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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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 Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 4:13 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
| I don't think humanity is capable of the kind of collective action that will be required to save it from itself. |
Okay, but that was only half of your position. The other half was the implication that the mass extinction of humanity would not be tragic. If the needless end of a potential-laden species like humanity is not a tragedy, I guess I'm curious as to what is a tragedy. Do we simply live in a tragedy-free universe?
If one child's death is a tragic, the death of all children, everywhere seems to me to be infinitely more of one. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 4:14 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| I don't think humanity is capable of the kind of collective action that will be required to save it from itself. |
Okay, but that was only half of your position. The other half was the implication that the mass extinction of humanity would not be tragic. If the needless end of a potential-laden species like humanity is not a tragedy, I guess I'm curious as to what is a tragedy. Do we simply live in a tragedy-free universe?
If one child's death is a tragic, the death of all children, everywhere seems to me to be infinitely more of one. |
Human suffering is much more tragic than human absence. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 4:43 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| I don't think humanity is capable of the kind of collective action that will be required to save it from itself. |
Okay, but that was only half of your position. The other half was the implication that the mass extinction of humanity would not be tragic. If the needless end of a potential-laden species like humanity is not a tragedy, I guess I'm curious as to what is a tragedy. Do we simply live in a tragedy-free universe?
If one child's death is a tragic, the death of all children, everywhere seems to me to be infinitely more of one. |
Human suffering is much more tragic than human absence. |
This principle crumbles both in the face of critical thinking and in the face of real world experience. Indeed, if accepted, the only logical course of action is species-wide suicide. I can't think of a more obvious proof of ridiculousness than that. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 5:07 pm Post subject: |
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| Let me put it this way: in the very long term, we cannot prevent the demise of our species. As such, the idea of our planet without humans doesn't seem particularly tragic to me. We might, however, be able to largely put an end to hunger, disease, and deprivation (though I'm doubtful). Essentially, everyday human suffering is something that might be avoidable, whereas our eventual extinction as a species is not, therefore the one bothers me far more than the other. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 5:27 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
| Let me put it this way: in the very long term, we cannot prevent the demise of our species. As such, the idea of our planet without humans doesn't seem particularly tragic to me. We might, however, be able to largely put an end to hunger, disease, and deprivation (though I'm doubtful). Essentially, everyday human suffering is something that might be avoidable, whereas our eventual extinction as a species is not, therefore the one bothers me far more than the other. |
Again, this just leads to the logical necessity of immediate mass suicide. Mass suicide would perfectly prevent hunger, disease, and deprivation; no one would go wanting if no one existed. Applied on a smaller and more personal scale, it also logically demands immediate personal suicide; every moment you don't embrace death, you subject yourself to the tragedy of incidental suffering, which you assert to be the worse of the two. The fact that you are still living and breathing proves you don't genuinely believe in this principle. Death clearly bothers you far more than suffering.
If all you want to do is explain how you feel, well, okay. I don't want you to feel like I'm harassing you here. But if you actually think this is a reasonable position which is remotely defensible, you're very wrong; even being alive to defend it makes you a hypocrite, unless you think of yourself some sort of perverse anti-Buddha who is temporarily foregoing their own benefit with plans to to "benevolently" murder the world in order to "save it" from suffering. Needless to say, I don't think you're planning any global genocide in the immediate future.
And this doesn't even get started on objections to your case which revolve around the fact that, unlike an individual human, humanity collectively has no set lifespan, meaning that while eventual extinction is statistically almost certain over unlimited time, any individual extinction is almost assuredly just as avoidable as suffering (perhaps even more so, depending on the type of extinction), meaning that one cannot appeal to unavoidability when arguing against it's inherent tragedy. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 5:41 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| Let me put it this way: in the very long term, we cannot prevent the demise of our species. As such, the idea of our planet without humans doesn't seem particularly tragic to me. We might, however, be able to largely put an end to hunger, disease, and deprivation (though I'm doubtful). Essentially, everyday human suffering is something that might be avoidable, whereas our eventual extinction as a species is not, therefore the one bothers me far more than the other. |
Again, this just leads to the logical necessity of immediate mass suicide. Mass suicide would perfectly prevent hunger, disease, and deprivation; no one would go wanting if no one existed. Applied on a smaller and more personal scale, it also logically demands immediate personal suicide; every moment you don't embrace death, you subject yourself to the tragedy of incidental suffering, which you assert to be the worse of the two. The fact that you are still living and breathing proves you don't genuinely believe in this principle.
If all you want to do is explain how you feel, well, okay. I don't want you to feel like I'm harassing you here. But if you actually think this is a reasonable position which is remotely defensible, you're very wrong. |
Isn't the definition of what is tragic inherently subjective? Why do I even have to defend it? And is our biological imperative to prevent tragedy or to survive? I don't want to die, nor do I want the people I love to do so, but I'm not going to get hung up on a world without people when we have much more pressing concerns. You think it's ridiculous that I find suffering more tragic than absence, I think it's ridiculous that you worry about the eventuality of our destruction. Both sides are ultimately subjective, and as such I don't know why I have to defend it (or why I've been trying to). |
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visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 5:48 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
| Let me put it this way: in the very long term, we cannot prevent the demise of our species. As such, the idea of our planet without humans doesn't seem particularly tragic to me. We might, however, be able to largely put an end to hunger, disease, and deprivation (though I'm doubtful). Essentially, everyday human suffering is something that might be avoidable, whereas our eventual extinction as a species is not, therefore the one bothers me far more than the other. |
Why so pessimistic? Have you been reading Schopenhauer or something? 
Life is beautiful despite suffering, and despite the knowledge of our mortality. In fact, the only thing that gives life any meaning at all is striving (both individually, and as a species); if there were no suffering and no death, life would literally have no meaning. Facing adversity is what makes us human, and gives birth to creativity. It is what makes humanity so beautiful; and by contrast what makes the notion of giving up on life and humanity so ugly. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 6:07 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
Isn't the definition of what is tragic inherently subjective? |
No, not at all. Remember, the term tragedy originally pertained to a type of play, one which ended in disaster (and not necessarily an avoidable disaster, given tragedies can include elements of Fate!). Now we often simply apply the term in question to the world directly. I see very little real subjectivity at all, especially when considering disasters of epic proportions (such as, for instance, a mass extinction).
| northway wrote: |
| And is our biological imperative to prevent tragedy or to survive? I don't want to die, nor do I want the people I love to do so, but I'm not going to get hung up on a world without people when we have much more pressing concerns. |
Yes, but look at how you've phrased that: you're not going to get hung up on a world without people because you have more pressing concerns. It's not the nature of mass extinction that is the driving force here, it's the perceived remoteness of it. And you're right that we have more pressing concerns at the moment than our own mass extinction, not because it wouldn't be a horrific thing if it occurred, but because it's so very implausible at the moment. With concerns over super-powers engaging in full-out nuclear war fading, we really don't have much to worry about on the extinction front in the present; even climate change isn't going to be driving us extinct, but rather would simply cause life to become harder.
| northway wrote: |
| You think it's ridiculous that I find suffering more tragic than absence, I think it's ridiculous that you worry about the eventuality of our destruction. |
I live by my proposed principle. You do not, and moreover, cannot. I think that's a sufficient demonstration of which principle is the more ridiculous.
| northway wrote: |
| Both sides are ultimately subjective, and as such I don't know why I have to defend it (or why I've been trying to). |
Trying to pull a discussion into subjectivity is an admission of the weakness of your position. I've demonstrated why your proposed principle contradicts both itself and your own chosen lifestyle. There's nothing subjective about that. If you wish to bow out of the discussion, feel free. As I've said, I've no wish for you to feel harassed. |
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Koreadays
Joined: 20 May 2008
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| Posted: Sun Aug 28, 2011 10:52 pm Post subject: |
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| well, if the humans were wiped out I am sure the other 10 million species on earth would be happy. I mean Humans seems to think there is only species here on earth. and that's THE HUMAN SPECIES! |
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visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 3:45 am Post subject: |
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| Koreadays wrote: |
| well, if the humans were wiped out I am sure the other 10 million species on earth would be happy. I mean Humans seems to think there is only species here on earth. and that's THE HUMAN SPECIES! |
I wasn't aware there were 10 million other species capable of feeling the emotion "happiness" (in fact, I'm pretty sure that minus some primitive emotions felt by other mammals, only humans feel emotion strongly enough to project it onto to non-sentient creatures and things).
As for "wiping out" all other species, I don't think that is the goal of any human (minus the odd psychopath), nor is that the direction we're headed in. But even if it were, I can feel sure that were any other animal on earth in the position to dominate at the expense of killing all others, they wouldn't hesitate. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 1:29 pm Post subject: |
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| visitorq wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| I don't really think that's hateful so much as harshly realistic. Can you really argue that humans aren't selfish, greedy, and destructive, at least when viewed in the context of the entire species? Moreover, considering that our eventual demise is a certainty, will it really be a tragedy? |
I don't buy into the anti-human ideology. Sure, we're capable of some remarkable inhumanity towards our fellow humans, but there's also a lot of beauty and good. I find humanity at its best a whole lot more beautiful than anything else in nature.
Yet there are plenty of people (mostly Gaia worshiper types) who view humanity on the level of a bacteria or cancer and would literally like for us to be wiped out to save the whales or rainforest or whatever... I do not sympathize with such views. |
Why is it anti-human necessarily? I'm sure Northway loves being a human, and loves much about our species. He's not stating that he wants our extinction, just that he expects it to occur at some point in the future. Just because he acknowledges that we have flaws as a species, doesn't mean he is anti-human - just that he is realistic about our limitations.
Most species become extinct eventually - only a few seem to stay around for long. We humans are such extraordinary little creatures, and I certainly like that I happen to be one, and I love so much of what we have acheived as a species, but I also acknowledge we have a very selfish and destructive aspect, and that this may very possibly end in our eventual demise. I also don't feel sad about a far off future extinction - it's abstract, and hopefully won't happen in my lifetime, or the lifetime of other creatures I love - but I accept it's likely to happen eventually. We've only been around less than a million years and we are such a young little species, but we've buggered things up for many other species, caused the extintions of thousands of them, are likely to cause the extinctions of thousands more, and quite frankly, it won't be a tragedy for most other species on the planet if we leave, even if it may viewed as a tragedy by us.
Northway's prediction that we'll do ourselves in eventually is hardly a novel one. Just look at our inaction on the current environmental crisis - most of us don't give a toss and can only think of our own immediate concerns, and many of us try to justify and rationalise our inaction. Climate change won't likely lead to a complete extinction, but it's likely that it will lead to a situtation where far less than our current population can be supported by the new environment. Still, most of us don't really care.
I also agree with Northway's view that the thought of people suffering (presumably with little hope of alleviation) is less palatable than them not being here at all. That's not novel either. We may love our pet dog, but when his quality of life becomes too poor, and his pain and suffering too great, we may choose euthanasia for him to release him from his suffering. Many humans choose this for themselves when physical or mental trauma becomes more than they are willing to bear. I don't see how holding such a view means you should be expected to top yourself there and then. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 1:45 pm Post subject: |
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| Big_Bird wrote: |
Most species become extinct eventually - only a few seem to stay around for long. We humans are such extraordinary little creatures, and I certainly like that I happen to be one, and I love so much of what we have acheived as a species, but I also acknowledge we have a very selfish and destructive aspect, and that this may very possibly end in our eventual demise. I also don't feel sad about a far off future extinction - it's abstract, and hopefully won't happen in my lifetime, or the lifetime of other creatures I love - but I accept it's likely to happen eventually. We've only been around less than a million years and we are such a young little species, but we've buggered things up for many other species, caused the extintions of thousands of them, are likely to cause the extinctions of thousands more, and quite frankly, it won't be a tragedy for most other species on the planet if we leave, even if it may viewed as a tragedy by us. |
Frankly, I think weighing humanity equally with other species is crazy. Yes, it would be better if we could preserve more species. But it doesn't make me look forward to the extinction of the human race. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 1:51 pm Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Big_Bird wrote: |
Most species become extinct eventually - only a few seem to stay around for long. We humans are such extraordinary little creatures, and I certainly like that I happen to be one, and I love so much of what we have acheived as a species, but I also acknowledge we have a very selfish and destructive aspect, and that this may very possibly end in our eventual demise. I also don't feel sad about a far off future extinction - it's abstract, and hopefully won't happen in my lifetime, or the lifetime of other creatures I love - but I accept it's likely to happen eventually. We've only been around less than a million years and we are such a young little species, but we've buggered things up for many other species, caused the extintions of thousands of them, are likely to cause the extinctions of thousands more, and quite frankly, it won't be a tragedy for most other species on the planet if we leave, even if it may viewed as a tragedy by us. |
Frankly, I think weighing humanity equally with other species is crazy. Yes, it would be better if we could preserve more species. But it doesn't make me look forward to the extinction of the human race. |
I'm not looking forward to the extinction of the human race. Neither (presumably) is Northwood. It's just that we accept it as an inevitablility and don't feel emotional about it.
And pointing out that our extinction won't be a bad thing for other species is not crazy, it's just pointing out actuality.
Since we are trying to put ourselves into the boots of aliens, and pondering how they would consider us, I don't see why we should be confining our concerns to what is best for humans. An intelligent alien wouldn't be confined to thinking 'what is best for humans' but they may be considering what is best for the larger environment. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 2:05 pm Post subject: |
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| Big_Bird wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Big_Bird wrote: |
Most species become extinct eventually - only a few seem to stay around for long. We humans are such extraordinary little creatures, and I certainly like that I happen to be one, and I love so much of what we have acheived as a species, but I also acknowledge we have a very selfish and destructive aspect, and that this may very possibly end in our eventual demise. I also don't feel sad about a far off future extinction - it's abstract, and hopefully won't happen in my lifetime, or the lifetime of other creatures I love - but I accept it's likely to happen eventually. We've only been around less than a million years and we are such a young little species, but we've buggered things up for many other species, caused the extintions of thousands of them, are likely to cause the extinctions of thousands more, and quite frankly, it won't be a tragedy for most other species on the planet if we leave, even if it may viewed as a tragedy by us. |
Frankly, I think weighing humanity equally with other species is crazy. Yes, it would be better if we could preserve more species. But it doesn't make me look forward to the extinction of the human race. |
I'm not looking forward to the extinction of the human race. Neither (presumably) is Northwood. It's just that we accept it as an inevitablility and don't feel emotional about it.
And pointing out that our extinction won't be a bad thing for other species is not crazy, it's just pointing out actuality.
Since we are trying to put ourselves into the boots of aliens, and pondering how they would consider us, I don't see why we should be confining our concerns to what is best for humans. An intelligent alien wouldn't be confined to thinking 'what is best for humans' but they may be considering what is best for the larger environment. |
Its called projection. The academics in question just projected their immediate concerns onto the aliens, but without resolving the inherent contradiction. Why would the aliens wipe out one species to save another? Especially when one of those species is capable of empathy and technological exchange and the others are . . . lesser species.
Its not the end of the world, its the end of you.
Anyway, Stephen Hawking was much closer to the truth, IMO. Aliens might wipe us out because of fear or simple acquisitiveness. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 2:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Big_Bird wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Big_Bird wrote: |
Most species become extinct eventually - only a few seem to stay around for long. We humans are such extraordinary little creatures, and I certainly like that I happen to be one, and I love so much of what we have acheived as a species, but I also acknowledge we have a very selfish and destructive aspect, and that this may very possibly end in our eventual demise. I also don't feel sad about a far off future extinction - it's abstract, and hopefully won't happen in my lifetime, or the lifetime of other creatures I love - but I accept it's likely to happen eventually. We've only been around less than a million years and we are such a young little species, but we've buggered things up for many other species, caused the extintions of thousands of them, are likely to cause the extinctions of thousands more, and quite frankly, it won't be a tragedy for most other species on the planet if we leave, even if it may viewed as a tragedy by us. |
Frankly, I think weighing humanity equally with other species is crazy. Yes, it would be better if we could preserve more species. But it doesn't make me look forward to the extinction of the human race. |
I'm not looking forward to the extinction of the human race. Neither (presumably) is Northwood. It's just that we accept it as an inevitablility and don't feel emotional about it.
And pointing out that our extinction won't be a bad thing for other species is not crazy, it's just pointing out actuality.
Since we are trying to put ourselves into the boots of aliens, and pondering how they would consider us, I don't see why we should be confining our concerns to what is best for humans. An intelligent alien wouldn't be confined to thinking 'what is best for humans' but they may be considering what is best for the larger environment. |
Its called projection. The academics in question just projected their immediate concerns onto the aliens, but without resolving the inherent contradiction. Why would the aliens wipe out one species to save another? Especially when one of those species is capable of empathy and technological exchange and the others are . . . lesser species.
Its not the end of the world, its the end of you.
Anyway, Stephen Hawking was much closer to the truth, IMO. Aliens might wipe us out because of fear or simple acquisitiveness. |
| I wrote: |
| they may be considering what is best for the larger environment. |
We can only speculate how aliens might think and feel. I've forgotten what exactly is in the original OP, as mostly I'm just responding to the way people have responded to Northway. I disagreed with their logic and conclusions.
But let's look at one possible train of alien thought. Humans bugger things up for other species, other humans, and other generations of humans. They foul up their own world and they go to war so easily. They are selfish and destructive - even if they have other beautiful qualities. If humans are on the brink of technological breakthroughs that may allow them to travel the galaxies at large, its probably better to vapourise them sooner than later. |
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