In class yesterday we concluded our conversation on the ideas of Charles Darwin. I enjoyed the whole discussion, but the end of the discussion was the part that interested me the most. We ended the class discussion by bringing up an idea that seems to be very important in today’s society: the constant debate between human morality and natural selection.
During the class, there was a lot of discussion related to the idea that humans are trying to avoid natural selection by trying to find cures for anything that would lead to a premature death. People in our class kept bringing up the idea that humans are unable to let other humans die, which is something that other species do; people were trying to say that the human species is trying to avoid natures attempt at eliminating the weaker part of the human species.
I found this idea very interesting because it seemed to imply that humans should not be helping other humans that are in situations that are difficult to survive. Then the idea that humans are supposed to be moral creatures came into my head. Humans are supposed to follow the “golden rule”, which means we need to help others who are in difficult situations because we hope they would do the same for us. It seems the idea that humans should stop avoiding natural selection is completely ludicrous. If humans decide to not help others who are having trouble surviving then we do not seem to be following the “golden rule”.
I do not know if anyone in our class actually feels this way, but it seems that people were implying that humans are wasting their time searching for revolutionary scientific breakthroughs. I agree that it is smart to go natural by reducing wasteful technology such as automobiles, but there is absolutely no reason to stop trying to find ways to help more humans survive. If learning to clone human hearts could save lives then I do not see why we should not try to learn. I think it is ridiculous for people to think that we should not try to save human lives when we have the opportunity too. I know that it may seem like we are cheating the system by doing things like cloning, but I believe that it is each humans responsibility to follow normal moral values. If we have the opportunity to save other human lives then we need to take advantage of it.
My reasoning on this subject goes back to the final discussion that we had in class; Dr.J brought up the idea that some people try to find a balance of animal nature and human morals that just does not exist. People try to say that their decision is okay because animals do it in nature, and humans are apart of this same nature. The problem with this argument is that once humans use any type of human morals, it then becomes difficult to suddenly use the excuse of animal nature.
The idea that Dr.J brought up relates perfectly to my overall argument, which is that humans are not making a mistake by trying to “avoid natural selection”. It is our moral obligation as human beings to want to save as many lives as we can. We cannot let people die because of a disease just because animals die naturally of diseases all the time. Of course humans are still apart of the overall concept of nature, but humans should be looked at differently then animals are; human nature and animal nature is much different.
Do you feel that it is right to view human nature at different standard from nature in general? Why or why not?
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