Some Trivers video...
Reg
location: back to the wilderness
listening to: static
registered: 1999.11.22
http://www.edge.org/video/dsl/trivers.html
The above link will take you to a video of Robert Trivers. Really a fascinating individual. I'm no closer to making a documentary featuring this character than I was before (David would of course be asked to provide the music) but this video may at least provide a little insight about why I find him so interesting. He talks about the key aspect of his theory that inspired me and that is basically our instinct to self deceive to propagate what we feel is our way of life even if it may be self destructive to the whole. As an example we could hold up the fact that some people voted for George W. Bush in the last election because they felt it would further their pursuit of ending abortion or defending heterosexual marriage even though on some level they understood it would not benefit mankind (or even all US citizens) as whole to continue his presidency.
Somewhere at the genetic level this selfishness can be explained in that they are willing to sacrifice other human beings who don't believe as they do because not only does it meet their surface goals but it also meets their selfish genetic desires to see those who don't believe as they do destroyed so that their kind will triumph and survive. You can try to bury all that in some hokum about God and values but the fact is its simple animal instinct and genetic desire steering the ship. Top that off with our general embrace of denial and we arrive at the point where a guy like Dubya gets elected. Overall not that complex or surprising.
Of course this can all go much deeper than that simplistic example but it's a starting point.
"For the last ten or fifteen years, I've been trying to understand situations in nature in which the genes within a single individual are in disagreement—or put differently, in which genes within an individual are selected in conflicting directions. It's an enormous topic, which 20 years ago looked like a shadow on the horizon, just as about a hundred years ago what later became relativity theory was just two little shadows on the horizon of physics, and blew up to become major developments. In genetics it's fair to say that about 20 years ago a cloud on the horizon was our knowledge that there were so-called selfish genetic elements in various species that propagated themselves at the expense of the larger organism. What was then just a cloud on the horizon is now a full-force storm with gale winds blowing." -Robert Trivers
–--
'The only way to avoid getting crushed by absurdity, is to humbly include the absurd in our calculations.'
Reg
(view)
http://www.edge.org/video/dsl/trivers.html
The above link will take you to a video of Robert Trivers. Really a fascinating individual. I'm no closer to making a documentary featuring this character than I was before (David would of course be asked to provide the music) but this video may at least provide a little insight about why I find him so interesting. He talks about the key aspect of his theory that inspired me and that is basically our instinct to self deceive to propagate what we feel is our way of life even if it may be self destructive to the whole. As an example we could hold up the fact that some people voted for George W. Bush in the last election because they felt it would further their pursuit of ending abortion or defending heterosexual marriage even though on some level they understood it would not benefit mankind (or even all US citizens) as whole to continue his presidency.
Somewhere at the genetic level this selfishness can be explained in that they are willing to sacrifice other human beings who don't believe as they do because not only does it meet their surface goals but it also meets their selfish genetic desires to see those who don't believe as they do destroyed so that their kind will triumph and survive. You can try to bury all that in some hokum about God and values but the fact is its simple animal instinct and genetic desire steering the ship. Top that off with our general embrace of denial and we arrive at the point where a guy like Dubya gets elected. Overall not that complex or surprising.
Of course this can all go much deeper than that simplistic example but it's a starting point.
"For the last ten or fifteen years, I've been trying to understand situations in nature in which the genes within a single individual are in disagreement—or put differently, in which genes within an individual are selected in conflicting directions. It's an enormous topic, which 20 years ago looked like a shadow on the horizon, just as about a hundred years ago what later became relativity theory was just two little shadows on the horizon of physics, and blew up to become major developments. In genetics it's fair to say that about 20 years ago a cloud on the horizon was our knowledge that there were so-called selfish genetic elements in various species that propagated themselves at the expense of the larger organism. What was then just a cloud on the horizon is now a full-force storm with gale winds blowing." -Robert Trivers
–--
'The only way to avoid getting crushed by absurdity, is to humbly include the absurd in our calculations.'
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