Taylor J. Smith wrote: > > Hi All, > > Regardless of whether or not one believes in original sin, > it must be admitted that something is seriously wrong with > homo sapiens.
No, it mustn't. Humans mess up a lot, it's true, but they try a lot, too. When the last polar bear is gone from the arctic, what species will mourn? Homo sapiens, and that's all. Trivial example, large concept. Humans evolved in a world in which "everybody", as perceived by any one person, was perhaps a few dozen individuals. Our innate knack for politics also evolved in that world. Yet despite the small size of the slate we were designed on, we've gone on to produce institutions which work (more or less) on a planet wide basis. We wrestle, all of us, with instincts which were evolved in a world where eating more calories was almost always good, where reproducing was vital and more children was nearly always better, where land was infinite and nurturing the land was unnecessary, where large predators were the Enemy and compassion for other species was silly and/or self destructive. Yet, many of us regularly rise above the instincts that evolution left us with, and act in ways which seem so utterly selfless that they might totally amaze members of any other species, if they could understand what we do. Saving large predators which are known to prey on humans, just because they *should* be saved, is just one small example of such behavior. Altruistic behavior is, frankly, common as dirt among humans. Charities would not exist without such behavior. Not only does such behavior always extend beyond the family group, or even the race group, it often, as I already pointed out, extends across species boundaries. When a sparrow falls in the woods, who cares? There's only one species I know of with members who might pick up a fallen sparrow and try to nurse it back to health: Humans. (Contrast *that* with the documented behavior of the Old Testament "god" who killed Job's wife and children and inflicted him with boils just to prove a point in a stupid argument.) Things are not going well right now in a number of ways, and we may or may not find a way out of our current problems. None the less I would hesitate a long time before I issued a blanket condemnation of humankind. Errors, accidents, and failure are not automatic proof of either malicious intent or any intrinsic lack of worth.
