Ormand Wrote:
How will the species continue to evolve if violent men destroy the species?
Your concerns about the violence of men halting their evolution, is a noble one, but there are other concerns that are more likely to lead to our demise in the not to distant future, if we cannot work together to prevent it.
It is the evolution of all life that matters, not just the evolution of human life, we may with the human advanced intellect position ourselves in a self deluded position of supremacy over other life, however we are just a species like all others, and our real forces of destruction have probably already been unleashed, not against ourselves but against other life forms, many of which could become extinct. With the destruction of other life forms will at some point come our own, unless our perception of the problem changes.
The evolutionary path of life to fit it for its environment will continue long after records of the human species and its "achievements" have decayed into dust and blown away, and our evolution via intellect will be forgotten.
Our hope may be that an attack of one society on another will be impeded by the realization that the application of total war, would mean the destruction of everything that could be gained by pursuing it, such as cultural supremacy over the other society and its wealth, and as I have suggested before war relies on people to execute the orders to enable it, with the proper education people would not exist prepared to carry out the tasks needed. We should always be prepared to defend our culture from what we see as other misguided ones, but at the same time allow them to pursue their own agenda within their sphere of influence and so evolve through experience without interference.
Belindi Wrote
Men aren't simply sexually defined but are defined by gender typing which is cultural. Women likewise, and even in present times the woman gender is still culturally defined to the disadvantage of women.
To test your hypothesis we would need to remove education from the human intellect along with speech and then observe what happened. It is I think probable by doing this we would observe that each human is equipped with a basic conscience which would affect behaviour, that in turn would then be conditioned to fit with the conditions of the environment whatever they were. Animals manage to survive well in this way without an educated intellect. It is very difficult to be able to determine how conditioned by education and speech our intellect is, and how well it can override conscience and presumably it varies from one individual to another.
To suggest, "gender is still culturally defined to the disadvantage of women." Is perhaps easy to beleive but from my observations I would say that within partnerships between male and female, the woman always has an equal and usually superior role to play, and as individuals we often feel persecuted just because we feel and perceive we are different.
Belindi Wrote
I agree with Gordon that human males are generally aggressive, more so than human females notwithstanding the few recorded exceptions
Violence within our societies from men is generally under control, and I think rare, but always well publicised, and from my personal experience I have never witnessed any, except perhaps when at school many years ago. The "civilised" cultures to which we belong, encourages popular entertainment that portrays gratuitous violence, they also support within the application and conditions of their penal institutions a culture of revenge rather than reform, and the US still retains a death penalty which sets an example of barbarity which is then often mirrored in the society which condones it.
My subject here is that of the reason for war, and my conjecture the human male accepts the concept of war, and will volunteer to serve in an army because it is part of the natural survival strategy that has been passed on as the result of evolution via reproductive natural selection.
The male of the human species has, via conscience, had its behaviour effected at an intellectual level and conditioned, to naturally defend the females of their perceived group, and in turn try and compete for the females of "rival" groups, many defensive walls have been built by men, based on this belief, possibly rooted in the requirements of reproductive natural selection from a primitive human past. One strategy for achieving peace between societies may be to highlight our common needs, make everyone realise there is more that unites us than divides us, and make us all feel part of one world wide society and culture.