So where are we then in our development as a species?

Question

I saw a programme on UK television tonight C4 entitled The Last Slave http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/a-b/britains_slave_trade.html - I found it very interesting, not least because as the man on the documentary kept saying ''there is no black and white'' to the truth.

He researched into his past with the aid of his grandfather's diaries, a trip to Jamaica & a visit to a historian in central London & found he had to come to terms with some rather uncomfortable truths about the slave trade and human behaviour in general i.e. that black people sold black people to slave traders etc., that most of the wealth of 17th and 18th century England had relied heavily on the slave trade and that people in Jamaica inspite of it, thought that the British Empire had left somethings behind that were to be desired - the highlight of the documentary was when this black man in search of his roots so to speak came face to face with a white owner of a surviving sugar plantation!

So where are we in our development from e.g. 2001 A Space Odyssey's Gorilla learning to use a bone as tool to where we are now where we know that enslaving people is wrong on the one hand but we are losing control of our kids on the other?

Are we progressing or regressing?

Are we advancing into something towards Arthur C. Clarke's 'Star Child' or is it more like when 'Q' says to Guinan in Star Trek's Next Generation's Q Who episode when he says they or moving to fast and Picard says ''by whose calculation''?

We seem to moving in 'leaps and bounds' when it comes to technology, but what of these mass shootings at our schools blamed on the 'new technological' wonder of the computer game.

Will we become enlightened and wise or we will always be a 'slave' to our ancient drives with our obsession with sport? Is that after all a soft form of war? Is suppressing our violent urges actually hurting us as a species?

With the Far East in one country or another tearing itself apart over ideology and identity - can we overcome the animal in us and achieve balance?

I asked a question recently asking is Evil the default of nature? Well is it ? Can we become more than genetic makeup, our default programming to eat, have sex and go to the toilet ?

To put it in a single sentence:-

CAN WE SURVIVE TO UNDERSTAND WHY & CHANGE & ADAPT & IMPROVE THE PARAMETERS IF WE WISH OF THE EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS?

Even today people worship and argue and fight and kill over the belief of God - since God is what is regarded as the optimum by many - is that as a species what eventually we would hope to achieve - omnipotence?

Answer 1

Your question assumes that our development is on a track, or has some end goal we are heading for. Change on a large scale happens so slowly, I don't really think it's worth asking about, not when compared to change on a small scale.

History is full of individuals who transcended the opinion of the times, or the taboos of their culture, for an ideal or principle. Practices have changed over thousands of years, but I don't think people have, not in the fundamental way you're suggesting. I'm not saying we're all still barbarians. I'm saying that we've always had the capacity to display the attributes (things like compassion and tolerance) that many people think are the evolved traits of modern day humans in modern day society. When that capacity changes on a large scale, or ceases to exist, we probably won't be humans anymore. We'll be something else, what humans have changed into.

Answer 2

Survival is in our nature, as is in other animals. The strong will prevail and the weak will be used at the disposal of the powerful. This is one way a society can work (monarchy).
Another is, for example, in a Bushman tribe, where everything is shared and everyone wroks to the best of their ability. These are two common social functions in social animals.

Answer 3

We have absolutely no way of knowing where we are in our development. For all we know, if more savage people survive and procreate, we will become more savage instead of less. Only time will tell.

I can tell you that 40,000 years of biology will not be beaten by 300 years of civilization. Or even 1,000 years.

Answer 4

here is some dailly example:

we eat chiken cows, and other meat without feeling that we have kill them and not to mention that leftover are ok, just need another unoticed slughter

Answer 5

We as a species have been stagnant and really not developing as we should it seems at times we are going backwards.

Answer 6

Just because we can trace where we've been, doesn't necessarily mean that we can know where we're going next...