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Title: Human Nature Author: Anark Date: Aug 28, 2019 Language: en Topics: Human nature, primatology, science, revolution, social structure, Breadtube Source: Author script, video source: https://youtu.be/e27RVFxNOcc
The following is the script of the video I published on my channel
Anark. If you would like to watch that video, it is here:
Minor edits have been made to the script to instead refer to itself as
an essay instead of a video. Other than this, the content has remained
the same and may be seen as a copy of the video, in text form, that can
be distributed wholly in place of the video.
Solidarity forever.
This essay is on a topic that is, by all measures, contentious in every
political community. But...it is contentious precisely because of its
importance and bearing that in mind, I think it would be irresponsible
for me to avoid it. In my experience, even if, after a long descent into
political discussion, the person I am speaking with is on board with
radical change and even if they agree with the critiques of capitalism,
and even if they agree that the leftist vision is the correct one, they
will still often express this one last compunction that prevents them
from really allowing themselves to imagine a better world:
“I agree with you, okay?” they’ll say, “capitalism is corrupt, socialism
would be an improvement, and humans can’t be trusted with unaccountable
authority…but I just can’t get over this feeling that human beings are
inherently selfish, competitive, and brutish and that they’ll just ruin
this whole project with their greed.”
So what is human nature?
---
This question of humanity’s inherent nature is one of the oldest
philosophical dialogues in recorded history, rooting all the way back to
the Greeks and the Chinese, where both took for granted that humanity
had such a nature. For this reason, their analyses largely centered
around discussing what it was and how humanity might organize itself
under its auspices. During the Enlightenment, however, a countervailing
idea came into popularity. In this view, human beings were born without
innate ideas and were instead formed by their circumstances. It has
often been called the “blank slate” theory of human minds. This blank
slate conception underpinned an entire generation of philosophical
inquiry, enduring with only moderate critique until the discovery of
genetics.
So we must ask: Is humanity a creature defined by its essential
qualities and therefore shackled to them for all eternity? Or is
humanity a blank slate, written upon by the quill of material
conditions, unbridled by limitations to explore an infinite potential?
The contention of this essay is that there are aspects of truth in both
perspectives. Yes, there are some components of humanity which can be
said to be attributable to their nature as a species, but there are also
an enormous host of components that are erroneously attributed to human
nature for the needs of the powerful and are, in reality, formed purely
from humanity’s interaction with the world. Above all, we will argue
here, that humanity’s most characteristic trait is this: adaptability
through learning.
Now, a disclaimer: this is not to say that this trait is what defines
each individual as human. A person is human by genetic fact. Further,
individual humans can be both quite unadaptable and quite limited in
their ability to learn. Instead, what we mean to say is that humanity as
a species is most characteristically defined by its ability to adapt
through learning. And, indeed, it can be said that a variety of other
species share this trait, especially those that have high intelligence.
But that is the crux. Intelligence necessitates the ability to learn and
the ability to learn increases the capability to adapt rapidly.
But one cannot be blamed for feeling that this dodges the question. When
we discuss human nature, especially in the context we are interested in,
what we are really asking is if humanity can better itself in a
permanent fashion. Surely, given our knowledge of modern genetics, we
must concede that some aspect of humanity lies unchanging as the tides
shift around them. However, even if we assume it is true that humanity
is somehow bound by its nature, who is to say that this nature is
brutish and selfish?
The science certainly does not offer such a clear condemnation. For
example, a study that was carried out in 2012 demonstrated that human
infants as young as 15 months old had already developed a keen sense of
right and wrong. To quote the Scientific American summary:
“To measure moral sentiments, researchers first had the children watch
movies of an actor distributing food, either equally or unequally,
between two people. Most of the toddlers spent more time looking at the
unequal outcome, suggesting it surprised them by violating their basic
sense of fairness. Next, every child picked his or her favorite of two
new toys, and the researchers then asked the kids to share one of the
toys. Of the infants who shared their favorite toy, 92 percent had also
been surprised by the unfair outcome in the videos.”
This, at an age when very little, if any, opportunity for learned
behavior has presented itself.
And it cannot be said that our closest genetic cousin displays this
brutish and selfish nature: the bonobo does not solve its problems
through dominance and bloodshed. Quite the opposite, their disputes are
solved by trading sexual favors, interpersonal conflicts are rare, and
female bonobos are treated well despite their smaller stature. The
bonobo even largely neglects tribalism, resolving problems that arise
between groups non-violently.
But we have to be fair: there are also extreme counter-examples among
our genetic cousins, are there not? The baboon is known for its
quickness to anger and its internal social hierarchy. All relationships
within their troupes are brutally reinforced by the will of the
patriarch and the chain of dominance that lies underneath him defines
the way that all social interactions play out. The weak baboons are left
to demure in the face of such force, while the strong vie for the
patriarch’s position through bloodshed and daily conflict. This may seem
worrisome to those arguing for humanity’s better nature. Indeed, it
would seem it did not take extraordinary genetic variance to achieve
this affair. But...let me tell you a story...
Robert Sapolsky is a professor of Biology and Neurology at Stanford who,
for a period of time, staked out a position watching a troupe of baboons
in eastern Africa. The baboons he came to observe, at first, were a very
common sort: based highly on a dominance hierarchy, very male oriented,
very violent. Shortly after, nearby to Sapolsky’s troupe, humans began
dumping their trash in an enormous pile. Baboons in the area began
feasting on the trash that was being left there. Violence erupted at the
site as they fought over the spoils and the strongest baboons continued
to victor. But then...something happened.
Sapolsky noticed that many of the baboons were becoming horribly sick.
It turned out that they had been accidentally eating meat infected with
tuberculosis. It rapidly began killing all of the baboons in the troupe
who were occupying the dump. And all of the dominator baboons?
Well...they were the ones who had eaten the meat most, thus they began
dying very quickly. The baboons that were left over began to display
very different behaviors. Adult males ceased to quarrel and began
practicing reciprocal grooming behavior. The males also began to respond
in-kind to grooming from female baboons, an almost indecipherably rare
act beforehand. Violence diminished enormously. The female baboons were
no longer oppressed or pushed to the sidelines and their society was
both more civil and more stable.
This may have seemed like an astounding experiment to play out in front
of someone in Sapolsky’s circumstance. Sapolsky, however, feeling that
his study had been ruined due to the mass die-off, moved away and began
observing another troupe. However...he did return to them six years
later. And six years after the die-off, the troupe had not changed its
behavior. They still groomed each other in a way which was completely at
odds with what “regular” baboons did, they still practiced a culture of
cooperation, and they had not re-established the dominance hierarchy
that is so supposedly characteristic of their species.
Now...from the perspective of the nature side of this debate, it may
appear that nothing is amiss. Sure, it’s a peculiar happenstance, but
it’s not absurd to imagine that the baboons with the most violent
genetics had been weeded out and this would leave the more timid baboons
to build their interpersonal relations afterwards. But here’s the twist:
only a single male from the original troupe that Sapolsky had left six
years previous, still remained. This new society was formed with both
old and new baboons. Thus this was not the result of genetic preening.
Even these new baboons that had not been selected through the
tuberculosis die-off, were now cooperating in the new societal
structure. Baboons with zero presumed genetic predisposition to function
in this new way had entered their society and adopted their structure of
cooperation.
In nature, species evolve ignorant of the mechanics of the universe.
Yes, the fields and the animals and the trees all have their known
place, arrived thereupon by countless generations of struggle. But when
an animal evolves forward, it is not known to them how everything
functions, nor which is the best way to deal with the natural hurdles
that stand in their way. Evolution is a very slow process and ecologies
teach their lessons through cycles that span millennia, often quite
ineffable to the things within them.
And indeed, humanity arose, as all other species, fundamentally victim
to the natural universe’s inherent laws. Eat or starve, drink or die of
thirst, seek shelter or be inundated by the elements. As humanity rose
to meet these demands, no instructions awaited them, either on how to
best overcome their natural hurdles or on how to manage their expansion
should they succeed. Humanity was then, in its ignorance, forced to
decide for itself: how will we determine our collective future? What are
desirable and undesirable actions? How might we enforce or encourage
adherence to that list of actions? The answers to these questions would
determine whether they, as a species, survived or went extinct. In this
trial by fire humanity developed its intellect to produce an
ideologically consistent tool and using that ideological tool was a way
to effectively and efficiently rise above the pressures of the natural
world.
But bearing the reality that no methodological response was set by
nature, ideological conflict would naturally arise. Having been born
from a universe that was such a harsh steward, some would choose the
bandit’s way, while others would rebel against this and choose safety in
trust networks. The cooperators were the ones who formed the first
societies. They settled and tended the land, their numbers providing
safety from the brutal accumulation of the psychopath and the sociopath.
Free to relax and to settle, the cooperators discovered the luxury of
time and freedom from fear; and attendant with it: the time to seek
knowledge and to endeavor towards its preservation.
This is why recorded human history coincides with the beginning of
modern society. To record history requires a communal linguistic
development, societal stability, and the application of a sort of
methodology. If humans had formed themselves to the constrictions of
competition and individual subsistence in the state of nature, there is
no doubt each would have died shivering in their hovels and all of
humanity’s history would be lost to oblivion just as that of the tens of
thousands of years of human history that now only exist in the
inspection of archeological record.
But herein lies the ultimate tragedy of our nature: a species defined by
extreme adaptability is also a species which can be transfigured into
almost anything. Humanity lies in constant flux, a species whose
identity is eternally malleable to redefinition. And those with power
have quite explicit desires about how they might carry out such a
redefinition, circumscribing it to forms of social organization contrary
to the best interests of the many, serving only to vindicate the petty
justifications of the powerful and their empty quest for power.
Therefore, even though cooperation may lie at the practical center of
humanity’s survival, in capitalism we are forced into the mold of the
competitor. The central propaganda of a capitalist society is that now
all humans are to include themselves in the rat race of selfishness and
greed. No longer able to justify the orientation of power through the
mechanisms of Divine Right or ruthless dictums of might-makes-right,
competition has become the propagandistic fetish of the modern elite, an
ideological foundation which justifies their placement in a false
meritocracy, and they have thus created a society which perpetuates such
a fetishization to the very masses who are deprived by it. The
competitor, seeking to transmute humanity into the animalistic,
individualist hunter, inherently drives to compartmentalize knowledge
and reduce cooperation. After all, if knowledge proliferates, the
competitor loses their edge.
But we did not hunt the mammoths as individualist hunters. We hunted
them together, through the communal sharing of knowledge, by the mutual
learning of skills, and the fluid coordination of necessary roles.
Neither did the agricultural revolution take place due to the commands
of the monarchs; though they exploited the newfound inertia once
humanity achieved it. Nor did the industrial revolution come about by
the wishes of the lords; although they took credit for the insights of
the great naturalists after they were grown to fruition. And neither did
the digital revolution arrive at the command of the capitalists,
although they now obfuscate the advancements of public researchers and
wield their achievements as a cynical bludgeon to stymie calls for
revolution.
In all eras, the power structures have crowed of the achievements that
were had in the wake of their wars and plays for dominance and petty
betrayals. For example, history uncritically repeats the notion that the
Roman empire built vast networks of roads and erected metropolises in
their wake. Surely they can be lauded for that. But the Roman emperors
did not pioneer the knowledge of how to make roads or build cities. They
simply commanded others to implement the knowledge that had been gained
through the cooperation and hard work of others. That the Romans had to
wait to holistically implement already existing technologies until they
served the needs of military dominance and establishment of sovereignty,
confirms the role of the powerful as the throttle, not as the great
accelerator, of progress.
As highly intelligent beings, our minds are power-houses of observation,
inspection, and analysis. Yet, quite contradictory to that nature, power
structures seek to gate human knowledge, monopolize the results of
observation and inspection, and preferentially orient all progress
therein to the benefit of themselves. This leads to knowledge and
insight being compartmentalized, leading to not only a weaker society,
but also weaker individuals with less capability to overcome a variety
of obstacles. It is by sharing knowledge that humanity shares the
pre-figured ability to respond to obstacles, something that other
species fail to do effectively. It is by cooperating with others who
have embraced curiosity and spreading the collective knowledge gained
therein, that the progress of a few is made into the progress of the
many. Cooperation is therefore the organizational structure of a society
that focuses humanity’s most productive instincts and capabilities
toward their highest goal.
Cooperation, taking a view of humanity that is more than the sum of its
individually reductive self-interests, is the mechanism by which we
create what could be. Competition is a luxury born from the fruits of
cooperation’s labor, a hanger-on to progress who seeks out marginal
benefits while the cooperators pioneer the next revolution. Competition,
relegated to seek a vision of advancement predicated upon personal gain,
can only ever hope to apply a more efficient application of what is. To
truly innovate is to invite risk, something that business entities
outside of idealized models seek to minimize to near non-existence. This
was noted by the anarchist and biologist Peter Kropotkin in Mutual Aid:
A Factor of Evolution:
“[...] if […] we ask Nature: ‘Who are the fittest: those who are
continually at war with each other, or those who support one another?’
we at once see that those animals which acquire habits of mutual aid are
undoubtedly the fittest. They have more chances to survive, and they
attain, in their respective classes, the highest development of
intelligence and bodily organization. If the numberless facts which can
be brought forward to support this view are taken into account, we may
safely say that mutual aid is as much a law of animal life as mutual
struggle, but that, as a factor of evolution, it most probably has a far
greater importance, inasmuch as it favours the development of such
habits and characters as insure the maintenance and further development
of the species, together with the greatest amount of welfare and
enjoyment of life for the individual, with the least waste of energy.”
Thus...in a twist which is perhaps most absurd of all, the competitor is
in gradual self-sabotage. In the delusional pseudo-meritocracy that a
society of competition creates, the very structures of cooperation which
brought the revolution of ideas that the competitors exploited for their
glory to begin with, are undermined. And instead of the scientist and
the creative resting in luxury to uncover the next revolution, they are
callously bound to the wheel of competition, distracted from their
highest goal, and the progress of humankind is thus slowed to the
snail’s pace of an oligarch’s revelation.
Let’s return, for a moment, to the story we told about the baboons
earlier. Robert Sapolsky was asked, when interviewed later, why he
thought the baboon society had changed in such a drastic and enduring
way after the die-off. Sapolsky said that, in the original troupe, when
the new male baboons would enter, regardless of any pre-programmed
genetic code, they were quickly inundated with the most violent and
degrading treatment from the dominators of the group. Fearful of
reprisal from the bullying baboons, females would refuse to mate with
the new males or groom them. In witnessing this hierarchical society,
the new baboons were trained on the requirements to survive: become a
dominator or be outcast. But...once the bullies were gone, the new
baboons that entered the troupe were no longer attacked and degraded.
Instead, upon arriving, they were introduced to a reciprocal
environment. Females, no longer threatened by the violent bullying
baboons, could now freely choose their mates. The new baboons adapted to
this way of life and flourished.
Baboons, considered one of the most violently dominant species of
primate in existence, were able to completely change their social
structure in an enduring way in extremely short order. And, most
notably, it did not require that there be genetic preening to select
some ideal peaceful baboon. It only required that the dominators were
removed from the population long enough for those that were left to
build a better society. After that society was built, they no longer
even produced dominators, nor did newcomers reintroduce the dominator’s
behavior. It has now been twenty years and Sapolsky’s troupe still
functions this way.
I contend we are not bound to a lesser fate than baboons. You see, it is
not humanity’s fate to be competitive and selfish, but nor will humanity
naturally gravitate toward a nature of selflessness and cooperation if
left completely to their devices. It should instead be said that a
society of cooperation is one which is better fit to humanity’s
strengths; collaboration is a tool which allows humanity to overcome
their communal obstacles, to focus upon discovery instead of incremental
benefit, and to pursue the aspects of their being which bring the
flourishing of the individual and society together.
We are a species with an intellect whose rival is seen nowhere in the
animal kingdom. And that intellect guarantees that we can adapt far more
quickly than any other animal on Earth. Why should we be burdened by the
mal-adapted instincts of the few? Why should we wait around for the
scales of justice to tip in our favor by chance? Humanity, gifted with
such incredible intelligence, is a species able to conceive of a better
future. More than that, we are gifted with the ability to create a
better future, if only we can oust the dominators from their perches.
Because...this society of ruthlessness, of selfishness, of greed and
deprivation of other...it is simply not conducive to our nature.
Thus..while it may be true that our nature does not constrain us, it
also does not guarantee our flourishing in the face of the dominators. A
better future requires our intervention if we hope to see it. While our
destiny could lie among the stars, so too could it lie here...stranded
by the petty selfishness of the few...upon a dead planet; dominated by
the mean-spirited, a species who could have spanned galaxies, relegated
to live its remaining miserable centuries in the dead womb of the thing
which birthed it. The difference will be decided upon whether we may
build a society of hope or a society of cynicism. So reject learned
helplessness, reject the defeatists and the other assistants to decay.
Our best future shall only ever lie in the hands of the courageous and
the eternally undeterred. We must build the structures of liberation
that are needed so that we may find freedom from dominance forever. It
is not only your own fate that you hold in your hands, it is the fate of
many generations to come.