Just Curious

[Kit Kat P]

Yep, those skulls are also FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND YEARS OLD. Anatomically modern humans did not arrive on the scene until about two hundred thousand years ago, and the Great Leap Forward didn't begin until about sixty thousand years ago.

We are descendants of evolutionary dead ends that were cannibals. There is no evidence that pre-modern man was exactly what you are calling us. Take a few seconds, and stand outside of your argument, eh?

I am not discounting the possibility of cannibalism happening in extreme cases amongst our ancestors. Indeed, the Donner Party's grisly story would make such a denial foolish. However, FOR THE NORM, I feel that pre-modern man would rather avoid a fight than get in one.

Because... if you can walk away, you can live for another day.

by the by, they have proven that there wasn't any cannibalism at Donner's Pass

[phee]

Watching Gaf and Ttogreh is a little like watching somebody with a split personallity argue with themself...

[ttogreh]

Phee, my point of view is that humans, the great amoral innovators, did not commit war as a tool for most of human existence because there were so few of us, and we were sparsely distributed. Gaf seems to believe that war is bred into our genes, and that we were just biding our time until there were enough of us around to commit war as a tool.

It is a dismal, cynical, and altogether dark and pitiable view of humanity.

We commit war as a tool because there is a PAYOFF from it. Ideas are just like any other spear, fish hook, or buffalo hide, Phee. The state is a successful idea because war works.

However, we are developing different ideas, and different tools. The isms of the world just need the right amount of societal maturity and technical assistance to provide a valid counterpoint to the state.

It won't happen in our lifetimes, and I don't know when it will happen. However, I see the consolidation of more and more power into the hands of fewer and fewer states, Phee. What the hell is the state to do when it has finally won?

It can create more bogeymen, or people will realize that the state is an obsolete idea.

Humans are wonderful generalists. We can find the new middle path, and walk it. I suspect the state, that immortal idea with so much power, will not fade away without a fight, though.

After all, that's why we thought it up in the first place.

[ZhukovCodeslinger]

I love cheese! Please pass me some lemongrass and mustard.

[Steven]

Phee, my point of view is that humans, the great amoral innovators, did not commit war as a tool for most of human existence because there were so few of us, and we were sparsely distributed. Gaf seems to believe that war is bred into our genes, and that we were just biding our time until there were enough of us around to commit war as a tool.

It is a dismal, cynical, and altogether dark and pitiable view of humanity.

We commit war as a tool because there is a PAYOFF from it. Ideas are just like any other spear, fish hook, or buffalo hide, Phee. The state is a successful idea because war works.

However, we are developing different ideas, and different tools. The isms of the world just need the right amount of societal maturity and technical assistance to provide a valid counterpoint to the state.

It won't happen in our lifetimes, and I don't know when it will happen. However, I see the consolidation of more and more power into the hands of fewer and fewer states, Phee. What the hell is the state to do when it has finally won?

It can create more bogeymen, or people will realize that the state is an obsolete idea.

Humans are wonderful generalists. We can find the new middle path, and walk it. I suspect the state, that immortal idea with so much power, will not fade away without a fight, though.

After all, that's why we thought it up in the first place.

I tend to agree with Gaf.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

So do people who have studied human history.

[ttogreh]

Yes, but we are talking about PRE History, Gaf. We developed the ability to traverse an entire continent in a year. We USED that ability. Then, we figured out a way to get rid of the blisters on our feet.

It is this preconceived notion that war, since it is prevalent amongst current AGRARIAN primitive societies, that war was prevalent amongst the humans that had absolutely NO concept of land ownership, that I reject.

The early days of humanity were violent, desperate, and altogether hanging by a thread enough already to not really need war. The risks were likely too high, and the payoff was likely too small.

[know_buddy_kares]

Watching Gaf and Ttogreh is a little like watching somebody with a split personallity argue with themself...

it actually reminds me more of this than anything...

[Kit Kat P]

Yes, but we are talking about PRE History..

I may regret this later but....

Are you serious?!? PRE History?!?

[ttogreh]

I just find holding the shift key to be easier than typing out the BB code for italics, Kit Kat P.

[wearyone]

communism working...... and a GOOD example of that would be found where?

Hmm...

I'd casually find an excuse to unentangle myself from them and walk away quickly.. very quickly..

so yeah it would bother me, a lot.

[AstralCrux]

As a small and precarious population, Moriori embraced a pacifist culture which rigidly avoided warfare, substituting it with dispute resolution in the form of ritual fighting and conciliation. The ban on warfare and cannibalism is attributed to their ancestor Nunuku-whenua.

"...because men get angry and during such anger feel the will to strike, that so they may, but only with a rod the thickness of a thumb, and one stetch of the arms length, and thrash away, but that on an abrasion of the hide, or first sign of blood, all should consider honour satisfied" [2]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moriori

I'm going to argue that it is social... In fact I'm under the impression that it is more nurture than nature. There are cultures that have practiced a good amount of pacifisim and the amount of violence that each culture has is separate from one another. Today we see more of an overlapping, because of concepts like mass media. Humans are not extremely agressive by nature. Protective, posessive- yes, but many have used forms of manipulation rather than agressiveness.

Utopia (1847 to 1860s)

Utopia was an individualist anarchist colony begun in 1847 by Josiah Warren and associates, on a tract of land in the United States approximately 30 miles (48 km) from Cincinnati, Ohio. Personal invitation from the first settlers was required for admission to the community, with Warren reasoning that the most valuable individual liberty was "the liberty to choose our associates at all times." Land was not owned communally, but individually, with lots being bought and sold at cost, as required by contractual arrangement. The economy of the community was a system based upon private property and a market economy where labor was the basis of exchange value (see Mutualism (economic theory)). Goods and services were traded by the medium of "labor notes." By the mid-1850's, the community eventually came to contain approximately 40 buildings, about half of which were of an industrial nature. Also present were two "time stores" (see Cincinnati Time Store). The impact of the American Civil War, the rising prices of surrounding land (which made expansion difficult), and the requirement of being invited by the original settlers are said to have led to the eventual dissolution of the project. However, as late as 1875 a few of the original occupants were still in residence and some business in the area was still being conducted by labor notes.

Sources:

Rick Crawford, Uneasy Spirits: 13 Ghost Stories from Clermont County, Ohio (Rhiannon Publications, 1997)

Martin, James J. Men Against the State. The Adrian Allen Associates, Dekalb, Illinois, 1953.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_anarchist_communities

[Steven]

I may regret this later but....

Are you serious?!? PRE History?!?

thats actually a pretty dang good point.

[phee]

thats actually a pretty dang good point.

It took place slightly before the past began....

[Steven]

It took place slightly before the past began....

yes....I can actually feel myself getting more smarter now

[ttogreh]

... And this particular discussion has thoroughly burnt itself out.