The Red Queen starts out with the stated assumption that we have a typical human nature. So exactly what is human nature and where did it come from?
Ridley states:
I agree and disagree.
Have to be honest here, this first part of the book is the hardest for me to get through. Once we get down into the details there is so much that Ridley writes that I feel is right on target, but setting the scene... I have a question.
Why draw the evolutionary effect line at some invisible point when we became human?
To me it's kinda like the glass half full analogy or the seeking of the branching in human evolution. Yes, we can definitely say the fungi is not human, and that today's hss definitely IS human. But where's the mid-point and why try to find it?
Ridley begins the discussion, defining what he considers human nature, by pointing to various reactions that he considers solely human (smiling, etc). These reactions not having changed in the last hundred thousand years or so. But these reactions themselves evolved. So why draw the line at that point?
Take the fight or flight reaction. That reaction is so hardwired into our system I doubt we could remove it. Yet it is not solely a human reaction. You can't even really consider it solely a mammilian reaction. Nor reptile. And probably not even as far back as simply amphibian. In other words, it's been around for millions (billions?) of years and yet is a part of our human evolution.
I feel many of the responses viewed as human are simply our inheritance from forebearers. Those forebears not always human, mammals, or so on. I'm sure we've even some going back to fungi.
So why draw an arbitrary line and call it human nature, when that nature is not solely human?
Lynne
Ridley states:
Quote:
This book is an inquiry into the nature of that human nature. Its theme is that it is impossible to understand human nature without understanding how it evolved, and it is impossible to understand how it evolved without understanding how human sexuality evolved.
I agree and disagree.
Have to be honest here, this first part of the book is the hardest for me to get through. Once we get down into the details there is so much that Ridley writes that I feel is right on target, but setting the scene... I have a question.
Why draw the evolutionary effect line at some invisible point when we became human?
To me it's kinda like the glass half full analogy or the seeking of the branching in human evolution. Yes, we can definitely say the fungi is not human, and that today's hss definitely IS human. But where's the mid-point and why try to find it?
Ridley begins the discussion, defining what he considers human nature, by pointing to various reactions that he considers solely human (smiling, etc). These reactions not having changed in the last hundred thousand years or so. But these reactions themselves evolved. So why draw the line at that point?
Take the fight or flight reaction. That reaction is so hardwired into our system I doubt we could remove it. Yet it is not solely a human reaction. You can't even really consider it solely a mammilian reaction. Nor reptile. And probably not even as far back as simply amphibian. In other words, it's been around for millions (billions?) of years and yet is a part of our human evolution.
I feel many of the responses viewed as human are simply our inheritance from forebearers. Those forebears not always human, mammals, or so on. I'm sure we've even some going back to fungi.
So why draw an arbitrary line and call it human nature, when that nature is not solely human?
Lynne
I'm scared!). A chimp "smiles" by lowering its bottom lip showing its bottom teeth and covering its top teeth with its top lip.
