Posted: Sep 22, 2019 10:22 am
Jayjay4547 wrote:Cito di Pense wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:
The main external relations for our deep ancestors, like for any prey species in a deeply structured biome like in Africa, would be their predators.
JJ, you've set up humans and something external to humans in order to place humans at the center of whatever relations you're postulating. If you don't understand that this assumes your conclusion, then you don't. You're still trying to portray the environment as forcing human evolution. But that's also your conclusion.
Not so complicated Cito, I was identifying the “external relations” for our early hominin ancestors. Then I went on to model how those relations bore on the human creation.
Yeah, that's what Cito just said.
This 'human origins story' isn't like a Marvel superhero origin story. There's no devised grand narrative arch to be played out, with popcorn. No hero, no antagonist, no catharsis, no redemption, no actors, agents, producers, directors, or writers all working to bring a story to life, as it were. So what if it's all just dumb material doing dumb material stuff, and that we call all that evolution, and that us two-legged thunking mammals are just one of the results of alll of it? Really, what's wrong with that story?
Sure, it's (relatively speaking) important to tell each other stories about where we've come from, where we are, and where we're going. In fact one might argue that our evolved capacity for story-telling is a response to certain environmental pressures, and that this capacity allowed our ancestors to succeed by offering them a means to transmit information and plan ahead, and all that jazz. However, your stories about early humans being involved in a unique and peculiar Battle Royal between themselves and Nature, a battle that by rights humans should have lost if not for the helping hand of Shiva, Odin, Arceus, Bandu, Him, Her, or whatever deity, starts with humans being a special species and continues to justify that specialness on the basis that... well... on the basis that humans are just special.
If that story works for you then that's great. jayjay, I think you're special. Really, really special.
Now tell me again why it's not OK for people to think that they're nothing special or why nobody else can be special unless they accept your story as actually factually true?