To atheists?How did humans evolve the ability to lie, cheat and steal?

Question

No animals have this capacity. Or at least they don't know they're stealing if they do. When did the ability to do evil split from our common ancestor.

Okay. Everyone says animals do lie, cheat and steal? But it's not that to them. Do they feel sorry, guilty? Do they have a sense of right and wrong?
If we came from a common ancestor, how did this sense of "wrong" emerge?

Answer 1

Not true. Deception and theft have been observed in numerous social species.

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Fruitcake: Even wolves will show remorse if they injure a fellow packmate. They are aware of their actions having been wrong, and capable of expressing this awareness of wrong doing. In many species, this form of apology is even ritualized.

Again, this is something all social mammallian species share, as is to be expected since the emotions involved are regulated by areas of the brain held in common between all social mammals.

Answer 2

It came about when a human/ancestor of humans found that it was self-serving to lie, cheat, and steal and that such actions could make his/her life easier.

But this isn't really a form of "evil." Animals do it, too. (Example of stealing: A cheetah runs down an antelope. It begins to eat. A pride of lions finds the meal and chases the cheetah away. Cheetah is stuck without a full meal, while lions have their own without having to hunt anything down.) Anyway, how do you know that the animals in question don't know that they're stealing?

The only reason that stealing is considered "wrong" is because of social and meme evolution. (For example, living in clans would destroy much lying and stealing behaviour. Unlike when living independently, a human would run into a certain individual more and more often. This allowed grudges to be held. Would you lie to someone if the other person would hold a grudge and be able to do something about this grudge daily? Thus stealing and lying became more infrequent, but only because it would hurt an individual if he/she did it, not because it was "evil.")

Answer 3

nicely, if I lie then i'm dishonest at regardless of i'm doing, and in a way...stealing the benefit or reward. If I cheat, i'm no longer being straightforward (so it really is a lie), and that i'm stealing the benefits by no longer having gotten them legitimately. If I scouse borrow, then i'm dishonest the monetary equipment we've in position, and that i'm mendacity about being a regulation abiding citizen (until eventually I proclaim to the international that I stole said merchandise), or good individual. So, i wager it would not truly count number. you could't have one without the others.

Answer 4

Perhaps it's because humans make the rules, correct? Humans also made the bible, which is chock FULL of lies, deception, cruelty, absurdity, sexism and violence.

Look at a wolf pack, and see that the Alpha wolf takes what he wants because he's the strongest. The lesser wolves allow the alpha to do so for no other reason but that he's alpha.

Humans do not follow the "survival of the fittest" rule like animals do. We invented society, which at times goes against our animal nature to take from weaker members of our species.

If you have two dogs, and you only put out food for one of them, will the other one "steal" food from the first or is it simply dogs being dogs? The rules of society are what define criminality, and without these rules other animals simply act by instinct.

Answer 5

I read a poem once about a monkey or ape that said, "The man the ornery cuss may have evoled but not from us. No monkey ever put a fence around a tree to keep other monkeys from eating. It went on to say they never steal or lie or make weapons of mas destruction.
Man has freewill from god and a brain, which it can use for good or for evil. Animals move by instinct and it is programed into them what they do.

Answer 6

Ah, OBVIOUSLY lying, cheating and stealing ARE gifts from god.

Actually, you are very wrong. Most animals will steal if given half the chance - food, nesting materials, nest sites, mates.

I have even seen reprts of male salmon that do not migrate to th esea and bother with all that fighting back upstream. they stay small and in the headwaters, and just "nip in" when there are females around. I suppose that is cheating.

Isn't mimicktry a form of lying?

It's all about competative advantage.

Answer 7

No animals can talk either. Or wear clothes. This doesn't act as any kind of proof against evolution.

And animals do cheat and steal. Never seen lions fight over a kill on TV?

Answer 8

Yes, some animals do. I just read an article in the new york times about some animals lie.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/26/science/26lying.html?ex=1324789200&en=e5a094f99c4fd167&ei=5089&partner=rssyahoo&emc=rss

Answer 9

Male penguins have been observed taking every rock in the area, the rocks that female penguins need to make nests. When the female comes looking for rocks, the male penguin makes her mate with him first, then lets her have one rock. To get another rock, she has to go through this again. Penguin prostitution. I'm not kidding.

Answer 10

I'd like to point out that you are assuming moral absolutes, which do not exist. Lying and stealing are not always morally wrong in every single situation.