5/3/12

In section three of Darwin's theory of Human Nature it is talked about the difference between biology's point of view when it comes to our nature and why we act the way we do. It is known in society that woman are more inclined to take care of the children and biologically it is thought this is because the women are the one's carrying the child so they feel a connection to the baby on a different level than the father. But what about the way that society defines us as women and men? Nature is not our destiny when it comes to biology, but it is argued the fact that society makes us act and feel a different way.  Girls at a young age are taught to be more understanding and compassionate as while men are taught to be tough, care givers and more agressive. The argument is how much of this has to do with biology and how much has to do with the way that we are treated at a young age.   

5/2/12

When reading about Darwin it is said that men are superior to woman but woman could be trained to think and act more like men. This concept baffles me because what I get out of this thinking is that it is thought that it is only necessary to keep women around to have children. I question if it was wrong to act like a woman in Darwin's eyes or to just be a woman in general? I know that some men like woman that are more masculine, but how are men suppose to be attracted to woman that are constantly acting like men? Also I question if Darwin would think that woman would be subject to natural selection if it wasn't for the fact that they are needed to bare the children and that by acting like a man they are more fit to survive? I might be looking into this a little to far but the way that woman were viewed during that time blows my mind; how do you think that women could be trained like animals to act a different way? 

5/1/12

When reading into any great philosopher it is a given that there are going to be different ideas, writing styles, and ways of viewing the world. But what influences those ideas? The issues in society (like racism) can be traced into even the most enlightened peoples work. Another example of how things have changed is before in writing only "he" was used, females weren't usually talked about in earlier writings. Now in almost every writers work both woman and man are talked about in their written text. But a newer influence of society that has infected writers in the bi-est look at Mideastern people after 9/11. In our society still we look at people from the middle east as the bad guys and the people that shouldn't be allowed on a plane. Even though most of them do not practice in the harsh beliefs of terrorism, we still look at them as though they did something wrong. This belief can even be traced in our text of the modern age.

4/30/12

With Darwin's idea of natural selection it is said that anyone that has a defect of any kind (mental or physical) would die because of the environment and that is natural selection at it's finest. In other words nature would weed them out, for example blind people would get hit by cars and handicap people wouldn't be able to get out of their houses and therefor they would die because they are not fit enough to live. They are only alive because of the people that are fit enough to take care of them and feel guilty enough to help them. In his theory he thinks that by us helping those that are not fit to live on their own that we are messing with the natural selection process and that is wrong. But there is a hiccup in this theory; no human can live on their own, we need help from one another to survive no matter how fit we are. Without someone taking care of us when we were born we would die within a couple hours. We're not like crocodiles who as soon as they are born they run from the nest because their mother sees them as a source of food. I would say that we're pretty luck in the sense that our mothers don't want to eat us as soon as we're born.  

4/26/12

Competition of resources causes us to battle for them, and by this nature selects who's the most fit. But by fitness I'm not talking about who is the strongest, ants can lift 100x's their weight, no human can do that but yet we can crush an ant and think nothing of it. There is also the example of dinosaurs who were one of the strongest and biggest animals on Earth. It is proven by their extinction that they weren't fit for their environment so they were killed off. Also fitness isn't shared genetically, just because your parents were smart doesn't mean that you are going to be just as smart. This is where Nature vs. Nurture comes in. Your parents might play the guitar, that doesn't mean automatically that you are going to love guitar, but because you have been around the guitar all your life you might pick up an intrest from your surroundings.  

4/25/12

Everyone has heard of survival of the fittest, at least anyone that has taken a biology class. It is the process of selecting an animal to survive based on who's most "fit". But philosophers argue what it means to be the most fit, does it mean that you are the most physically fit, or the smartest, or the animal that just has the best luck? Some would argue that it depends on the situation. We talked about in class how a snake would be able to crawl through a small hole to survive, yet even though we are smarter as humans and kill snakes all the time in that example the snake would be more fit. But if it came to be able to create a way to feed yourself for live and make the tools to make that skill easier humans would triumph any animal. I feel that we are all fit in different ways but it's just the environment that you are in and what danger you need to survive that makes all the difference. We might be one of the smartest animals on earth, but we defiantly aren't the most capable animals to survive.   

4/24/12

Something that really blew my mind was finding out that when George Bush was running for President the way that people morally chose between who they would vote for was thinking who they would more likely have a beer with. How can we as Americans think that is a rational way of thinking that is the way that we should make a decision as to who should run our country? As I said in my last post, we are responsible for the choices that we make, so how can we be so mad at George Bush when we are the ones that put him in office in the first place. I agree that he needs to take responsibility for the choices that he made to but I feel that it is a two way street. I also said in my last post that people having different morals make it hard to judge what is right and wrong, but there is also something known as common sense and I feel that should be considered something that we could judge if someone has it or not.