.) I am yet to decide whether we can solve either problem, let alone both of them. I am quite certain that education alone is not enough.

I think you are avoiding the topic you stated something about hardwired behaviors in humans and now you change the topic.
You haven't shown the hunter gatherering group over harvest of harm the ecosystem they live off of.

No wonder you are changing the subject again.

You are still talking about 'natural psychology', sure whatever, and show an example of an instinct or hard wired behavior in humans.

Of course you are certain of your assertions, but you have yet to demonstrate them.

Human behavior is learned, it can be influenced by biology of the system but not driven by it. There are no know hard wired behaviors in humans after the age of six weeks, rootong, the babinski relex and the palmar reflex. That is all we know of, so what are you talking about?

So where are those 'hard wired behaviors'?

[Dancing David]

Not to anthropomorphosize the super organism, but I suspect there is much to learn from them regarding our own models for survival.

Of course, be nice to your siblings, don't take more than you need, share what you have, everything for the colony.

But the fungus, the bacteria and the ants are fortunate accidents, we can do it on purpose.

[Puppycow]

I consider everything between the 3rd and 6th options to be within the realm of realistic possibility. The 1st and 7th seem highly unlikely. I voted for 6th because I'm an optimist.

I believe that genetic engineering will eventually lead to a cornucopia of new food sources and possibly energy sources. As well as many other amazing new things. DNA was only discovered in the 50s and we've hardly scratched the surface of what is possible once we learn to understand and control DNA.

[UndercoverElephant]

I think you are avoiding the topic you stated something about hardwired behaviors in humans and now you change the topic.


No, David. I'm trying to get you to understand what the topic actually was in the first-place.

I don't know where to start with you. You think that no human behaviour after the age 6 weeks is hardwired and that ants are disorganised.


You haven't shown the hunter gatherering group over harvest of harm the ecosystem they live off of.


I never claimed they did. I said they would if they stayed in the same place permanently, which they don't.



Human behavior is learned, it can be influenced by biology of the system but not driven by it. There are no know hard wired behaviors in humans after the age of six weeks, rootong, the babinski relex and the palmar reflex. That is all we know of, so what are you talking about?

So where are those 'hard wired behaviors'?

ME WANT SEX WITH GIRLS.

Please do not try to convince me that my sex-drive is learned behaviour. It is not.

Just out of interest, do you believe it is possible to train all homosexual humans to be heterosexual?

According to your theory, it ought to be possible to take any six-week-old human and, via the correct conditioning and training, to ensure that that individual grows up to be gay. Regardless of the fact that it would be totally immoral to try such an experiment, I'm fairly certain it would fail anyway. It might work in some cases, but in most it would either fail completely or cause all sorts of undesirable psychological side-effects. There is at least one very unfortunate case which proves this is true - the case of an individual whose penis was accidentally destroyed when he was a toddler and was subsequently given surgery and brought up as a girl. According to the idiotic psychological theories of the time, this would be fine, because sexuality is learned behaviour. It was an abject failure. The child was never happy as a girl and always knew that something was badly wrong.

You are claiming that it ALL complex human behaviour is down to nurture, and none of it is nature.

[UndercoverElephant]

Do you think humans are Jack Russell terriers?

Now, my friend, it is you who is avoiding answering questions. Of course humans aren't jack russell terriers. But some of their behaviour really is hard-wired, and so is some of ours. The only question is which behaviours are hard-wired and which are not. Your answer, at least in the case of humans, appears to be, "none are hard-wired." I believe this claim to be not only incorrect, but absurd.

[Dancing David]

No, David. I'm trying to get you to understand what the topic actually was in the first-place.

I don't know where to start with you. You think that no human behaviour after the age 6 weeks is hardwired and that ants are disorganised.

How do ants get food, how many go which way at what time to the food and from the food?



I never claimed they did. I said they would if they stayed in the same place permanently, which they don't.


This is what you stated:
Homo Sapiens has always been out of balance with its environment. We evolved down a unique path - that of a generalist with a large brain whose sole survival strategy is to dominate and manipulate its environment in ways that no other animal could ever do. The most primitive societies still in existence - the hunter-gatherers of the Amazon and the Bushmen in Africa - live in semi-permanent settlements. They spend a few weeks in one place, strip the forest of anything they can use, then move on somewhere else. This *IS* our place in the ecosystem. We have no other. Living in balance with the rest of the local ecosystem simply isn't what we evolved to do. So in order to live sustainably, don't we have to try to become something that we aren't, and never have been?


You stated "strip the forest of anything they can use", which is obviously false, they do not kill every animal they do not harvest all the available wodd, fish out every single fish, they do not 'strip' even all the food resources.
They hunt and gather what they can gather easily and then they move on, your statement implies that they are 'strippings the forest of anything they can use', what they can use and what they take are considerably different sets.

Then there is this really majot statement:
"Living in balance with the rest of the local ecosystem simply isn't what we evolved to do.", you have not presented much about how hunter gathering societies live out of balance yet and you go on to just assert that.

Why not demonstrate your premise that HG groups are out of balance , I would assume you mean destructive to the biome in some way. In that they damage the biota and alleged balance of nature.

You did not demonstrate that. You did not satte that they would be out out of balance if they stayed in one place, now did you?





ME WANT SEX WITH GIRLS.

Please do not try to convince me that my sex-drive is learned behaviour. It is not.

The sensations of arousal are biological, as are many of the triggers. the behaviors in response to the sensations are learned. they are not hard wired. i am not denying the role of biology, I beleive myself (without evidence) in subtle imprinting and chemical attraction. But if human sexuality were hard wired, all sexual behavior would occur exactly the same for all members of the set given the appropriate stimulus.

Seriously the sexual behavior of butterflies is exactly the same for all butterflies of the species. The patroling of the males is the same, the response to the phermone trigger is the same. the responses of the females is the same. It is hard wired into their little nervous systems.


Just out of interest, do you believe it is possible to train all homosexual humans to be heterosexual?

Not what i said is it, i asked you for an example of a hard wired behavior.
I am addressing the ones you have brought up.


According to your theory, it ought to be possible to take any six-week-old human and, via the correct conditioning and training, to ensure that that individual grows up to be gay.

Not what I said either.

Regardless of the fact that it would be totally immoral to try such an experiment, I'm fairly certain it would fail anyway. It might work in some cases, but in most it would either fail completely or cause all sorts of undesirable psychological side-effects. There is at least one very unfortunate case which proves this is true - the case of an individual whose penis was accidentally destroyed when he was a toddler and was subsequently given surgery and brought up as a girl. According to the idiotic psychological theories of the time, this would be fine, because sexuality is learned behaviour. It was an abject failure. The child was never happy as a girl and always knew that something was badly wrong.

Oh, a single case study, that is great, isn;t it.

describe a 'hard wired behavior'.


You are claiming that it ALL complex human behaviour is down to nurture, and none of it is nature.


You said 'hard wired behavior', attraction is not exactly a behavior (except under radical behaviorism), I said biology has an influence but there are no hard wired sexual behaviors in humans, we don't engage is stereotypic sexual behaviors.

That is my point, you can have biology without it being 'hard wired', wiring is different than programming. A light bulb that is not broken will go on when the switch is thrown. What happens after the light turns on is not programmed in humans it is learned.


Unlike mating behaviors in certain animals (male cats for example, many fish and birds) where the behaviors are programmed into the brain structure of the animal, they can not choose to change that behavior, all members of the species capable of response to the stimuli will respond to it with the same set of nuerologically driven behaviors. This is not true of humans.

[Dancing David]

Now, my friend, it is you who is avoiding answering questions. Of course humans aren't jack russell terriers. But some of their behaviour really is hard-wired, and so is some of ours. The only question is which behaviours are hard-wired and which are not. Your answer, at least in the case of humans, appears to be, "none are hard-wired." I believe this claim to be not only incorrect, but absurd.

That si because I have not said that stimuli and sensation are not 'hard functions' of the human species. However the behavioral responses to the sensations are learned.

If the behavior was determined by biology them our sexual patterns would be the same, they are biologically driven but they are not biologically determined, unlike creatures that do have 'hard wired behaviors'.

How does a baby human eat? Does it know how? Does a toddler know what food is and how to walk? Some ungulates and the like are capable of walking within an hour of birth, that is a hard wired behavioral reponse in their brains. Humans don't. Now human babies will root if you rub the side of their face with someting especially near the mouth, that is the 'rooting response' and it is hard wired. But it fades at six weeks.

[UndercoverElephant]

David,

I am sorry, but as far as I am concerned this discussion is both (a) off topic and (b) utterly ridiculous. I have no idea how or why you ended up believing what you do on this subject, and I don't care either. You are, unfortunately, in the same boat as the people who thought that removing the damaged penis of a small boy and bringing him up as a girl would be a success, because, after all, it is all learned behaviour. They were talking ******** and so are you.

Good day.

Please do not circumvent the autocensor. Thank you.

[quarky]

Of course, be nice to your siblings, don't take more than you need, share what you have, everything for the colony.

But the fungus, the bacteria and the ants are fortunate accidents, we can do it on purpose.

"Fortunate accident" is a poor wording for the lives of super organisms.

We can do it on 'purpose', may be true, but we haven't managed to yet.
The ants do population control, and some genetic engineering.
We're still bashing and crashing.

[Dancing David]

David,

I am sorry, but as far as I am concerned this discussion is both (a) off topic and (b) utterly ridiculous. I have no idea how or why you ended up believing what you do on this subject, and I don't care either. You are, unfortunately, in the same boat as the people who thought that removing the damaged penis of a small boy and bringing him up as a girl would be a success, because, after all, it is all learned behaviour. They were talking ******** and so are you.

Good day.

I see that you still haven't learned the rules of the forum or of debate.

You presented a number of notions and I called you on the lack of evidence, I in fact quoted your statements that I thought were questionable. I explained how I feel about the biology and what hard wired behaviors are. (Such as how humans learn to walk as oppsed to some animals thatw alk very shortly after birth.)

Your ability to defend your own ideas and statements is lacking, that is no excuse for being pouty and making bad analogies.

BTW My quote of your post has been altered to conform with forum rules.

I do not defend whatever people you are talking about, I also asked you for examples of hard wired behavior and then countered what little you did offer.

[Dancing David]

"Fortunate accident" is a poor wording for the lives of super organisms.

We can do it on 'purpose', may be true, but we haven't managed to yet.
The ants do population control, and some genetic engineering.
We're still bashing and crashing.
Would you agree with 'happenstance' if you don't like accident.

[UndercoverElephant]

The result of this poll is very interesting from my POV. It's not scientific - the respondents are primarily American, which skews it in one way, but also anti-religious and pro-scientific, which skews it another. Nearly half the people who voted think that life is going to get harder. I'm willing to bet that if I'd started this poll a few years ago...before 9/11, hurricane Katrina and the financial crisis...that less than a quarter would have said that life was going to get worse, maybe even far fewer than that.

I think it is also interesting how many people are crammed into one section - the one that admits serious problems but still thinks life for the average human being is going to improve. I'd be interested in any suggestions as to why that is the most popular choice.

I'd also be willing to bet that if I start a similar poll at the end of 2012, more than 75% will think life is going to get harder.

[Cynic]

The result of this poll is very interesting from my POV. It's not scientific - the respondents are primarily American, which skews it in one way, but also anti-religious and pro-scientific, which skews it another. Nearly half the people who voted think that life is going to get harder. I'm willing to bet that if I'd started this poll a few years ago...before 9/11, hurricane Katrina and the financial crisis...that less than a quarter would have said that life was going to get worse, maybe even far fewer than that.

I think it is also interesting how many people are crammed into one section - the one that admits serious problems but still thinks like for the average human being is going to improve. I'd be interested in any suggestions as to why that is the most popular choice.

I'd also be willing to bet that if I start a similar poll at the end of 2012, more than 75% will think life is going to get harder.


I dunno -- pre 9/11, the environment was the topic of conversation in America, with Al Gore and all that. As for rest, I think that makes sense. We recognize that the same resource usage and technology that is "dooming" the planet is doing so based on a goal of improving the lives of the people that use it. As expectations of improved standards of living continue to trickle down from industrial to third-word regions (indeed, as third-world regions become industrial), the life of the "average human being" will improve, even as we continue to struggle with environmental issues. But I expect that as our backs are to the wall, we'll find ways to balance it out so that higher standards of living can coincide with sustainablity.

It's just going to take thousands of years. ;-)

[UndercoverElephant]

I dunno -- pre 9/11, the environment was the topic of conversation in America, with Al Gore and all that. As for rest, I think that makes sense. We recognize that the same resource usage and technology that is "dooming" the planet is doing so based on a goal of improving the lives of the people that use it. As expectations of improved standards of living continue to trickle down from industrial to third-word regions (indeed, as third-world regions become industrial), the life of the "average human being" will improve, even as we continue to struggle with environmental issues. But I expect that as our backs are to the wall, we'll find ways to balance it out so that higher standards of living can coincide with sustainablity.

It's just going to take thousands of years. ;-)

When the original industrial revolution happened, in England, life did not improve for the "worker ants" of the system. It improved for the top half of the pyramid, because they were the ones who had enough money to purchase the newly-available goods at lower-than-previous prices, and at least a bit of spare time to enjoy them. The workers would have been lucky to be able to purchase cotton undergarments (big improvement on linen) to make their 14-hour shifts at the newly-built mills and factories a little more comfortable. When we look at the industrialising world today, we see exactly the same thing.

IMO...

The golden age of western civilisation lasted almost exactly half a century. It began at the end of WWII and began to end when the world trade centre came tumbling down.

Interesting times.

[quarky]

Would you agree with 'happenstance' if you don't like accident.

I like "complex bio-feedback mechanism" better, if your cool with it.

[Dancing David]

I like "complex bio-feedback mechanism" better, if your cool with it.

Sure because I meant the original conjunction of ants, fungus and bacteria was accidental or happenstance.