People be crazy. I submit as evidence the following video in which
a person I used to be friends with, before he became a little too nuts even for
me, speculates wildly about the origins of homo sapiens. He’s a nice guy who
certainly means well, but he is one of those types of people who absolutely
refuses to hear arguments against the things he wants to believe. He usually
presents us with typical “I’m right and you’re wrong” mentality although he
astonishly refrains from doing that in this video rambling, instead choosing to
engage in the laziest kind of thinking one could possibly participate in. I
encourage you to watch the video above, with an open mind of course, then read my
rebuttal.
1) You
simply have to love it whenever he says, “If you really think about it…”
because when he says at 2:40 that the conventional thought for centuries was
such that life on Earth was the only life in the universe, he’s really saying
that such was the conventional though among Western European countries for the
past few centuries, though I guess he thinks such a distinction is a given and
that’s why he doesn’t qualify his statement. He also seems to imply that such
conventional wisdom is the product of a deliberate deception [you can also draw
this conclusion from his other videos] without thinking of a reason why people
might assume life on Earth is the only life in the universe – namely, because
that’s what the evidence so far indicates.
2) He
says at 3:25 that humans are the only animal that creates clothing, weapons,
and transportation to meet some need. That’s a simply false assertion. There
are plenty of examples of other animals who use weapons and tools to fight and
accomplish tasks. Monkeys have been observed using weapons while monkeys,
crows, dolphins, and even octopi have been observed using tools to perform
tasks such as opening nut shells or crustaceans. Now, I can’t name any examples
of animals building transportation off the top of my head, but even a deer
would need a boat to cross an ocean, thus refuting his assertion that “a deer
doesn’t need a [vehicle] to get anywhere.” Some sea animals, however, are smart
enough to use currents to their advantage, helping them migrate faster than
they would otherwise. So, it’s not like animals never have a need or never
utilize transportation methods. While we have to grant that the tool use by
other animals is rudimentary by comparison to human beings, all that means is
that we’re very good at tool making. That’s it.
3) At
4:10 he talks about the disadvantage a person dropped off in the woods would be
if not allowed to cloth themselves without thinking about the disadvantage a
polar bear would be at if dropped off near the equator or the disadvantage a
tropical bird would be at if dropped off in the Arctic. He seems to believe
that the mal-adaptation of humans to some environments means that we cannot be
of this planet. Simply lazy thinking. We are certainly not the only species on
the planet that needs protection from the elements; most land mammals do not
sleep out in the open and instead opt for caves or dens to protect themselves
from predators and inclement weather. Geez, birds live in caves and build
nests, too, while snails seek the protection of shells which btw they don’t
grow themselves. So, I don’t know how he’s coming up with this stuff.
4) At
5:30 he makes it explicit that because human being are not adapted to some
environments that we may not be from Earth and he draws this conclusion without
considering the human mind as an adaptation. Sure, unaided, I could not survive
without clothing near the Arctic like I could near the Equator, but to
reiterate, human beings have been very good at tool making which has allowed us
to conquer extreme environments. The ability to make advanced tools is not
evidence that we are not native to Earth.
5) At
6:30 he says that when you break down religion into its most basic element,
they all worship a god or god. True most of the time, but hardly an unequivocal
statement. But he goes on to say that most of these gods came from the stars, a
statement that once again is plainly false.
6) At
8:45 he asks if we are really supposed to be meat-eaters if we don’t have the
teeth and jaw muscles necessary to bring down a wild animal. Again, he
completely ignores the evolutionary process and the fact that not all
meat-eater have long fangs. Seriously, are we supposed to consider him a thinker
if he doesn’t possess the reasoning process necessary to draw believable
conclusions?
7) At
9:54 he asks why no other animal appears to think like we do. Uh, I think it’s
safe to assume that if fish could think at all like a human being, they’d be
wondering why there are animals above the water. Would the fish think we are
gods and that we created them? I’m confident that few animals think like
another animal much different than themselves. And this guy, well, he’s a
different breed altogether.
8) He
concludes by saying we should think about this with an open mind, meaning, he
wants you to speculate as wildly as he does as long as you don’t accept
conventional wisdom on the matter. Okay
then, how about he thinks about my points with an open mind. Do you think he
will? Do you think he’ll even consider the question I pose to him: What does it
matter if we are indeed from another planet? Doesn’t our current situation and
where we are headed as a species matter more? Granted, we look towards our
origins assuming it will give us direction, but the fact is that doing so has
not given us any clue on that account. So, who cares where we came from? I do
not consider it a relevant question.
No comments:
Post a Comment