The decision to go against natural instinct

[glooper23]

Our history has been referred to by someone who knows much about instincts, biologist Konrad Lorenz, as "the abnormal and pathological process of domestication of humans." He studied the behavior of wild and domesticated animals throughout his long and fruitful career and concluded that

 

nothing in human behavior is radically different from animal behavior, and

humans exhibit typical behavior patterns of domesticated animals.

 

This is the saddest piece of information I'd ever come across in my entire life, and some evidence that became available later only corroborated this view. Not only are we domesticated animals, we've been tampered with on the level of our chromosomes. All apes have 48 chromosomes (24 pairs), yet humans have 46 (23 pairs) and there's evidence that this was accomplished by fusing the 2nd and 3rd chromosomes together, which is unlikely to have happened naturally for any reason, and very likely to have been genetically engineered.

 

Which is why many of our instincts are scrambled and most of our "natural" behaviors are about as natural as those of a circus tiger. Sure, the tiger gets his morsel of food if he jumps through the hoops of fire. So do we. But it has nothing to do with "instinct," "natural," or "normal behavior of the species."

 

Poor us.

 

Was this genetic engineering of the 2nd and 3rd chromosomes done by a human, or was it part of natural evolution?

[Marblehead]

 

Poor us.

 

Yeah, I suppose that we could sit around and say over and over again, "Poor us."

 

But I prefer to say "Fortunate us." and go about doing things inspired by my free will as opposed to jumping through the ring of fire for a goody-goody.

 

Peace & Love!

[宁]

No. Hehehe.

 

I don't read Chinese so I am at the mercy of those who can. All I can do is read the translations of others and adopt the most commonly used definition or the one that sounds the most logical to me. Logic has a lot to do with the way my brain works.

 

Peace & Love!

 

I didn't mean Chinese. Take a look:

 

virtue Look up virtue at Dictionary.com

early 13c., "moral life and conduct, moral excellence,"

vertu, from Anglo-Fr. and O.Fr. vertu, from L. virtutem (nom. virtus) "moral strength, manliness, valor, excellence, worth,"

from vir "man" (see virile). Phrase by virtue of (early 13c.) preserves alternative M.E. sense of "efficacy." Wyclif Bible has virtue where K.J.V. uses power. The seven cardinal virtues (early 14c.) were divided into the natural (justice, prudence, temperance, fortitude) and the theological (hope, faith, charity). To make a virtue of a necessity (late 14c.) translates L. facere de necessitate virtutem. [Jerome]

[C T]

Our history has been referred to by someone who knows much about instincts, biologist Konrad Lorenz, as "the abnormal and pathological process of domestication of humans." He studied the behavior of wild and domesticated animals throughout his long and fruitful career and concluded that

 

nothing in human behavior is radically different from animal behavior, and

humans exhibit typical behavior patterns of domesticated animals.

 

This is the saddest piece of information I'd ever come across in my entire life, and some evidence that became available later only corroborated this view. Not only are we domesticated animals, we've been tampered with on the level of our chromosomes. All apes have 48 chromosomes (24 pairs), yet humans have 46 (23 pairs) and there's evidence that this was accomplished by fusing the 2nd and 3rd chromosomes together, which is unlikely to have happened naturally for any reason, and very likely to have been genetically engineered.

 

Which is why many of our instincts are scrambled and most of our "natural" behaviors are about as natural as those of a circus tiger. Sure, the tiger gets his morsel of food if he jumps through the hoops of fire. So do we. But it has nothing to do with "instinct," "natural," or "normal behavior of the species."

 

Poor us.

 

Consider perhaps the gods stole the missing pair of chromosomes? Thats like taking away our independence, so we will have to forever strife to be like them, but somehow never getting there, so endlessly heads are bowed in veneration, with the hope that they will somehow bestow upon us the grace of wholeness? After all, if we were complete, heaven could end up a pretty desolate place, and the gods will be deprived of regular entertainment, albeit nowadays most of it is pay-per-view, mind you!

 

Poor gods.

[Marblehead]

I didn't look. I'll take you word for it.

 

Agree. what was presented is what I spoke of in that we separate the concept 'virtue' fron the concept 'vice' for "moral life and conduct".

 

Duality: Virtue = good, Vice = bad (evil).

 

Something that caught my eye was: where K.J.V. uses power

 

I don't remember the translator but during my early years of reading the Tao Te Ching I read one translation that was titled: The Way of Tao and Its Power.

 

But the word "virtue" is used in most translations of the TTC when speaking to the character of man as well as the Way of Tao.

 

I forget which translation it was but one used the word interchangably but when the word referred to the character of man a lower case 'v' was used but when speaking to the Way of Tao they used a capitalized 'V'.

 

Peace & Love!

 

 

This is the saddest piece of information I'd ever come across in my entire life, and some evidence that became available later only corroborated this view. Not only are we domesticated animals, we've been tampered with on the level of our chromosomes. All apes have 48 chromosomes (24 pairs), yet humans have 46 (23 pairs) and there's evidence that this was accomplished by fusing the 2nd and 3rd chromosomes together, which is unlikely to have happened naturally for any reason, and very likely to have been genetically engineered.

 

I watched a program on TV about this a while back but I don't remember enough of it to make any valid comment.

 

But it is the genetic mutations thatt have species to evolve; some for the better, some lead to the extinction of the species.

 

No rhyme or reason.

 

Peace & Love!

[Pietro]

So you agree with me, now I'm worried However, I think you and I may have different understanding regarding what I've wrote there:

Do you know the meaning of the word "paranoid" :-)

 

All apes have 48 chromosomes (24 pairs), yet humans have 46 (23 pairs) and there's evidence that this was accomplished by fusing the 2nd and 3rd chromosomes together, which is unlikely to have happened naturally for any reason, and very likely to have been genetically engineered.

[Pietro]

I think a good translation of De is Power.

Which for me it makes more sense than virtue.

As natural ability to do something.

But I might be totally off :-/

 

 

It seem to me that before going forward we need to distinguish between education and instinct.

 

I think nowhere as in the "pick up" community could I observe the clear difference between education and instinct. I would say you cannot be successful in picking up girls if you are not really clear about the difference between education and instinct. Here are some actual claim from the community that point out to this difference.

 

"You can never convince a woman to have sex with you"

"if a woman will not sleep with you it is always your fault. You did something wrong"

"Every women will betray their partner at the drop of a had, under the right conditions"

 

I am not writing this to offend women (although no doubt some women will get offended, don't bother, that's not the point here). You can surely find similar claims for men, also.

 

Another interesting fact that just points to our deep differences are the difference between men and women, when they receive similar education. Most of us, and even more, most of our parents have grown up under the myth that education defined everything. According to my father, he thought so until he found himself parenting a girl. Similarly the author of "the female brain" describes how surprised she was when her baby-boy would just use dolls to shoot, and someone else described how their daughter would put to bed the train, tucking it under the blankets for the night.

 

So there is an education level,

then there is an instinctual level,

and I would say there is a deeper level too, under that.

 

A real education would help a person to reach that deeper level, but how often does that happen?

 

Socrates got it right, when he clarified that what is good cannot be good because the gods said so. (A) because the gods disagree between them all the time. ( because even if all the gods were to agree they could still all change their mind. Instead what is good must be inherent in the action in itself.

 

 

On this I just found this page from wikipedia, which looks really good:

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

 

If an education is just giving you a list of precepts, that is just covering the layer of dirt with a sand mandala.

 

That taoist, the greek philosopher, even

christians, suggest that the only way to morality is through internal digging.

[Marblehead]

I think a good translation of De is Power.

Which for me it makes more sense than virtue.

As natural ability to do something.

But I might be totally off :-/

 

So there is an education level,

then there is an instinctual level,

and I would say there is a deeper level too, under that.

 

 

Not off at all, I think. I have had discussions with some Philosophical Taoists who much prefer the word "power" over "virtue". (I still prefer "virtue" though.)

 

Regarding to what you were speaking to I generally use the word 'genetics' rather than 'instinct'. Some men have feminine traits and some women have masculime traits. That's just the way life is. Those with the opposite traits of their physical sexuality are likely to become homosexuals. I consider this to be within the natural processes and have learned (yes, it took a long time) to just accept it as a fact of Nature.

 

Yes, it is sometimes very difficult to determine what part of our essence, what part is our own learning from our 'real life' experiences and what has been taught to us over the years. I think that the most important of these three for us to question are the things that have been taught us by others. This is because there is always a tendency for others to teach us those things that they can use to control us. Of course, we should now and then question even our own experiences because oftentimes we have an experience and we attach a false understanding to what has been experienced.

 

Peace & Love!

[doc benway]

So you agree with me, now I'm worried

Yeah, people are usually horrified when they find that they agree with me...

However, I think you and I may have different understanding regarding what I've wrote there:

It's so terrible that now you're backpedalling, huh?

 

Before you get to 'Just be yourself' there are alot of installments that need installing But I won't get into that here.

Maybe our idea of installments are different but that's just different strokes.

To me it is not about adding installments but dropping the "domestication" as Taomeow so elegantly put it.

I agree 100% with the concept of humans being domesticated animals.

Again, this is what the sages have been asking us to shed so that we can return to whatever we mean by words like "natural" and "true nature" and so forth.

 

In general, I think we're using different words to describe similar concepts.

Run Away!

[宁]

Now, Steve, I was (partly) joking You're quite a nice guy.

Our necessities are different, so it's normal that our views differ.

non idem est si duo dicunt idem

 

Pietro, watch out, I'll get you at the next corner

[Pietro]

Pietro, watch out, I'll get you at the next corner

[mat black]

Our history has been referred to by someone who knows much about instincts, biologist Konrad Lorenz, as "the abnormal and pathological process of domestication of humans." He studied the behavior of wild and domesticated animals throughout his long and fruitful career and concluded that

 

nothing in human behavior is radically different from animal behavior, and

humans exhibit typical behavior patterns of domesticated animals.

 

Interesting.

Animals generally exhibit reactive and predictable patterns of behaviour. People can become like that if we get angry too often, or when we become too passive or lazy we can become just like a domesticated animal.

It's intersting to observe the interaction and mutal emotional influence that people and their pets have on each other. Like attracts like as the saying goes.

 

To me, the differences between humans and animals lies in our potential.

 

It appears that humans can be just like animals to varying degrees depending on the person, but to me, here's the key difference: humans have the potential and capacity to go beyond the typical 'instictive' and reactive behavioural tendencies of animals and actually open up wisdom, understanding, compassion. Then, a human will not act or speak from a position of spontaneous reactivity.

It's all up the us, it's depends on the level of effort we apply in clarifying our minds.

Edited January 12, 2010 by mat black

[voidisyinyang]

Actually this is a really fascinating book on the subject -- the "biology of god -- a study of man, the religious animal"

 

http://www.jstor.org/pss/1201889

 

Essentially it works on this analogy:

 

Dog is to Man as Man is to God.

 

So for wild dogs there is an instinctual "mercy" reaction against killing which is lacking in "civilized" man -- unless you consider the divine right of Kings and Presidents to give amnesty, etc.

 

So when two wolves fight for dominance the one who loses bears his neck to the dominant dog -- so that the subdominant dog can openly be killed.

 

Only the dominant dog, instead of finishing the fight, just refuses to kill the dog by biting the neck.

 

 

 

Interesting.

Animals generally exhibit reactive and predictable patterns of behaviour. People can become like that if we get angry too often, or when we become too passive or lazy we can become just like a domesticated animal.

It's intersting to observe the interaction and mutal emotional influence that people and their pets have on each other. Like attracts like as the saying goes.

 

To me, the differences between humans and animals lies in our potential.

 

It appears that humans can be just like animals to varying degrees depending on the person, but to me, here's the key difference: humans have the potential and capacity to go beyond the typical 'instictive' and reactive behavioural tendencies of animals and actually open up wisdom, understanding, compassion. Then, a human will not act or speak from a position of spontaneous reactivity.

It's all up the us, it's depends on the level of effort we apply in clarifying our minds.

[Taomeow]

Interesting.

Animals generally exhibit reactive and predictable patterns of behaviour. People can become like that if we get angry too often, or when we become too passive or lazy we can become just like a domesticated animal.

 

Well, let me try to turn the argument around a bit and invite you to look from a different perspective. The view you presented is an athropocentric view shared by most modern humans but apparently not by tao, far as I've been able to discern. Reactive and predictable patterns of behavior sound so not cool to us -- unless we compare these with patterns exhibited by tao itself as encountered in all of non-man-made nature, and notice that "reactivity" is actually sensitivity, adequacy of responses (commensurate with stimuli, not exceeding and not failing to match their extent, nature, and quality);

while "predictability" is "heng," a Virtue of tao, which consists in reliability, trustworthiness, the ability to be long-lasting without jerking any of the participants around any which way on a whim.

 

Wild animals have behaved consistently with these features and virtues of tao for the longest time, which is why all natural species of animals on Earth are older than ours. Tao rewards this behavior with being, with participation in its process. On the other hand, domesticated animals (foods, goods and pets, i.e. no longer animals) exhibit the same wide array of erratic, unpredictable, neurotic behaviors as humans.

To me, the differences between humans and animals lies in our potential.

 

It appears that humans can be just like animals to varying degrees depending on the person, but to me, here's the key difference: humans have the potential and capacity to go beyond the typical 'instictive' and reactive behavioural tendencies of animals and actually open up wisdom, understanding, compassion. Then, a human will not act or speak from a position of spontaneous reactivity.

It's all up the us, it's depends on the level of effort we apply in clarifying our minds.

In other words, the difference between humans and natural animals is that natural animals are already natural, while humans have a potential to become so. If it is formulated this way, I do agree.

 

Shinto, by the way, the native religion of Japan, is of the same opinion. So are many indigenous traditions that place animals on top of the totem poll and humans who have "potential" to get there, on the bottom.

 

The human way, for the longest time, was to assert our specialness (the kinds of specialness we ascribe to ourselves vary but the "better than thou" mentality vis a vis all non-human inhabitants of the planet persists). I wonder who we learned it from, and what for... So far I'm not too crazy about the practical outcome of this ideation. It's so easy to marginalize something "different" and dispose of it from some "sacred right" perspective in any manner whatever/whoever is designated as "superior" sees fit. Whole civilizations, countless communities, and vast ecosystems have perished as victims of this paradigm, as well as countless billions of individuals, human and animal alike. Whenever we stop seeing ourselves as part of nature -- not the "special part" with special rights but just part -- we invariably start doing really stupid things...

Edited January 12, 2010 by Taomeow

[Trogdorf]

I agree,

The way of Tao is not inherently good or bad but somewhere in-between (natural/ preserving/ right).

 

I believe it does have a mind and it has a way.

I believe we all have access to our way of being, but most are taught not to use it from an early age. It is a very primal thing..

 

People that are "bad natured" are just people out of touch with reality due to having a bad life, they become addicted to anything that makes them feel again.

 

 

My two cents..