Philosophy of human civilization

[Lonesomebri]

Silly Burner, you wanted the Mussolini train.

I vant Z train.

I'm gonna keep pushing on regardless of Camp A or Camp Z.

[theCryptofishist]

Silly Burner, you wanted the Mussolini train.

I vant Z train.

I'm gonna keep pushing on regardless of Camp A or Camp Z.

So, you vant Z train, but you'll "take the A train?"

[Elorrum]

If you miss the A Train: You'll find you've missed the quickest way to Harlem.

[BBadger]

Scary thing is.... I believe we HAVE passed our peak as a civilization, and that happened very recently when we invented medicine and sanitation and ways to keep most people from being eaten by animals, and thus eliminated the natural ways the stupidest were kept from growing up to reproduce.
Now we go out of our way to keep the stupidest alive to reproduce like flies. As a society we are down-breeding ourselves.
It is most frightening every time I realize the stupidities I am "capable" of myself.

Only if you're equating "stupidity" (code for inferiority) to lack of means or opportunity. Gotta get out of that Puritan mindset, Elliot. Perceived blessings on earth do not necessarily imply virtue or intelligence.

Anyway, if you're a fan of directing mankind's progress to some set genetic purpose, don't leave it up to "nature" to do the work: nature doesn't know "best" because nature doesn't care. That's just a cop-out anyway -- said by those who don't have the stones to just come out and say that they'd prefer degenerates to be dead. So let's cut the shit and just come out and say it: 1) only humans can determine what is best desired for mankind's future, and 2) humans must be proactive if they want to achieve some specific species goal -- and that implies eugenics. GOOD + GENETICS! Yes, that's right. The "stupid" and the weak-who-would-fall-to-common-diseases get weeded out; the strong (by whatever metric you choose) get to live.

Why stop at just preventing breeding? After all, it's not just a degenerate's children that are the burden, but the degenerates as well. A current burden is still a burden that prevents meaningful growth. Let's not delay! We have a job to do!

B-b-but ... HITLER!

Naw, we're not being Hitler! He had some delusions about race and religion, and other nonsense. We're past that. We know better. We're basing all this on verifiable metrics: poverty. After all, the fact that you're not well-off implies that you're less capable, and the poor have always been disproportionately susceptible to disease (ignoring those inbreeding diseases of the royalty). This poverty has, in fact, benefited us -- at least in our goal by indicating the less worthy, and the less intelligent. After all, they're in poverty because they're stupid. It's why poverty is a self-perpetuating cycle. It's like they're a separate species (not race though!) So why not break that cycle by gassing, or just enslaving those poor people? Enslaving might be a better choice, as it will relieve us homo superiors of the burden of doing menial tasks beneath our position. We'll have them build pyramids to our honor or something. Something virtuous.

So HELL YEAH, we'll achieve that singular civilized society even yet!

[theCryptofishist]

We better get all those people in wheelchairs, too. Whiners. Thinking they have some sort of dignity, or something.

[Box Burner]

EDITED TO ADD, FOR FULL DISCLOSURE: I find that a lot of people are really stupid.

This is particularly true when you consider how stupid the average person is, and half the population is even more stupid than that.

Now, there's something we can agree on!
Scary thing is.... I believe we HAVE passed our peak as a civilization, and that happened very recently when we invented medicine and sanitation and ways to keep most people from being eaten by animals, and thus eliminated the natural ways the stupidest were kept from growing up to reproduce.
Now we go out of our way to keep the stupidest alive to reproduce like flies. As a society we are down-breeding ourselves.
It is most frightening every time I realize the stupidities I am "capable" of myself.

Some of the reading I have done suggests that the human body actually is healthier and functions better when you are not too comfortable and a little hungry. And that this decline began with the advent of agriculture. Agriculture changed everything. What we ate, how we got it, and how we dealt with other people. Ownership of property (land, and then the technology to improve it) was invented and it became not only easier to treat other people like shit but fashionable too. Now look where we are.

[Lonesomebri]

We better get all those people in wheelchairs, too. Whiners. Thinking they have some sort of dignity, or something.

I'm gonna have to wait until the consensus is in from the more civilized before I can go along with this, but if they give the go ahead, we are all happy!
Heck, some nice young man in a clean uniform helping me on A train, here I am in rags and uncouth, he's mentoring me as it were, helping to speed along the civilization, or at least someone's definition of it, of humanity. What are a few bumps along the way?


FYI: I am not Badgers puppet, but sometimes... I wish I were.

[Elliot]

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Well put, BBadger. And Box Burner, I like the invention of agriculture as a tipping point.

When I started this, I did not dream of so much good input!

Now, this thought: Might we say Burning Man is an embodiment of Hypothesis A? Or -- since I must allow for radical inclusiveness -- at least a good portion of us like to think of it that way?

[ygmir]

I'm struggling with the polarization. a or z, still not seeing much in the middle.

[Box Burner]

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Well put, BBadger. And Box Burner, I like the invention of agriculture as a tipping point.

When I started this, I did not dream of so much good input!

Now, this thought: Might we say Burning Man is an embodiment of Hypothesis A? Or -- since I must allow for radical inclusiveness -- at least a good portion of us like to think of it that way?

I think that is a fair assessment. At least it seems so to me. If you stripped burning man to the core and laid it over civilization before the advent of agriculture you would see a very good and favorable comparison.

[Elliot]

Ygmir, certainly the ideal -- if there is an ideal in a world of radical inclusion -- is somewhere in the middle. Mother Teresa doesn't work real well, and neither does Mitt Romney (political aspect aside).

[Elliot]

I think that is a fair assessment. At least it seems so to me. If you stripped burning man to the core and laid it over civilization before the advent of agriculture you would see a very good and favorable comparison.

I suppose life before agriculture was pretty much a Z type world -- eat or be eaten, minute to minute. Wow, we are lucky!

[Box Burner]

I'm struggling with the polarization. a or z, still not seeing much in the middle.

I think there is only A or Z. Everything in the middle is just "maintenance" (for lack of a better word) to varying degrees.

[Elorrum]

I speak as a true genetically polluted degenerate who cheated selection, having been ejected from the womb two months early into the hands of modern western medicine. I have the dysfunctional expressions of traits that may have been honed evolutionarily for survival but for modern times, not so fine: A fight or flight adrenalin dumpout that makes that collared lizard running on his hind legs look calm; and an addictive nature that might have helped an ancestor find her next meal. You ask the people I work with, I can be a right awful bitch.

I think everyone has a story and a reason, and if we really heard them, our hearts would break. I have every right to be here, along with every other oxygen wasting animated meat sack. Something good could come of this. I guess I'm not much of a big picture type.

Props to bbadger for saying it plainly. Musing about who deserves this merry go round ride is akin to musing about killing. Great song, box.

[Box Burner]

I think that is a fair assessment. At least it seems so to me. If you stripped burning man to the core and laid it over civilization before the advent of agriculture you would see a very good and favorable comparison.

I suppose life before agriculture was pretty much a Z type world -- eat or be eaten, minute to minute. Wow, we are lucky!

No, I would say it was an A type world. If you look at some of the few primitive cultures of hunter/gatherers that still exist you will see that they share everything. There is a high degree co-operation among the members of the group. They do not think their lives are poor. they work together play together, eat well or go hungry together. These groups number about 150 to 200 members, which is about the maximum number of people that you can maintain stable relationships with. (see Dunbar's number. There were no cities with thousands of people living in their own filth.

[BBadger]

Some of the reading I have done suggests that the human body actually is healthier and functions better when you are not too comfortable and a little hungry. And that this decline began with the advent of agriculture. Agriculture changed everything. What we ate, how we got it, and how we dealt with other people. Ownership of property (land, and then the technology to improve it) was invented and it became not only easier to treat other people like shit but fashionable too. Now look where we are.

Oh right, let's go back to being hunter-gatherers. What a wonderful life they led. Instead of having predictable food sources we'll just raid the other village and take their food stocks. After all, that's what raiders and bandits do right? No place to call home, so they go take what others have created or fought for.

Nevermind that predictable food sources transformed humanity from a bunch of backwards tribals into actual civilizations. Nevermind that people would have something else to think about besides survival.

It seems like we have a segment of this board that naively seem to prefer dystopian societies because of poorly reasoned views of cause and effect.

You've got it all wrong. Why would a perfectly contented underling want to rebel? Who is going to be treating another like shit when you've got every need fulfilled? Even predators will ignore prey when they're not hungry. Paradise is a world without need.

The rulers of Saudi Arabia are trying to do this, but for other motives: keep your populace placated with oil wealth, remove all tools of power (such using expats to deny the populace of labor leverage), and your peoples will remain good and complacent. The last thing the Saudis want are some people looking for a Caliph to replace the monarchy. Treat 'em good, and they'll ignore the problems.

If you want to truly treat someone like shit, you will keep them down and deny them of opportunities. Hunger is a great weapon in that regard. Denying nourishment means that your pathetic little underlings will not only be obedient to the hand that feeds them, but will also remain weakened, and so will not rebel against your beneficence.

For entertainment, toss a piece of meat into the arena and promise more if the winner defeats the others. It's how you train dogs and other animals to fight. Men can definitely act like animals. Keep them hungry. Keep them uncomfortable. They'll grab at any opportunity they can. Deny them the plow so that they may take up the sword.

Now, this thought: Might we say Burning Man is an embodiment of Hypothesis A? Or -- since I must allow for radical inclusiveness -- at least a good portion of us like to think of it that way?

I used to think that about the event before I ever attended. That BM comprised a bunch of deluded, arrogant, myopic weirdos with no concept of the real world, or for that matter that their event relies on a functioning society -- i.e. dirty hippies, the salt of the earth. I thought I'd have to shoot down the ideas of bozos preaching on about their "grand vision of the world." I thought I'd be subjected to every last complaint about how the "man" was ruining the world -- but that the "dude" telling me this had no solutions.

Those were my thoughts. Probably some conflation of BM and the Rainbow Gathering. I never read anything, nor watched anything about the event prior to attending.

Then I actually attended and discovered that people at Burning Man are as in tune with how the real world operates as any other -- if not more. The best part for me? That people weren't building and creating stuff for Burning Man for the sake of some sort of ideal, but just to make something great -- in their own way -- for a week a year. That's right. Creation without the taint of ideals or trying to please or better everyone -- or the world.

To me, Burning Man is the antithesis of hypothesis A.

Burning Man is a place born out of disparate minds creating products of their own, unique visions to share with others, not pushing one single ideal of "civilized society."

The city starts out as a blank state and is populated within a week by thousands of little fiefdoms each with their own rules and standards. From a society standpoint, nothing is really different in BRC than the real world -- except we get to rebuild it again each year. BRC is beautiful for that reason -- for the same reason that humanity demonstrates its beauty in its diversity of ideas and ideals.



So Hypothesis A can go fuck itself. There is no creativity in the world of Hypothesis A. It's a degenerate, hive-minded society model representing something that cannot apply to "mankind" -- but often represents mankind's worst qualities.

[Simon of the Playa]

"i refuse to join a club that would have me as a member"

[cyberina]

I have been in so many weird places ,and most you get the "feeling" to be on your guard , these events do not instill that in me. As helping society ,well I still have only been trying to improve myself, and my family . But I found if I give smiles to everyone , I get them back ,and it feels great. thanks all ")

You are an amazing human being. Many people who have been faced with some of the harder life experiences you have just become more and more Z. Dare I even say most people do. Its an old adage that "that which does not kill you makes you stronger." It takes an incredible sense of self, and a well rounded sense of good and evil to be able to truly come out a BETTER, more well rounded, caring person after hardships... IMHO "stronger" does not mean "More me me me! F' U! All for ME!" Stronger means "I've got me down, and now I'm here to help you, too." When it comes down to it, life is reflective. What you put in is what you get back. "Karma" is not some spiritual force. Its human nature.

LIBERALLY SNIPPED QUOTING:
In 1944 there were 29 reindeer. In 1963 there were over 6,000. In 1965 there were 44 reindeer. By the 1980s there were 0 reindeer.

As far as the propensity for violence goes, I've always liked Lt. Col. David Grossman's take on things. Basically people can be separated out into three broad categories (though it IS a spectrum, not all-or-nothing). The first category are sheep. ...... Naturally, sheep have enemies, namely the wolves who prey on them.....
The third category are where I think you guys probably fit. Namely sheep dogs.

I also LOVE these analogies. Life is almost NEVER black and white (see my references to a sense of good and evil above).

I think that lack of touch is also a strain. I think we go crazy without it. (For a given value of crazy...) I think that the way prisons are designed (building and socially) drives people a little crazy.

YES, we DO go crazy without human touch. Its not a matter of lovey dovey cuddle monkies being all hippy and shit. Sure, that counts, but its more. Its the handshake. The pat on the back. Even the hand placed on a shoulder to say "Ahem, I'm trying to get through where you are currently standing." Any form of human touch generates hormonal response. Truly any. In most people, all non-aggressive contact generates happiness hormones. I firmly believe that is one part of why BM is so therapeutic for so very much people. Even outside of the hippy dippy, and the bacchanalian orgies, touching one another is widely accepted as something that you do there.

hey, I'm giving my all for the good of all you bastards and this is the thanks I get?

That's where the problem lies. The expectation that someone will get something real, and direct back in return for their good deed will set one up for disappointment every single time. The buddhists are onto something when they say that expectations are the cause of human suffering. Sometimes, "the thanks you get" are more thinly veiled and indirect.

Real life example for you:
Summer of '11, I found myself dragging a very out-of-their-mind intoxicated person out of an algae-filled canal because they really truly thought not only that they could breath under water, but that they absolutely had to do so. Had I not happened to notice that they had wandered into the not-swimmable water, and had gone under for FAR too long, that person would not be with us any longer.

Fast forward 2 years.

A misunderstanding between myself and some mutual "friends" of the person who's life I saved (but did not include the person who's life I saved outside of hearing the he-said-she-said) has caused the person who's life I saved to stop speaking to me. I cannot sit there and tear myself up over this and get all pissed off. "I saved your life, and in return you're feeding into this immature, irrational BULLSHIT that is causing my entire family strife?!?!" Instead, I have to think: Regardless of my position on this specific confict, this person has been personally responsible for a number of amazing things in the past 2 years. If I had not saved their life, they would not have been able to touch so many people in so many positive ways in the past 2 years. I can only hope that if there is a next time, since I won't be around, someone else will happen to notice the trouble they might be getting into.

EDITED TO ADD, FOR FULL DISCLOSURE: I find that a lot of people are really stupid.

This is particularly true when you consider how stupid the average person is, and half the population is even more stupid than that.

One of my favorite quotes of all time (although I no longer know who receives credit) deals with this. Groups of people follow the lowest common denominator for morality. My take on this is that whenever something is eating at an individual's conscience, there will be someone there to justify the bad behavior.

Scary thing is.... I believe we HAVE passed our peak as a civilization, and that happened very recently when we invented medicine and sanitation and ways to keep most people from being eaten by animals, and thus eliminated the natural ways the stupidest were kept from growing up to reproduce.
Now we go out of our way to keep the stupidest alive to reproduce like flies. As a society we are down-breeding ourselves.
It is most frightening every time I realize the stupidities I am "capable" of myself.

I agree with you that we're on a decline, though I don't think it was any one singular thing that put us there. To refer back to FossaFerox, if anything, I think its just that we're reaching maximum capacity... Overpopulation. Agriculture, medicine, and all sorts of other technologies come into play.

I joke that I choose my partners and friends based upon who I could survive the apocalypse with. There's a bit of truth in every joke. The downside to this selection method is that not all of those people are particularly adapted to society as it currently stands purely on the basis of trying (or refusing) to politic.

Anyway, if you're a fan of directing mankind's progress to some set genetic purpose, don't leave it up to "nature" to do the work: nature doesn't know "best" because nature doesn't care.

I'd MUCH rather leave it up to nature than society to decide who has what it takes for survival. I mean really.... Hitler has already come up enough in this conversation.... Let's take it to a modern situation, like LGBT issues for example. "Gays are why [insert anything bad at all anywhere in the world.]" REALLY?!?!?! Society has too much fear of the different, and is too prone to knee-jerk reactionism.






And my own answer to this whole question???? I choose neither A nor Z... I've already said it once, but its worth saying again... There is no black and white in good and evil. Everything is a grey area. There are moments where helping others will better suit you. There are others when helping one's self will better suit you. Do too much of one or the other, and you're setting yourself up for failure.

[cyberina]

PS: When I talk... I talk a lot. HI!

[Simon of the Playa]

talk is cheap.



lets see some titties.

[cyberina]

talk is cheap.

lets see some titties.

LOL!
Shoulda gotten your eyefull when I was changing clothes in BRC, neighbor.

Oh wait.. This must be a "further civilized society to their best ability" scenario A response. (If one does not enjoy the boobies, they can at least point and laugh)

You crack me up, sir.

[Lonesomebri]

That people weren't building and creating stuff for Burning Man for the sake of some sort of ideal, but just to make something great -- in their own way -- for a week a year.

I don't know about others, but when I hand out free drinks on the playa I expect the world to listen.
How disappointed I am when returning to the default world, saddling up to the bar, and having the bartender ask for money! Stupid Z Camp.

I like the middle ground of A to Z; I do what I think is right, I see it makes things better for me and others, that's what makes it the right thing to do. I'm not trying to impose my will, or my idea of civilization, on the unwashed masses, not playing martyr and saying, shish, this isn't working out the way I want, I quit. Not blaming all those others who don't share my views. Even if no one showed up at Black Rock but me, I'd still do LNT. It isn't some crusade for others.It's for me. The whole A-Z spectrum is based on Camp A defining what civilization, or advancement, or degenerates, or whatever is, declaring that high ground, and looking down on those who aren't sharing the same vision. And seriously, one more time, hasn't alot of damage been done by the more civilized trying to clean up the riff-raff, imposing order and "good", only able to see others as Camp Z, just lowlifes who don't care and should be swept away? Jeese, if you're debating whether to give up your ideals due to how others act, as the thread here seems to ask, maybe those ideals ain't worth having. Well, unless we can wave them around and show how enlightened we are.....

[Lonesomebri]

I'm pretty sure I know what camp this guy sees himself in-
http://gawker.com/lawmaker-wants-librar ... 1465144571

[tatonka]

I know love is the answer and cure for all , but I cannot turn the othe cheek very well

[Box Burner]

Some of the reading I have done suggests that the human body actually is healthier and functions better when you are not too comfortable and a little hungry. And that this decline began with the advent of agriculture. Agriculture changed everything. What we ate, how we got it, and how we dealt with other people. Ownership of property (land, and then the technology to improve it) was invented and it became not only easier to treat other people like shit but fashionable too. Now look where we are.

Oh right, let's go back to being hunter-gatherers. What a wonderful life they led. Instead of having predictable food sources we'll just raid the other village and take their food stocks. After all, that's what raiders and bandits do right? No place to call home, so they go take what others have created or fought for.

Did not say let's go back to being hunter/gatherers. Just said that how they live together compares favorably with the ideals of burning man.

You did not have anyone raiding villages until you had agriculture. Hunter/gatherers moved with their available food as the seasons changed and the herds moved. They did not have food stocks to raid.

Also did not say that agriculture was bad. Fire is good too. But if you let it get out of control it can burn down the forest. Then what are you gonna do?

[Aurelia]

Well said BoxB !

I am going to spend a few weeks watching over the place of some friends and will enjoy sleeping outside sometimes
full moon romorrow and special sky lights

May try to eat differently as well

Because I worked forest fires command post sometime ago .. I am wary of fire power
we were far less powerful

[tatonka]

You are an amazing human being. Many people who have been faced with some of the harder life experiences you have just become more and more Z. Dare I even say most people do. Its an old adage that "that which does not kill you makes you stronger." It takes an incredible sense of self, and a well rounded sense of good and evil to be able to truly come out a BETTER, more well rounded, caring person after hardships... IMHO "stronger" does not mean "More me me me! F' U! All for ME!" Stronger means "I've got me down, and now I'm here to help you, too." When it comes down to it, life is reflective. What you put in is what you get back. "Karma" is not some spiritual force. Its human nature.

Thanks I found getting away from people makes it easier to enjoy there company when I am around them . Here is a fishing spot I go to by the coast range. I lived on my own here for 5 mths after I got out of the service. Here I am cooking my lunch , 4 little fish a rainbow , and a cutthroat and two samon smelt.

[Aurelia]

Perfect !

in the days of having to feed the kids also took them down to catch and eat

[BBadger]

Did not say let's go back to being hunter/gatherers. Just said that how they live together compares favorably with the ideals of burning man.

If you're railing against agriculture you are talking about hunter-gatherers. Agriculture implies predictable food sources, which includes animal husbandry.

It also appears that you're one of those people who believe in the whole "noble savage" myth. The unsubstantiated belief that primitive cultures were somehow more noble, moral, or less inclined to violence. Well nothing is further from the truth.

The primitive world was just as violent, unfair, miserable, and even obsessed with material possessions and status. Even the cave paintings of these "noble savages" that you believe embrace these so-called "Burning Man ideals" depict the violence and victimization of other tribes and groups. And why should it not be? Even "lesser" animals will fight, mark their territory, make war on another, exile their own, and starve the weak. Primitive man did not strike up a perfect balance between animal and future society, but just continued the natural pattern of both. No agriculture was ever needed for an animal to wrong another animal, or a man to wrong another man.

You did not have anyone raiding villages until you had agriculture. Hunter/gatherers moved with their available food as the seasons changed and the herds moved. They did not have food stocks to raid.

Now you're victim-blaming. Oh right, the farmers caused the raiders to steal from them, just as Burning Man bicyclists cause bike thievery. Is this the logic you're pushing? These are some mixed up values you're describing.

Regardless, you don't need farms or bushels of wheat to steal and raid. No, instead of farms, you had tribes raiding other tribes for whatever they had! They'll go attack and steal another tribe's women, their weapons, their horses, their cattle. They'll burn their huts so that their victims can't do the same back to them. Protecting territory was also important: rich hunting grounds were an important resource to protect against other groups. You don't need a plow to encourage raids. You don't need land as "property." All you just need something of value and there will another to covet it.

That Dunbar's number you cite also has no bearing on people treating others like shit. People treat others like shit regardless of population size because they just don't like each other or have something to gain (which can be anything). A clique of three high school kids can bully a group of two; siblings torment each other even just for attention from their parents. The number only describes how large a group can be before individuals can maintain inter-personal relationships. It says nothing about how groups or persons interact with each other, which is the real determining factor in feuds, exploitation, and any other "bad thing" you might associate with human interaction.

Think about Burning Man: if the ideals and this event are to be held in such esteem, why are there so many dysfunctions at Burning Man -- this place where we have a clean slate, where we have no commerce, where we have a gifting economy and all our needs provided for us? Why do we still have MOOP? Or camp drama? Or people projecting their generator noise at other camps? Or people complaining about RVs? Why do these happen at all levels, even between small camps or close friends -- even over commodities such as personal space? Why? Because Burning Man is a creation of mankind. Because Burning Man is a society. Because Burning Man comprises a conglomeration of small groups that don't all agree with each other. Because that's how humans interact.

So drop these silly notions that the "noble savages of old" better represented the "ideals" at Burning Man. They were treating each other like shit long before recorded history. The only thing civilizations and technology enabled was writing to document some of it. We aren't any more violent now than we ever were -- we're just more aware of it. Let's get back to reality here. Let's get back to humanity. Stop deferring blame to agriculture, or sanitation, or race, or any other scapegoat-concept that humans use to ignore the fact and responsibility that humans are humans. There was never a decline, only a change. The ways humans interacted, however, remained the same. The only way to reduce the "bad things" humans do is to work on how humans choose to interact with each other.

[Savannah]

So drop these silly notions that the "noble savages of old" better represented the "ideals" at Burning Man. They were treating each other like shit long before recorded history. The only thing civilizations and technology enabled was writing to document some of it. We aren't any more violent now than we ever were -- we're just more aware of it. Let's get back to reality here. Let's get back to humanity. Stop deferring blame to agriculture, or sanitation, or race, or any other scapegoat-concept that humans use to ignore the fact and responsibility that humans are humans. There was never a decline, only a change. The ways humans interacted, however, remained the same. The only way to reduce the "bad things" humans do is to work on how humans choose to interact with each other.

Agreed. Man's inhumanity to man is as old as time itself. We're just aware of it now, communicating at lightning speed and able to document everything that happens 24 hours a day, and it's overwhelming and at times, awful. But human nature is what it always was. As a species we change slowly. Only technology has changed, and that's because we've been able to piggyback on the existing stuff and don't have to remake the wheel with every generation.