Are human beings control freaks by nature?

Question

So many people I know have fallen into habit, and the idea of anything different is so scary some develop paranoia, anxiety disorders or psychosis. I want to know where that fear lies. What's so bad about not knowing what will happen next?

What makes 'change' and 'the unknown' such terrifying possibilities?

Answer 1

it appeals to a basic instinct to stick with what we know allows us to survive.

Humans instinctively seek a level of stability, and things that alter (or can potentially alter) this stablility lead to fear. This isn't really irrational, as seeking constant change and always performing risk-seeking behavior is a fast way to death in most circumstances. More to the point, when you start noticing that things are changing, you don't necessarily know how to react.

This applies to anything from a work situation, where you notice some odd things but aren't sure what they mean, to a coming hurricane - sure the wind and surf are picking up but you can't know what to do with certainty.

As for the unknown, it is the embodiment undefined risk and, I think, at a basic level reminds us of death - which we are generally built to avoid. There is nothing we can do about it, so we seek to define it, to find ways to mitigate it, but there will always be something unknown.


Hope this helps!

Answer 2

To answer the first. It's the animal nature in us all that makes us control freaks. The 'Alpha' nature of just about any animal on God's green earth.
Now, maybe I'm just tired and the coffee hasn't started to work yet, but I'm not seeing a relevance to the question and the details.
Being afraid of change and the unknown has nothing to do with being a control freak as far as my brain is telling at this point.
Change and the unknown are terrifying in the fact that they are 'change and unknown'. Humans are habitual animals and don't like it when that habit is changed. We get into a set routine and that's the way we live our lives. When that routine changes, it's rather frightening because we don't know what to expect. If it's going to be good or bad so we worry about it rather than looking forward to it.

Answer 3

Not by our natures, Godself, but by social conditioning.

Parents want docile children , who won't challenge them or become discipliary problems.

Governments want docile citizens, who won't question more fascist laws and being sent over to Iraq to fight some imaginary cause.

People are timid and afraid, because they are TRAINED to be that way. Because scared people do not stand up for their own liberties. Scared people do not challenge the "authorities". Scared people will take whatever goofy medicines that the doctors hand out this month.

Scared people will change their eating habits if something is "bad for them".

We aren't human beings anymore. We are a joke. Just enslaved to culture, government, fashion and fads, and above all to advertising.

Answer 4

I'm trying to discern your definition of "control freaks" in this. My own take on it may not be the same as yours. I distinguish a control freak from someone who wants to control the physical facts of his own life to the extent reasonable.

To me, a control freak is someone who gets off on controlling other people. Petty bureaucrat syndrome, if you will. To me, a control freak is a person who can turn into a real monster if given real power, and is a pain in the rear to us every day with what little power they have.

If you feel you must tell other adults how to do things even when their mistakes have no impact on your own life, you are a control freak. You do not trust the adult population to act like adults and take responsibility for their own actions. You've got to be Nanny (or Uncle Al?) and tell them what to do.

I'm a Libertarian, myself. That means I don't want to pay taxes to indulge those people who want petty control-freak jobs in the bureaucracy, where they just make people's lives miserable. I am convinced there is a better way to do anything they actually get accomplished. Except pay their own salaries, of course.

Answer 5

Awesome question! I think fear of the unknown is a good survival mechanism. But I also think modern man/woman would do well to educate himself to decrease the number of unknowns in his/her life...Or at least come to terms with the things he does and does not know. We can control many things, but not everything.

Answer 6

I would say that yes we all want to be in control of a situation as our egos like our environment to be predictable so that we can look at our best, prepared for what is coming and clever dealing with our familiar context of life.
Change means calling on other aspects of our personality that we don't use as often and most people don't thrive in those situations.

Answer 7

It's true many people are happy in their own comfort zone, but not all people,some like the thrill of new things. those that are truly frightened of new things may have had something from their past to make them that way maybe

Answer 8

Who controls the controller?

Answer 9

I believe it is in the blood.

Answer 10

You made me think about death, **** now im scared.