Evolution & Human Behavior
According to evolutionary theory, “there are costs as well as benefits to learning, so learning abilities will be beneficial, and favored by natural selection, only when the benefits outweigh the costs” (from Encyclopedia Britannica; “Animal Behavior”).
In view of the consistent and ongoing war and rumor of war, slavery, murder, rape, theft, false witness and other anti-human rights behavioral history of human civilization, this fundamental conclusion of modern biology remains highly suspect. Children and adults have to repeatedly be taught to behave, based on what parental and societal peer conscience dictates to be morally correct.
In order to convince us to be what we humans ourselves perceive as “good”, all manner of threats of punishment, rewards and various other pat-on-the-back “carrots” are dangled in front of our faces, from candy, ice cream, spankings and stars on primary report cards, to monetary and other prizes, trophies and plaques on up to the “Noble Peace Prize”.
While on the negative side, we quite easily and consistently disobey on our own, without any parental or general societal approval, encouragement or reward. And quite often, in the face of severe punishment, including societal ostracization, lengthy incarceration, torture and execution.
Why are classes on morality and ethics taught at major universities and, why do some modern 21st Century students decide to work for organizations like Doctors Without Borders, while others choose to work for the global war machine? Why are adults rewarded with an international “peace prize”, which includes not only international recognition but also a substantial monetary reward, for behaving like we believe we all should already behave?
This modern evolutionary view is highly suspect based on the fact that many of the most educated modern human beings continue to engage in the same highly destructive anti-human rights behavior as humans in ancient Babylon, Egypt, Greece and Rome. If anything, the human race seems to be devolving backwards.
Many highly educated modern scientists and other human beings continue to create ever more destructive weapons of war and otherwise, mass pollute all hope of our species’ reproductive survival into planetary oblivion, even in the face of overwhelming evidence, dire warnings and devastating predictions of looming planetary disaster.
Meanwhile, educated bankers, lawyers, politicians, preachers and self-help gurus most callously and deliberately continue to defraud fellow human beings out of what meager wealth they may possess.
They continue to sell our children’s future down the great historical river of tears for a few dollars more, regardless of how many millions or billions of dollars they already possess.
And thus, this fundamental assumption of modern evolutionary theory is weighed in the balances of human behavior in both the historical and current record and found severely wanting. When it comes to human behavior and what is best for humanity’s overall reproductive and literal survival, there appears to be no evolutionary advantage ever realized.
If human babies are born morally “pure”, as many adults rather wistfully wish to believe or, if babies are born neutral (i.e., morally “blank” and prone to act 50/50 in either direction) as Freud assumed, then it would be self-evident that what humans collectively perceive to be “good” would be just as easily acquired and adhered to, as what humans collectively perceive to be “bad”.
When in fact, the balances are heavily weighed towards disobedience, rather than obedience of societal moral norms, ethics and moral consensus derived from individual and collective conscience, custom and in the modern age, declared human rights law. We need to be coerced by rewards and punishment into doing what we perceive as being “good”, while we are “bad” quite easily on our own.
If we aren’t born with an inherent moral obedience problem, why is there any necessity for a theory of human rights and, why do some atheists and agnostics stand on street corners holding up peace signs? Why do many people believe it is “good” to hold up a peace sign and “bad” to go to war?
Who decides what is right or wrong for a fellow human being to engage in? If we don’t have an innate greed problem, why is there such a great disparity of wealth here in the 21st Century? Why after thousands of years of moral instruction, are we today standing on the verge of World War Three and global pollution planetary destruction?
How does this represent either a reproductive or any other advantage for our children’s future? Why do we still have walls, bars on windows, locks on doors, soldiers, police, courts, judges, juries and jails here in a modern age emanating from a so-called “Age of Enlightenment”? If this is just our natural selection manifest destiny, then why is Jesus still revered even by some of modern history’s most highly educated people?
How does natural selection weighed in the balances of 21st Century human behavior, equal respect for the teachings of Jesus on one hand, while equating Darwinism with what is really true on the other. As if one good hand of constructive altruism somehow washes the bad hand of sexual survival of the fittest at the price of our neighbor’s disadvantage?
As the New Testament teaches, God did not give us laws and a conscience because our Creator is naive and expected us to obey him but rather, to prove to us that we have an innate moral obedience problem, which the Bible calls “sin” and thus, we cannot save ourselves and need God’s help.
Changing “sin” to more modern terminology like “anti-human rights behavior” or “anti-social behavior”, obviously in no way, shape or form changes our underlying fundamental moral problem. Nor does it relieve any of the resulting violence, slavery, inequality of wealth and immense suffering and sorrow sin causes.
Studies today indicate that what many consider to be socially counter-productive or “evil” human traits like egoism, Machiavellianism, moral disengagement, narcissism, entitlement, psychopathy, sadism, selfishness, spitefulness and other non-caring and non-empathetic traits, stem from a common “dark core” within us. Even modern science believes we have an innate moral problem, which the Encyclopedia Britannica calls the “seething mass within” and the Bible calls “sin”.
Human beings both individually and collectively, represent a significant failure to live up to the fundamental human rights morality dictates of our own conscience. That is, we often fail to treat others like we ourselves wish to be treated.
The legacy of so-called ages of “reason” and “enlightenment” of European and American imperialism, the American, French, Russian, Chinese, Cuban and many other revolutions, WW1, WW2, Vietnam, Iraq and many other horrendous modern wars of unparalleled historical violence and destruction, coupled with modern global mass pollution and a looming WW3 and planetary disaster, very clearly demonstrates that if anything, evolution is taking us backwards. And science and education cannot save us from our sins.
Modern evidence indicates that the evil that people do traces to the same shared cause in the depths of our being, which is what the Bible likewise says (Jeremiah 17:9, Matthew 15:6–11, Romans 1 & 2).
The Dark Core of Human Personality
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180926110841.htm
Contact author: www.FreedomTracks.com
