Human Nature

[emma_goldman]

Are we naturally good or bad?

[RebelDog]

We are both, dependent on what the situation requires. Scarcity 'induces' hoarding in humans and self survival instincts are prominent and thus in the capitalist epoch such traits are seen as natural even though they are less common than co-operation. In a future society where scarcity is eliminated such traits will be dormant entities. Its almost like humans have a pack off cards and they play the hand the need to to survive, like one would expect an intelligent creature to do as a successful evolutionary response to changing social conditions. We live to pass on our genes and we can actually do that with the greatest of chances in a communal, co-operative, sharing society where need is obliterated. Humans have what they need to survive and that is one of the reasons we are around to debate this. Communism is our next evolutionary step and it will bring out the best in a wonderful species that has a great future.

[Leo]

Human nature is just a tabula rasa.

[RebelDog]

Originally posted by Leo [email protected] 11 2006, 09:31 PM
Human nature is just a tabula rasa.
I suppose the 'default' of a human would be such. But a human needs an enviroment to survive and thus cannot be defined without an environment. A mind without interferance must only rely on logic without interferance it cannot be biological surely?

[gilhyle]

I dont think human nature, conceived in abstraction from all environmental determination is a tabula rasa.....but I do think the mind game of thinking what human nature would be without environmental determination is a mere ideological device with no scientific or (legitimate) political significance.

Secondly, the most useful conception of human nature is that human nature is human history since human history is an accumulation of resources and practices that are passed on and determine our options as individuals and collectivities and it is, after all, the purpose of a concept of 'nature' to describe the potentialities of an entity. The current human entity is capable of what late capitalism permits and empowers.

Is this being, this being that can kill a million Rwandans or nurture a child at the cost of its life, good or bad ? Cant make sense of that question. This being simply is. Like it, dislike it, turn yoursself into a mad scientist and destroy it....either way it was neither good nor bad, this being the human species just lived.

Are sharks good or bad ?

[which doctor]

Originally posted by [email protected] 11 2006, 01:45 PM
Are we naturally good or bad?
Good and bad don't really exist. Naturally we aren't anyting since good and bad meant nothing at the birth of man. We naturally act in our own self-interest. Whether that is good or bad is up to you.

[Everyday Anarchy]

We naturally act in our own self-interest.You raise an interesting point, that I agree with almost wholeheartedly. However, if we always act in our self-interest how can you explain [non-religious] martyrdom or just simply taking your life so others can live. You would know that once you're dead, nothing matters... no fame, no respect, nothing. Therefore we aren't acting in our own self-interest.
Humans are capable of doing selfless things.

[JazzRemington]

I think the only thing we can really say about humans is that they act according to their material needs first and foremost. Beyond that, it's pretty much individuals acting individually, influenced by their environment of course.

[OneBrickOneVoice]

Fuck human nature. That's a bourgious lie. People are shaped by their surroundings and society and what they are bombarded with day after day after day with. No one comes out of the womb greedy or evil. They grown up in surroundings that make them like that.

[mauvaise foi]

Originally posted by Leo [email protected] 11 2006, 08:31 PM
Human nature is just a tabula rasa.
That's a simplistic and undialectical falsehood. Human beings are not merely "shaped" by "society." Marx summed it up quite aptly:

The materialist doctrine that men are products of circumstances and upbringing, and that, therefore, changed men are products of changed circumstances and changed upbringing, forgets that it is men who change circumstances and that the educator must himself be educated.

The tabula rasa argument usually runs something like this:
Human beings are shaped by their social environment, which is why people are greedy and violent. So, if we want to change people so that they aren't greedy and violent, "all we have to do" is change the social environment.

But who is this "we?" Does it not describe human beings? And what are human beings except biological creatures with a complex brain and genetic predispositions toward certain behaviors, shaped by millions of years of evolutionary history? "Human nature" is the dialectical interaction between this complex product of natural selection (the brain) and the social environment which was ultimately created by it.

[Janus]

Moved.

[Ultra-Violence]

Humans arent born "good" or "bad" we are all pruducts of our enviroment and cultures etc....Thats were we most of our behavoir from. First you get it from your immediate family and as you grow up you get it from your peers and soceity....
BUT i belive some traits are inbron like rapist and child molesters dont have any evidence to prove that but they do those things out of Impulse etc...
all i got to say :mellow:

[OneBrickOneVoice]

Originally posted by Ultra-[email protected] 12 2006, 02:21 AM
Humans arent born "good" or "bad" we are all pruducts of our enviroment and cultures etc....Thats were we most of our behavoir from. First you get it from your immediate family and as you grow up you get it from your peers and soceity....
BUT i belive some traits are inbron like rapist and child molesters dont have any evidence to prove that but they do those things out of Impulse etc...
all i got to say :mellow:
Rape and Murder don't really have anything to do with human nature.

[rouchambeau]

Both, and yes, good and bad do exist.

[gilhyle]

Originally posted by [email protected] 15 2006, 05:43 PM
Both, and yes, good and bad do exist.
I suggest, then, that you bottle them and sell them.

[Revulero]

We created human nature culturally. Bad and good is determined culturally for example some african tribes practice cannibalism which we see as something bad, but for them its something traditional and they see nothing bad about it.