I'm an evolutionist. One cannot argue that evolution isn't a fact. However, I'd be interested in the better informed amongst us here explaining in simple terms how the feeling of love evolved. It is a fact that animals can display altruism. Some dogs, for example, have laid down their lives for their masters.I'm an evolutionist. One cannot argue that evolution isn't a fact. However, I'd be interested in the better informed amongst us here explaining in simple terms how the feeling of love evolved. It is a fact that animals can display altruism. Some dogs, for example, have laid down their lives for their masters.
Ian, I have been giving this subject a great deal of thought myself in the last year or so. I have become an atheist just in the last year since leaving the JW's thanks, in part, due to the great debates and logical argumentation of the subject by some of the atheists on this discussion board. I have been seeing a counselor who is also an atheist and has a great interest in evolution, biology, and how human belief systems are formed. I remember one day when we were discussing how I felt like I had nothing to believe in anymore and how I felt that with no external moral compass to guide me, there was no reason to be good, loving etc. It was just survival of the fittest, every man for himself, take what you can get out of life, do what you feel like doing. (I realize now that this was a view of atheists that was taught/conditioned into my mind by JW's). Anyway when I said this to my counselor, he looked me straight in the eye and said with absolute conviction, "there is still something worth believing in: Love". I was very surprised to hear those words coming from an atheist and an evolutionist. I have been pondering them ever since, trying to reconcile how love fits in with evolutionary biology.
If you think of some of the basic principles of evolution: natural selection, survival of the fittest, competition for finite or scarce resources, it is easy to see many examples of these principles in action in the material world and animal societies, including humans. It is less easy to see how love fits into the picture. Love, or altruism, would seem to contradict some of these principles. While it is fairly easy to see how it is beneficial to parents to protect their own children (propagation of the species and their own DNA as Kid A argues, and someone to look after them when they are old and weak), it is less easy explain those humans who sacrifice their time, energy and resources to take care of the sick, the disabled, the poverty stricken, especially those who may never get better or be able to contribute to society or to the people who helped them in any meaningful way. Even more difficult, what benefit, from an evolutionary viewpoint, would there for a healthy human specimen to go so far as to sacrifice their own life to protect or save humans who are weaker and less competent to defend themselves? Yet, we know, there have been many instances where humans have done just that. We also know there are many humans who have done the opposite and exploited the elderly, the young, the weak, the sick, the disabled, for their own greed and personal selfish gain. They very much seem to exemplify the principle, "survival of the fittest" Which type of human do others of the species tend to admire and value and hold up as a role model worth emulating? Generally, in our society, the former. Why?
If we continue to look at the question only from the viewpoint of the individual human of the species, there is no advantage. If we widen out to the human family unit, we can see physical and economic value to the family as a unit if individual members cooperate and work together for the benefit of the family even though those benefits may come at a higher cost to some individuals. In families where the selfishness of one member dominates it is often at great detriment to the entire family as a unit. Now, widen that principle of altruism and self sacrifice to include neighbourhoods, cities, and even entire countries in the circle and it becomes obvious that those larger communities of humans can and do evolve in very beneficial ways to humans as a whole group or species, however, again, it may be at cost or great sacrifice to individuals of the species.
Now, because of advanced technology, what humans do in one country in one part of the world affects not only the humans in thier countries but in other parts of the world, for better or worse. Humans could, and many do, attribute western advancement and technology to superiority, greater success at competition for world's resources, survival of the fittest, might makes right, etc. It may not be loving/altruistic and some may call western over consumption greedy, but hey, it's just the natural evolution of things in the world. Yet, those conditions have now advanced to the point where the survival of large segments of the population in third world countries are threatened. Even worse, we have the capability of damaging the physical environment to the point where we threaten our entire species. This could be a natural evolution of events but it would certainly not be a beneficial one to our species as a whole.
If we define love as awareness and a recognition of the interconnectedness and interdependence of all members of our species on one another and the interdependence between species and the responsiblility to work towards not just the good of our individual selves and our individual families and our individual cultures but the good of the entire species and the planet as a whole, then it becomes clear exactly what role "love" plays in evolution. It is a survival mechanism for the perpetuation of the species.
It also occurs to me, in the act of writing this, that this definition of love is an excellent measuring stick to determine whether religion is truly a benefit to the evolution of mankind as a whole. While every major religious philosophy talks a good game about the meaning of love, and claims that total conversion of the world and obedience to their tenants would be love exemplified, in reality, it seems that most foster an "us versus them mentality" and this has resulted in the opposite of their declared goal, an inability to work together in cooperation for the good of all mankind. The only way they could truly accomplish this feat is to drop their beliefs that they are right and their way is the only way, "the truth". They would have to let go of their excessive attachment to their own community of relgious faithful, and truly accept that their fate is also inextricably intertwined with all others of the human species, not just the members of their own faith.
Cog
