• @jet@hackertalks.com
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    1 year ago

    I’ll take a different approach here. Evolution does not care about your feelings.

    If a species is unwilling to self-sacrifice for the greater good, and it comes up against an event that cannot be solved with selfishness, it goes extinct. Like in this scenario.

    But evolution is a motherfucker, and evolution does not care about your feelings, the only thing that matters to evolution is reproductive success. So some people are going to be altruistic because that’s better for the species because it makes it more survivable.

    I’m not saying it’s right, I’m not saying it’s wrong, but the species that’s going to survive is the one that’s willing to self sacrifice for the greater good of the species. To increase reproductive success. And that’s what’s going to be left in the universe. Because evolution does not care. You either get with the program or you get out of the gene pool no other option

          • Evolutionary biology is definitely no basis for a system of morality. But I must say, as a biologist who studied evolution, that social Darwinism is not based either on evolutionary theory or empirical evidence. The idea that evolution is driven solely by competitive ability is pseudoscience, and works neither in human nor animal populations.

            • @gapbetweenus@feddit.de
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              21 year ago

              I wrote it further down, ist based on very basic understanding of evolution (happen to have studied biology myself) and sure, like any other moral system it’s not based on any empirical evidence.

              • @jet@hackertalks.com
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                1 year ago

                It may not be the happiest way to go but I think it’s the only self-consistent way to go.

                As an individual I totally believe in making the world a better place, do unto others as that you would have them do unto you, all of that. But in the scenario where the world’s going to end unless one dude sacrifices themselves, I would say basic instinct kicks in. The tribe must survive!

                • @gapbetweenus@feddit.de
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                  21 year ago

                  I hope you just pretend that you don’t know what social Darwinism is and how applying it worked out in the end.

                  • @jet@hackertalks.com
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                    11 year ago

                    I’m aware of it, and I’ve made no statements along those lines. I think it’s disingenuous to conflate my statements of evolution and the question of one sacrifice for the good of the world, to social Darwinism.

          • You know Darwin himself was against the idea. He argued that our ability to look after one another was one of the most vital parts of being human and we can’t save humanity by giving up our humanity.