From: Hubert Mania (humania@t-online.de)
Date: Thu Feb 20 2003 - 11:27:31 MST
Me:
> > all you fine young
> > cannibals feel pretty relaxed because you have done the right
> > thing. That's why you appear to be the nicer people.
Brett:
>
> This sounds a little piqued Hubert, I mean no criticism by this as I
> think that's natural enough given the topic and the strong feelings
> many people have of it.
Well, with that "piqued" statement I had already disciplined myself from
using stronger words and images. Calling war supporters the "nicer" people,
is selfrighteous kindergarten level and cries for an answer.
>But I am interested in your suggestion that
> there might be an evolutionary and neurological bias towards
> feeling good about supporting a decision to engage in conflict.
> I am sceptical myself that this is likely to be a significant bias but
> what you saying is not obviously impossible (at least to me) do
> you have an data or research to support your view?
>
I am not an expert in evolutionary biology but it seems obvious that Homo
sapiens has more than one brain. The older stacks, sometimes referred to as
"reptile brain", regulate your alertness when your personal territory seems
to be attacked. Piss off you sonofabitch or I smash your bloody....(insert
whatever you want to have smashed on your enemy who actually might be a poor
and weak relative who wanted to ask you for some food) The slightest
threatening is answered by tightly wired behaviour with almost no options
left. You have to defend your little front garden, bark as loud as you can
and prevent the people from across the road to pee at the lamp post, where
your garden fence ends. This is a very powerful ancient evolutionary
program. Difficult to overcome.
>
> For my part I wonder sometimes if my atheism which I think is
> a position I've arrived at intellectually rather than emotionally
> may bias my perceptions more towards being willing to be
> hawkish when the circumstances require it.
>
> I grew up in a Christian tradition (Roman Catholic secondary
> school and all) and went through the stages of agnostic to atheist
> in my mid to late teens. ......
I grew up with the very same mind set and became an atheist in my late
teens. But it was in post war Germany, so I aquired the memes of my
generation (I was born 1954) that no country should engage in a war anymore
except when it is attacked. In that case, of course it is justified to
defend your life and I would probably learn to use a gun very quickly. And I
know that some contemporary Christian think tanks (yes, the DO have some :-)
are finally talking about a "just peace" - in the case of Iraq - instead of
a "just war" or a holy war, which had been a Christian dogma through the
ages. There is a congregation (?) in Rome, forgot its name. They were
already nominated for the Peace Nobel Prize. Maybe one of our Italian
friends knows who I am talking about.
Anyway, coming back to the topic: The USA are NOT attacked by Saddam, so
they have no bloody right to invade his country and piss at his garden
fence with a GPS penis. It is a crime and Troubleyou Bush will be a criminal
if he does so. This is the democratic point of view. The momentary Bush
doctrine is an imperialistic stance which scares the rest of the world,
because it shows a tendency to drift away from democratic principles.
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