Wednesday, February 07, 2007 ' 8:34 PM Y
& your soul is all i ever wanted
hmm....
have been reflecting on the latest post of benlo which was inspired by jason (both my seniors) and would now like to add my ha'penny worth.
(i have to refer to a dictionary and copy meanings of words when reading these posts...sigh)
firstly i agree with the latter points about society and security
However, I'd like to comment on the point
"our desires and needs are socially imposed constructs. Society forces us to believe that these things are essential and necessary to life, such that when we don’t achieve them, it directly attacks the only thing that, in principle, is truly inherent to us: Our sense of identity and worth."Firstly, let's scratch out the basic needs (aka the lowest level of Maslow's Hierarchy, I still remember my GeePee) because even before society existed, at the primal level our actions are determined by the need to obtain sustenance and ensure our survival. Once our survival is almost certain (I say almost because we still have some perfectly healthy people dropping dead for unknown reasons) then only can we manifest our hard earned energy into fulfilling our desires.
Which brings me to the definition of desires. A common definition of desire in this context might be something non-essential to our survival that we really want. However, as according to my GP tutor (tho' I'm not sure if this idea came from somewhere else) only 2 things motivate us, pleasure and pain. (Having examined this I'm still looking for a counter argument, and have not brought in any religious arguments due to the lack of empirical measurement of the validity of such arguments.) Combine this with my opinion (which needs to be challenged lest i lose hope in the human existance) that without religion, the only purpose of our existance is for propagation (meaning production of more humans through sex and gestation and birth until cloning of humans is possible) and you get my theory that
All our actions are built on the purpose of avoiding pain and obtaining pleasure because both these "feelings" enable efficient propagation of our species.(Of course, this theory does not take into account religion and is flawed in that aspect. Especially when it comes to my religion where we are neither supposed to "chase" pleasure or fear pain because all things are impermenant.)
Which FINALLY brings me to my point - since according to my theory, we are individually programmed to reproduce and ensure our survival, our needs and desires are inherent instead of imposed by society. What society does is enhance the survival of the race, and thus preserve the genetic blueprint of humans.
The mechanism is quite ingenious really. To ensure survival, by the law of natural selection the fittest individuals are those most adept reproducing and thus passing on their genes. How are the fittest individuals identified?? Well, there are the physical looks on the basic level, but as society progresses the means of measuring "probability that our offspring will survive" increase and become more complicated. So instead of your looks I may also look at your education, your ability to support a family financially etc etc.
Basically I feel that our desires and needs are not imposed by society, but are conferred to us naturally. (This argument obviously does not take God into account but then again, I do not believe in a creator god.) Since our desires are natural parts of ourselves, then perhaps there is room to explain the individual means we have to "determine" our needs and desires. Taking the breathing in of fresh air pleasure (which I enjoy very much too) perhaps there is an inherent meaning to that action, such as triggering a biological (or psychological) reaction pathway that convinces you:
congratulations!! you're still living and have full reason to do so, this is soooo pleasurable!
which cinches your desire to continue............surviving. and pass on the genes and so on
Omg this is such a lengthy piece, I'm not even sure if i have addressed the points.....
Shoot my writing has really degraded.
But here is my last argument for the inherent nature of our needs and desires....
Most societies have leaders. While having leaders increases the effieciency of most societies (most because some leaders have caused the downfall of societies for their own personal gain, perhaps ironically ensuring the survival of their genes in a very extreme manner) what encourages people to WANT to become leaders? (As from my experience it can be a big headache, unless you want to be a dictator) Power of course. Power is a way that you can ensure your genes and offspring WILL survive. (if there is need for further elaboration leave me a note in the taggie and i'll elaborate in the next post)
So, lets consider that there were many societies arising independently from each other in ancient times before communication across deserts and oceans were possible. All the ancient civilisations that left a noticable impact and history were governed by able leaders at one point or another. Since these leaders took charge independently of each other (for eg. early Chinese civilisations were not influenced by those say in the Fertile Cresent) I postulate that the "phenomenon" of a leader becoming established in any group of people is due to an inherent desire some individuals have for power (which is of course linked to survival).
Horrible argument I'd say, it seems to go around everywhere. Maybe i need to draw diagrams to illustrate.
Hope that made sense, otherwise...........IGNORE THIS I AM TRYING TO IMPROVE MY ARGUMENTATIVE COMPOSITIONS.
got lessons to prepare.
kchan
