Quote:
Originally Posted by marvin_pa
Reproduction is programmed behavior, designed to continue a species - it's not really a conscious decision to leave some kind of personal legacy. Yes, I know that a desire to extend the family line is a conscious thing, but there is also plenty of procreative activity that takes place, simply because the activity is pleasurable, something that's hardwired into our brains.
See above. Reproduction is programmed. Genetics is programming... with random corruption thrown in to add variety - thait last part is important, it's the element that prevents the initial code from going stale & being prone to destruction via unforeseen events. If this is a totally random, accidental state of affairs, then it's a massively fortuitous one for life as we know it.
I see no reason why life, the universe and everything cannot be equally represented by the creative works of Monty Python, Douglas Adams, Henrik Ibsen, Friedrich Nietzsche, or our own individual perceptions of what reality is - for they are all products of that same system. All deserve equal embrace...  |
No, no, no! Please be cautious in your use of programming, programmed, and design, etc. Those words suggest a
programer and
designer, a theological construct that I (and I’m not alone on this) reject. I know that I’m beating the Darwinian evolution equine, but he’s still galloping, not dead. Our odd sexuality — and even amongst the asexual reproducers — is evolutionary. Not at all by design! Yes, in many species, reproductive activities are
pleasurable but, I believe, the desire (!) to procreate is evolutionarily, even unconsciously, innate. As pop culture says, we want to churn out little versions of ourselves (if only because of an unconscious fear of death and a wholly irrational desire to live beyond death). That’s the science behind the continuation of our feeble species, I think.
Genetics. No, again, not programming, yet, though it’s fast becoming possible. What we pass on is our mutated genetic code. Is it random? Sometimes. More often than not, though, we unconsciously select prostitutes and life-partners because they have genetic traits that we find desirable; traits of being well-bred and capable of breeding
well. Evolutionarily innate. That’s science. Far from seeking variety, we seek good health and other traits for our potential progeny, going so far as to , again, unconsciously, evaluate the parents of potential life-partners.
Yes, certainly, artists represent and can enhance the ways in which we stumble through our limited lives. But it’s, maybe, just stimuli of our finite consciousness that leads us to enjoy such fabulous distractions.