The horseshoe theory reminds me why it's better to identify as centrist...

submitted by radicalcentristNational Centrism from self.debatealtright

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[–]radicalcentristNational Centrism[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (11 children)

Are humans really just animals? I have my doubts. Humans have are, in contrast to animals, not fit for their environment. Great apes have big feet and other body parts, that help them in their environment. Humans also do not have these powerful teeth, that predator animals have to best kill other animals. There are tons of other reasons, but anyways, humans are imperfect for any environment and thus, need to transform nature via technology, need to develop language, etc. Something, that animals do not need to do. Since this is not our main question, I will leave this question with this comment. I already said, that

We don't need to do those things. We only do it, because our brain, A BIOLOGICAL ORGAN, gives us the ability to do so.

Our ape-like ancestors possessed these identical traits. The only thing they lacked in comparison to modern man was cranial capacity. But otherwise, we are animals. We evolved directly from them instead of showing up on this floating space rock randomly.

Sure, life will still exist without us. But the obvious question is: Do you care, if you humanity goes extinct? A purely scientific point of view will lead to Transhumanism. Hence, mankind will be replaced by some new species, cyborgs or however you want to call it. This is an essential part of my critique. There is no scientific reason for mankind to always exist. You yourself admit this, by stating:

If everyone of us dies tomorrow, that question becomes moot. We can only care about humanity for as long we actually exist. But if humanity goes extinct because of say... nuclear war, or the sun exploding, then our species will be viewed the exact same way as the dinosaurs. There was proof they once existed, but not anymore...

Edit: And to cast more doubt on spirituality, why is it even possible for a fragile species like Man to be allowed to go extinct in the first place? Surely no one here would be afraid of nukes going off if it meant we would all survive thanks to having faith? Except, everyone on Earth is afraid of the possibility of going extinct from such an event. There's no one outside of Earth who can stop it, unless we count aliens (ayy lmao).

This is the problem. You do not care for our existence to be preserved. The existence of us has no importance. Hence, I call it nihilism.

I do not believe we will become ghosts or spirits, who have the ability to watch over Earth and see our rotting corpses on the ground. We literally do not have that ability.

If you want to preserve humanity, you must do the following:

-Reproduce and have as many children as possible

-Create a civilization that can sustain itself and the planet

-Invest in technology that can reduce sickness, mortality and other things that can extend our lifespan

-Don't vote in genocidal or stupid leaders who can destroy the earth at a push of a button

That's it. Praying to a god or having faith that we will live forever in some kind of afterlife does nothing to preserve us. There is simply no evidence for this stuff, and it takes away precious resources from doing real work here on Earth, and while we're still alive before we succumb to old age and die like every animal in history.

[–][deleted]  (10 children)

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    [–]radicalcentristNational Centrism[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (9 children)

    Well, animals also have a brain. Apart from this, do you believe we would have survived the days of the neanderthal without technology? Do you believe we would have fought a mammoth with bare hands or what would have happened?

    There are plenty of humans today who don't depend on technology today. The Amish or Mennonite communities avoid electricity. Or go even more primitive and look at tribes in Africa.

    I do not that our larger brain capacity has enabled us to do more and affect our surroundings. But I don't exactly treat this as an argument for why we're still not animals. I still remember from Grade School science class on how we define living things. Do we eat? Do we need rest? Do we reproduce? We're clearly not robots or some inanimate object. In strict evolutionary terms, we are just higher Apes. And even if we couldn't win against the Mammoths, there were still other Humans scattered throughout the Earth. Similar to how Chimpanzees have remained the same because their environment was good enough for them, then Humans living in Africa or Asia would kept their primitive forms instead.

    Might be, even though I highly doubt, that they had any sort of (complex) language.

    It's not really "might". Look at any human evolution graph and the differences become quite small near the end. It's the size and shape of the head that basically defines modern humans.

    https://files.catbox.moe/vw1g9n.jpg

    Sure, but we do exist. Hence, the question whether we should try to preserve our existence.

    The obvious answer is yes, but the question was framed in a way that we somehow have control over this when we're extinct. I brought up the dinosaurs who lived their day to lives technically fighting their existence, until one day a volcano or asteroid wiped them all out and all that remains is their bones. They're not aware of their fate, despite at one time existing. The same is true with Humans. If we're all gone tomorrow, that's it. But we can do our best while we're still alive today...

    Fine, but what does the existence of us, call it our family, race, species or whatever have to do with ghosts and spirits? I get it, believing in any of this might influence some people to make more babies, but you can definitely make babies without believing in god, ghosts or spirits.

    See the previous paragraph. I do understand and believe in the idea of self-preservation. But as a concept, it only works when the animal actually exists in the present time and has control of their actions.

    I agree, these are great ideas to help our preservation. Even though we might ask ourselves, whether every possible technology should be used or whether some might have negative consequences.

    That's what left/right-wing debates in politics are for. Before it all got hijacked by race and multiculturalism, it was absolutely fair to question whether we pay too much taxes, or not enough. Should we fund more hospitals or the military?

    Life is a puzzle and for the past thousand years, humans have tried many kinds of civilizations in order to survive and pass down their genes. I would argue that we are living in the best times though, when technology is balanced in relation to our biological needs. Hence the biggest threat right now when it comes to preserving people, in particular race, is globalism and mass immigration.

    I just wanted to explore the question, whether radical empiricism is nihilistic and maybe whether nihilism is bad.

    I apologies for going off-topic but I'll reiterate that radical empiricism aims to explain how and why certain real life behaviors exists, and through the use of data and scientific studies, we can make choices or decisions that are in fact, better at preserving life as opposed to destroying it.

    In my OP, I had two examples that drove this point across. On the Left, it was the dogmatic claim that race differences don't exist and society should never question why certain patterns exist (i.e blacks failing school, blacks doing more crime, are seen as "systematic" problems and not genes or biological).

    But on the right, there where also certain government objectors who only put themselves in harms way because they had more faith a supernatural being can make better judgements or save them, as opposed to other and more smarter human leaders around them.

    [–][deleted]  (8 children)

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      [–]radicalcentristNational Centrism[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (7 children)

      All of these groups have houses (or something akin to this), use fire, have tools for hunting, etc. So yes, all of these people use technology.

      So what exactly is the disagreement? That technology doesn't make us animal or acts as something special? My reasoning is you can't have technology without the brain part. "But other animals have brains too!" Yes, but we also know throughout the animal kingdom, that complex brains and levels of intelligence are still distributed. I actually remember Octopus are the most interesting example. They have brains located in every arm. It wouldn't surprise me that they can actually process information better than humans, but because they don't have thumbs, they will never use their full potential.

      https://biogeoplanet.com/why-do-octopuses-have-9-brains-8-arms-3-hearts-and-blue-blood-surprising-facts/

      Yes, we are living things. But so are trees and you would not call them animals.

      Correct, but according to the theory of evolution, we all still share a common ancestor. Eukaryotes to be exact.

      But I think my point is obvious. What makes us animals is we share more in common with other living beings as opposed to a rock or robot. And this is important because we can only trace our ancestry to other species that were on this Earth, millions of years before. We didn't just show up randomly, other organisms had to exist first to spawn us.

      See, the mammoth is just an example. Fight against elephants, lions or something similar and you will face the same problems in other parts of the world.

      What happens to Humans who live around those creatures today? They either fight them, or run away. It doesn't mean Humans stop existing. Evolution is driven by environmental pressures and without pressure to change, we remain.

      Let us accept this for the sake of the argument. But which pre-human being is able to hold a serious discussion. Just showing some image of the head is somewhat weak evidence. Otherwise, there should be some sort of ape, which was to able to do it, right?

      I'll admit, I'm not actually an expert on how language first originated. Or what are the real capacities of an ape-like ancestor being able to hold a conversation to humans today. My only real life comparison is to look at studies done with Koko the Gorilla, and scientists were able to teach her sign language and use it to communicate back with us. So it's clear that our ancestors could have most likely used words or even form sentences to describe things or talk with each other. But the real limits of this, you'll have to ask an Anthropologist.

      No problem and thanks for the interesting discussion. I am neither a primitivist nor an anti-empiricist. I just believe, that our decisions should also (!) take questions (like philosophical ones) into consideration, which might not be fully quantifiable. So let us return to a question from my first comment. Let us assume that in some decades (maybe centuries or millenia) there was technology to fully change the genome. We would be able to remove genetic diseases, make everyone highly intelligent and "improve" human beings in tons of other ways. So from a strictly scientific point of view, we should create custom human beings in the lab, right? And maybe science told us, that some organs are no longer needed, then let us remove those as well, right? My problem is, that this would abolish our people or our species as we know it today. I find it strange, that some people say they want to preserve their race, but do not see the problem with trans-humanism. In the future, a child born to two black parents can have the gene code of the average white American. From a strictly genetic point of view, he is white. But is this really all we should care about or are there other questions like ancestry, that should influence our thinking and policies? To be clear, you did not talk about topics like transhumanism, but like I said, I think this discussion will inevitably arise and our reaction depends on the question, whether our thinking should only be guided by empirical data.

      If we can create humans in a lab, I would assume that also means we would have saved all the original genetic information somewhere on a computer and in essence, we did still preserve the human race forever.

      I understand your concerns about what would happen when we start taking apart organs and become closer and closer to cyborgs or even machines. Well, just based on how technology constantly advances, I do think some type of future where Man & Machine merge is inevitable.

      In fact, you can even look at the state of humans today. Do you not own a cellphone? Do you carry it around with it everywhere? What you have in your possession is basically a mini computer in your pocket. I also bet you store important and private information on it as well? If you were to lose your cellphone, you would also be losing a part of yourself, because it's importance in society is second to none.

      Now I know what you're thinking. "But humans didn't always need smartphones or computers" and that's true. But since humans are always looking to conquer or have more power over others, we stopped using our fists thousands of years ago, and turned to the latest gadgets to have complete dominion over others. First it was the stick, then it was sharp tools like knives, than it was guns, and now wars don't even need to be fought with people anymore. We have drones and the economy to inflict heavy damage on people. In the future, it's obvious someone is going to take this idea further and adopt robot parts because it means they will be much smarter, stronger and even potentially immortal, in which case, your average human has no choice but to copy this or face being conquered again...

      As for this type of future being good or bad for us in the long run, plenty of sci-fi movies explore this concept. One major example is clearly The Matrix or The Terminator. The most powerful beings are Robots, but somehow there is still a much more primitive Human group to resist them. Whether or not the Robots are right or the Humans are wrong will remain a debate for the upcoming centuries.

      [–][deleted]  (6 children)

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        [–]radicalcentristNational Centrism[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

        It is more like, we need technology to survive. Animals on the other hand can survive without it.

        It's completely circumstantial. For example, send any animal into Space without a Space suit and they would die.

        Technology is certainly helpful, but having access to food and water is infinitely more important for any species.

        A good example, read about the Japanese holdouts. These were soldiers from WW2 who kept fighting years after the official surrender, and other than their guns, they were cut off from civilization and had to live off the land. They didn't perish.

        No doubt, we have ancestors. It is more like we have developed into something special.

        But what is this "special"? For example, I never denied that humans are indeed the smartest species on the planet. Sure, that's "special". But other animals have their own claims to fame too. For example, humans are definitely not the fastest species. Nor can we hold our breath underwater without passing out or drowning. Evolution gave every creature on Earth unique traits, and it makes sense to absolutely preserve them.

        Sure, it is just once again the technological dependence.

        We would sooner collapse from lack of food or water, then from being away from a computer or a stick. That's our biological limitation. Technology helps but if you can't even feed your body, it's worthless. Remember Steve Jobs? All his life, he was in charge of Apple and was constantly surrounded by technology. But once he got sick and his body couldn't go on any further, technology just didn't matter.

        Sure, they probably did communicate, maybe even with words. The questions is, whether they were able to make complex statements, like sentences with inferences. You are right, I should try to check some anthropological literature for this.

        It's not just Apes, there are Humans today who are mentally disabled and have trouble speaking or can't speak at all. But this is only proof that having a certain intelligence threshold is important, not that a lack of IQ makes you an animal. If any one of us got into a serious car accident and lost our ability to speak, did we stop being Humans? No.

        Sure, but is our species just some code an a hard drive?

        If we can take these genetic instructions and either 3D print or grow in a lab an exact replica of Human, that's no different from one born through natural methods, than the morbid answer is yes.

        I will admit though, that this type of topic is trippy and even freaks me out sometimes about why is this possible. But that's also the beauty of trying to learn and understand why life is like this.

        I agree, all technology changes our behavior. The difference is, that none of these technologies has replaced us with something else. Cyborgs on the other hand are not just some replacement for our smartphones, no, they are the replacement for us.

        The whole concept of evolution and natural selection has seen species replace one another because of survival of the fittest. If Robot Men enter society and are clearly superior at everything, then just like in the movies, some kind of techno-war will break out, or people will assimilate and wish to join the superior race. Hell, even without robots, the exact same phenomenon is used to describe immigration.

        Whites build better and more advance societies that now has non-whites flocking to them. We have many arguments and debates on how exactly we're suppose to this. Or in the case of the other side, they have arguments on how they want to be replaced. It wouldn't surprise me that perhaps Robots in the future will have the same discussion.

        "Dude, stop being racist and open your borders to the humans. Can't you see we're all equal!"

        [–][deleted]  (4 children)

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          [–]radicalcentristNational Centrism[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

          Sure, but they have some environment were they can live without technology. We do not.

          Earth is our environment and we can live out technology. Proof of this is when technology gets wiped out by natural disasters all the time, or when rolling blackouts render them useless. When these things happen, the first thing people look for is food and water. You can go an entire lifetime without a TV or Car, but you can't go 3 days without being dehydrated or starving.

          How is being born via sexual reproduction similar to being 3D printed?

          Correction: I don't literally mean the process is the same, but the end result. For example, in natural reproduction, cells are responsible for creating the building blocks of a baby. If we had to do this artificially, I would imagine a robot would be able to recreate organs/lungs/cells from scratch. I'll admit that this idea might not be realistic or sci-fi, so I'll stick with the "grown in a lab" scenario instead.

          Edit: Actually, maybe I'm not wrong about the 3d printing being sci-fi. Scientists already appear to have prototypes of printing out organs.

          https://www.ft.com/content/67e3ab88-f56f-11e7-a4c9-bbdefa4f210b

          See, the transhumanism topic is not the same as Neanderthal vs. Cro-Magnon. These human beings were not asked "do you want these other to exist". Cyborgs on the other hand are a product of us. We are able to decide, whether we want this. Well, at least, assuming we are the guys making the rules.

          They weren't asked, but you could say the same about when guns were introduced and used to conquer primitive tribes. Native Africans or Indians would have preferred the playing field be kept equal, but did the Europeans care? No, they simply went to war and defeated the other tribe for losing.

          If we were to stop the same thing from happening with Cyborgs, then that require passing some kind of international law or treaty forbidding such research. But unless you can actively enforce it, at least one country will still develop it in secret, because it's a symbol of power. Kind of like nuclear weapons.

          [–][deleted]  (2 children)

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