OT Re: [LINK] the myth of government censorship

[Antony Barry]

On Friday, April 4, 2003, at 04:01 PM, Phillip Piper wrote:

> I agree with Bernard. Society is "held together" by manners.

Society is held together by evolved behaviors. We are the most social 
of all the mammalian species. We evolved the emotions of love, 
affection, altruism, loyalty etc etc as  the genes which coded for then 
made us more successful. They of course conflict with more basic 
desires like lust, hunger and the fight/flight syndrome. Thence we get 
guilt when there is conflict between them and then we create elaborate 
mythologies to explain this because of the drive to find explanations 
which also evolved. For a few million years hominids moved rounds in 
small bands which competed. Hunter food gatherer societies tend to move 
in groups of around 150. We evolved to cooperate in groups of this 
size. Naturally there are problems in the larger aggregations since we 
took up agriculture and had food surplus to support greater 
specialisation of function and cities.

Good reading on this -

Robert Wright. Moral animal:Why we are the way we are: the new science 
of evolutionary psychology. New YorK, Vintage, 1994

Matt Ridley. The origions of virtue:human instincts and the evolution 
of cooperation. Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1996

Tony

phone : +61 2 6241 7659 | mailto:me at Tony-Barry.emu.id.au
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