Will our 'animal instincts' always prevent 'progress'?

[Brainaddict]

A simplistic question I know (hence the quotation marks) and we've discussed similar things before, but I find myself thinking that's the way things are more and more these days - we have all these animalistic responses to stuff - sex, violence and so on - and though a few people seem to be able to suppress them, it's always only a few (who for all we know don't have the relevant chemicals as strongly in the first place).

I'm not suggesting all 'animal instincts' are bad btw, but sometimes they create appropriate responses and sometimes they create really inappropriate responses.

I realise 'progress' is also a ridiculous word to use but it's just shorthand for whether we can ever stop wars, feed everyone, stop killing the planet etc.

Okay, I think there's a question still there after all that qualification

 

[Fruitloop]

I think what needs to happen is the creation of a society that fosters the better instincts (co-operation, kinship, empathy etc) and suppresses the bad ones. Unfortunately the culture that we have at the moment does more or less the opposite.

Sadly, I don't think it's really likely that there will be significant social change on the timescale that's required.

 

[Brainaddict]

I think what needs to happen is the creation of a society that fosters the better instincts (co-operation, kinship, empathy etc) and suppresses the bad ones.

Sounds a bit Freudian.

Besides, who decides which are the good and bad instincts, and how do you deal with instincts that are good in the right place (say the instinct to defend your family) and bad in the wrong place (defending the honour of your country instead)?

 

[Fong]

Greed can be an animalistic instinct, but tends to revolve around predators mostly. We have suppresed other animal instincts. I think we can repress greed eventually.

Doubt it will happen in my life time, but not impossible.

 

[Brainaddict]

Greed can be an animalistic instinct, but tends to revolve around predators mostly. We have suppresed other animal instincts. I think we can repress greed eventually.

Doubt it will happen in my life time, but not impossible.

Name an animal instinct we used to have that we have now suppressed.

 

[Thora_v1]

Sounds a bit Freudian.

Besides, who decides which are the good and bad instincts, and how do you deal with instincts that are good in the right place (say the instinct to defend your family) and bad in the wrong place (defending the honour of your country instead)?

A lot of those instincts are fed and moulded by the powers that be for their own ends though - patriotism/nationalism for example. I don't think killing for your country is a "natural" urge.

 

[Fruitloop]

Sounds a bit Freudian.

Besides, who decides which are the good and bad instincts, and how do you deal with instincts that are good in the right place (say the instinct to defend your family) and bad in the wrong place (defending the honour of your country instead)?

I was thinking more of Jung actually, specifically the Shadow self. There's a lot of stuff in our primate heritage that needs to be 'put away' for society to function, and one of the constant dangers for any society is the sudden irruption of these forces into the social order, which I guess is why most cultures that you can think of have some sort of safety valve that stops things boiling over (carnival, bacchic ritual, even Purim).

One of the reasons for the enduring attraction of fascism is that it yokes instinctive behaviour that would be better suppressed to state ends, offering the tempting but ultimately illusory prospect of social integration without the cost of having to repress destructive urges.

 

[kyser_soze]

I realise 'progress' is also a ridiculous word to use but it's just shorthand for whether we can ever stop wars, feed everyone, stop killing the planet etc.

AHHH...but is war not necessarily progress of a sort sometimes, esp if it excises elements of human society, or disease, that would hold us back? I mean I'd say that medcine, esp preventative medcine and vaccinations etc is a form or warfare on ill health.

At root is the question is 'what is it to be human' - when we look at a kewtickle pikchure on cuteoverload and go 'awwwww', that's an animal, not rational reaction.

Look at Star Trek - all the Alien species are simply elements of humans and 'How can we be better' - the Klingons are all warfare and fighting BUT also have an incredible sense of honour; the Vulcans supress their emotions and are all logic because they would otherwise have destroyed themselves, but lack insight in situations that cannot be resolved by the needs of the many/needs of the few argumnt or logic.

I use Trek as an example because it's simply a retelling of older tales and one that I can draw deep examples on, but the same stories go back to the tales of Gods and all that.

So...is the animal part of us fundamental to what makes us human, or is there something more, a human-human that wouldn't have what even some human cultures believe is a sentimental attachment to this physical plane?

 

[dada]

sometimes i wonder should we suppress our animal instincts? of course, if not we'd all be in chaos. but our biological structures state otherwise, such explain why men cheat more often than women.

 

[Brainaddict]

A lot of those instincts are fed and moulded by the powers that be for their own ends though - patriotism/nationalism for example. I don't think killing for your country is a "natural" urge.

Well it's one outlet of your natural urges. I mean, I guess we evolved in small community groups that had to defend themselves, so now that gets transferred to the national level. Obviously the problem wouldn't exist without the artificial construct of the state, but that still leaves you with the problem of which constructs should we allow and who decides, and how do we know whether they will channel 'destructive' instincts until we've set them up, by which time it's too late?

 

[Brainaddict]

So...is the animal part of us fundamental to what makes us human?

I'd say yes with some certainty, but I guess more from life experience than from any 'objective' criteria.

 

[kyser_soze]

I don't think killing for your country is a "natural" urge.

No, but killing for you family would be if it was under dire threat - and there are socialisation effects to make you think that your country is the extension of your family - and I would imagine that were you alive at the time of WWII you would feel very differently that the idea of going to fight for your country would mean.

And don't forget that socialisation does have positive benefits - while I realise that anarchists such as yourself feel an affinity for the whole globe as being one giant 'family' unit, for many (I would suspect most) people this is not something they are able to do either intellectually or emotionally.

Personally I don't think it's something anyone can do - to genuinely feel the same degree of loss and pain for the death of everyone who died in the Tsunami, or in the Concentration camps as one would feel for the loss of a family member of friend?

 

[Agent Sparrow]

Look at Star Trek - all the Alien species are simply elements of humans and 'How can we be better' - the Klingons are all warfare and fighting BUT also have an incredible sense of honour; the Vulcans supress their emotions and are all logic because they would otherwise have destroyed themselves, but lack insight in situations that cannot be resolved by the needs of the many/needs of the few argumnt or logic.

I use Trek as an example because it's simply a retelling of older tales and one that I can draw deep examples on, but the same stories go back to the tales of Gods and all that.

So...is the animal part of us fundamental to what makes us human, or is there something more, a human-human that wouldn't have what even some human cultures believe is a sentimental attachment to this physical plane?

Yup, surely our emotional "weaknessess" and negative base instincts can also be seen as our strenghts in a different context. If we lost jealousy and possessiveness then we'd also surely lose love? And emotions such as anger aren't necessarily all bad either - on an individual scale they tell us when something is wrong and needs to be changed, on a societal scale they've driven people and groups to seek change for the benifit of the group.

I think Fruitloop has a point - we could use society to try and help socialise people into using our base instincts for things that benifit the whole rather than are detrimental to it.

 

[Thora_v1]

No, but killing for you family would be if it was under dire threat - and there are socialisation effects to make you think that your country is the extension of your family - and I would imagine that were you alive at the time of WWII you would feel very differently that the idea of going to fight for your country would mean.

And don't forget that socialisation does have positive benefits - while I realise that anarchists such as yourself feel an affinity for the whole globe as being one giant 'family' unit, for many (I would suspect most) people this is not something they are able to do either intellectually or emotionally.

Personally I don't think it's something anyone can do - to genuinely feel the same degree of loss and pain for the death of everyone who died in the Tsunami, or in the Concentration camps as one would feel for the loss of a family member of friend?

Neither do I. What I was trying to say is that the instinct to protect loved ones is subverted by the state etc to persuade people to die and kill on the behalf of various competing ruling factions.

 

[deeplight]

Im not sure that it is so much a matter of suppression though undoubtedly that is what most of us do myself included more often than not.

Acceptance is the key here I think. Yes there are those parts of ourself and yes some of them do get in the way of certain things. If they are accepted though they can be let go of. To be honest this can only happen when we are happy and contented enough to fill the gap left by something positive.

Im not sure that I agree with the assumption that all of these animal parts of us get in the way of progress though. The sexual urge to take one example can be sated without causing over population thanks to contraception now.

Anger also can be directed in a positive manner. After all thats where most activism comes from. Im sure Gandi was angry about the British colonialisation of India but he handled things in a perfectly non violent manner.

In the end is it not also the case that our shadow sides can be harnessed to serve the greater good or at the very least nullified without ill effect.

 

[Fruitloop]

Well it's one outlet of your natural urges. I mean, I guess we evolved in small community groups that had to defend themselves, so now that gets transferred to the national level. Obviously the problem wouldn't exist without the artificial construct of the state, but that still leaves you with the problem of which constructs should we allow and who decides, and how do we know whether they will channel 'destructive' instincts until we've set them up, by which time it's too late?

Destructive from whose point of view, though? Society (taken to mean the broad mass of people, numerically speaking) has a lot to lose from peak oil and climate change, but powerful elites will most likely be able to profit from it and further secure their strangehold on resources. I think you need an awareness of class structure to understand why society appears to visit its destructive urges on itself.

 

[kyser_soze]

Im not sure that it is so much a matter of suppression though undoubtedly that is what most of us do myself included more often than not.

I'm sure AS will correct me on this, but our brains subconsciously supress vast quantities of information and reaction to that information with our awareness anyway (one of my personal theories on acid is that it releases the inbuilt censors for things like sight, sound and touch that we need to suppress for basic survival - after all while staring at a strawberry for an hour going 'OOOOOO it's SOOOOO PRIDDY' as one is wont to on acid isn't much use for survival if you forget to eat the damn thing!!!)

Deeplight - just a questions, but ae you more biased towards arts or sciences when it comes to human behaviour? You seem to be more from an arts and philosophy approach rather than science. Not saying one is 'better' than the other - my own position is that because our understanding of our psycho-biological selves is still in it's infancy, our understanding of how we behave as socio-biological creatures will be flawed - hence the repetitious failures of popuar revolutions to deliver on their iniital promises and usually land the peasants/working class in as bad/worse a situation than before - or at least in one that while removing some old terrors and injustices (e.g. Cossacks murdering peasants for fun or insulting the Tsar) for new ones (apparatchiks arresting and torturing because you insult them/make 'counter revolutionary' speeches).

 

[Brainaddict]

Destructive from whose point of view, though? Society (taken to mean the broad mass of people, numerically speaking) has a lot to lose from peak oil and climate change, but powerful elites will most likely be able to profit from it and further secure their strangehold on resources. I think you need an awareness of class structure to understand why society appears to visit its destructive urges on itself.

I certainly think hierarchy has a lot to do with our instincts being used badly, and sometimes class yes, but I don't think that's the fundamental issue.

For instance, mostly people have instinctive sexual jealousy, and to a greater or lesser extent we have the instinct to spread our genes around - the clash of the two causes much misery between sexual partners. This isn't a class or even hierarchy issue - it's just always going to be there.

 

[Thora_v1]

I certainly think hierarchy has a lot to do with our instincts being used badly, and sometimes class yes, but I don't think that's the fundamental issue.

For instance, mostly people have instinctive sexual jealousy, and to a greater or lesser extent we have the instinct to spread our genes around - the clash of the two causes much misery between sexual partners. This isn't a class or even hierarchy issue - it's just always going to be there.

Are you sure though? Other cultures organise their sexual and family relationships very differently to ours - is possessiveness and sexual jealousy more prevalant in western society? I think you can easily get onto dodgy ground when you start talking about "human nature".

 

[kyser_soze]

There is also the question of whether or not there is a hierarchical instinct in human groups as there are in other animals - is an ape or lion 'socialised' into wanting to become an alpha male and get all the ladies, or is it more basic than that? Do the differences in sexual intra-sex sexual competition represent pure socialisation or are they socialised manifestations of pre-existing biological impulses?

 

[kyser_soze]

Other cultures organise their sexual and family relationships very differently to ours - is possessiveness and sexual jealousy more prevalant in western society

Easy answer - find any society that practices period-based monogomy (i.e. couple pairings over a defined time period. In the JCI societies this is a life bond in theory, in others it could be a year) and if there is some form of punishment for adulterous behaviour.

Or just go around finding out whether people in different cultures who pair bond get pissed if their parnet fucks someone else.

My guess from my own travelling experience is that 'possesiveness' (not the beswt term to use in this context) and sexual jealousy are not exclusive to the West.

 

[deeplight]

Deeplight - just a question, but are you more biased towards arts or sciences when it comes to human behaviour? You seem to be more from an arts and philosophy approach rather than science.

I aspire to be as balanced as possible really kyser but my knowledge is probably more on the arts and philosophy side of things. Though I did once read a book called the power of the subconcious mind written by some bloke with 3 doctrates.

My belief is balance in all things will get us somewhere close to the truth. Somewhere between spirituality and science is what Im looking for. In practice I end up leaning towards spirituality not least because I feel I often have to come to its defence with so many empiricists about.

 

[Agent Sparrow]

I'm sure AS will correct me on this, but our brains subconsciously supress vast quantities of information and reaction to that information with our awareness anyway

Yup, you just couldn't function if you took everything in. Before it even gets a chance to hit our consciousness certain things would be filtered out, especially if we don't expect them to be there (which is why we are so good at effectively not seeing what we don't want to see). Of course we can see some of these things by adapting our attention (i.e. from switching our attention from the garden as a whole and by concentrating on the individual strawberry, like an artist might do if they wanted to recreate it), but there will still be things we miss out, like for example a slug approaching the stem at the edge of our periphial vision. Likewise we don't see black everytime we blink.

Of course the flip side of this is that we're very good at completing half images without knowing that we're doing it. If bits are missing our subconsious processes will fill in the gaps based on prior experience. In fact I think the way we process blinking also relies on this completion mechanism. I wish I could go into more detail but unfortunately it's been a while and perception was never my strong point.

On top of this considering some neuropsychological theories which suggest that consciousness is more or less an illusion, the most extreme of these making the idea of free will quite unlikely (I think the extreme theories have now been discredited but definately we still have less free will than we think) and really we seem more and more like the animals we've only just evolved from being anyway, which isn't really surprising.

 

[Brainaddict]

There is also the question of whether or not there is a hierarchical instinct in human groups as there are in other animals - is an ape or lion 'socialised' into wanting to become an alpha male and get all the ladies, or is it more basic than that? Do the differences in sexual intra-sex sexual competition represent pure socialisation or are they socialised manifestations of pre-existing biological impulses?

This is a very important question I think, and one that psychologists (if they are going to be any good to us ) should be able to answer at some point.

 

[Agent Sparrow]

<double post>

 

[Agent Sparrow]

This is a very important question I think, and one that psychologists (if they were any good ) should be able to answer.

Tbh it's a pretty difficult question to answer because it's hard enough to control for genetic and social factors when you're talking about individuals - when you're talking about a whole species it's near impossible!

The answer most likely to be true is "a bit of both" though unfortunately that tends to get called as a cop out.

*awaits Hollis*

 

[Brainaddict]

Are you sure though? Other cultures organise their sexual and family relationships very differently to ours - is possessiveness and sexual jealousy more prevalant in western society? I think you can easily get onto dodgy ground when you start talking about "human nature".

Good point, but in my mind this should be the realm of research, not of ideology. Now I know that research can't be entirely ideology-free but that doesn't mean it can't be useful.

For instance a quick search turned up this page;
http://www.pitt.edu/~ethnolog/winter02.html

which has this:

MANAGING INFIDELITY: A CROSS-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

William Jankowiak
M. Diane Nell
Anne Buckmaster

Anthropologists have not systematically examined extramarital affairs. Our cross-cultural study found that within every culture men and women actively resort to mate-guarding tactics to control their mate's extramarital behavior. A person's level of interest and involvement does not change with a culture's notion of descent, level of social complexity, or the degree to which a culture is normatively permissive or restrictive in sexual matters. In effect, sexual propriety is the presumed right of both sexes. Our findings are consistent with both the sexual jealousy and the pair-bond hypotheses, which hold that every marriage or love relationship is organized around a presumption of sexual propriety. (Extramarital affair, pair bond, sexual jealousy, human universal)

I dont' know anything about the people who wrote this paper, and I certainly wouldn't draw conclusions until I'd investigated fully and seen more research, but my point is we dont' have to sit around and make guesses (usually based on ideology) about how prevalent sexual jealousy is.

 

[kyser_soze]

On top of this considering some neuropsychological theories which suggest that consciousness is more or less an illusion, the most extreme of these making the idea of free will quite unlikely (I think the extreme theories have now been discredited but definately we still have less free will than we think) and really we seem more and more like the animals we've only just evolved from being anyway, which isn't really surprising.

Reading Pinkers book is drawing me to the same conclusion - that what we think of as 'consciousness' is in fact a 'Directors Cut' of reality, and our behaviour in that reality is very much down to how that 'director' has been socialised and what was there to socialise in the first place (i.e. their genes)

 

[Agent Sparrow]

Reading Pinkers book is drawing me to the same conclusion - that what we think of as 'consciousness' is in fact a 'Directors Cut' of reality, and our behaviour in that reality is very much down to how that 'director' has been socialised and what was there to socialise in the first place (i.e. their genes)

The thing is that I'm not so "we have no free will" as some of the really extreme theorists (I wouldn't want to go into my chosen career if I did), but I do believe that most of our "conscious" decisions have actually already been made in our subconsious, or at least that our conscious has only been offered limited choices. However, I think consciousness is closely linked to attention, and that by having some control over what we attend to we can then personally influence our on going socialisation (e.g. a person going to therapy is increasing their socialisation to help them see things in a different way to which they did before).

I like your analogy of a directors cut, but I'm not sure if it really captures the bi-directional nature of this relationship, i.e. your consciousness can still effect what is placed into your subconscious, so perhaps our consciousness is more like an old style editor of a manuscript, with limited revisions being possible, but the bulk still coming from elsewhere.

<edit> unless you meant the whole direction process is the conscious, but then perhaps that's giving too much freedom to the conscious...

 

[gorski]

Human beings have NO instincts!!

Define them and you'll see...

Do NOT mix with reflexes etc.

Be careful - what is socially learnt does not qualify! By definition...