The problem lies not in how we are trained to act, but in how we are trained to think. We are currently in the midst of the most rapid increase in human understanding to date. The common man has a mountain of information at his fingertips and endless opportunities for life experience outside his door. Even the poorest of the poor has an infinite imagination that can be used to explore the world around us. The tools to break free from monotony are staring us in the face, yet we are either blind to them or ignore them because we feel entitled to something more.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

I think I might have to publish that.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Ouch. My brain hurts.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

"I always looked at a bird and thought 'why do you stay in one place when you could fly anywhere?'. Then I ask myself the same question."

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Well a bird can fly anywhere for free, for us to just get up and leave costs money, everything we need costs money. A bird can just relocate to a different tree or country with complete freedom (that we know of, heck maybe they have their own bird currency).

by Anonymous 12 years ago

You don't get the point.. do you

by Anonymous 12 years ago

walking is free

by Anonymous 12 years ago

And that's a good thing. I'd hate to act like an animal my entire live. Civilized life ftw.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Cuz other animals have more rational thought and actions than us, and don't have flaws.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

I actually agree with coly here. Which is my whole problem with this post. We're the way we are for a reason... if we left a baby to be free and on it's own, it's not going to be like an animal... it's going to be like the first humans that existed. That human isn't going to fit in with monkeys nor humans.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

"...but we as humans train them to become all human-y by teaching them to walk and do taxes." This sentence amuses me. I'm picturing a two-year-old doing taxes.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Humans are definitely designed to learn to walk (look at our bone structure), talk (we have huge areas of our brains devoted solely to language development), and think (evolutionary pressure caused our brains to grow bigger and our bodies to grow smaller: we are designed to survive by thinking rather than getting by with brute force or bodily adaptations, like monkeys). We get "trained" to be humans because that's what we're best at doing. We'd be pretty shitty monkeys. And "boring" and "civilized" are relative terms. Personally, I think human life is pretty exciting. And only some people are civilized. And few people employ any difficult math in our lives. Really we're more animalistic than you give us credit for. We're all fucking machines just like most primates, but we drive cars instead of climb trees.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Onepiece dude, you're taking it a bit to the extreme. Wobbuffet, your kind of comment was exactly what I was looking for :)

by Anonymous 12 years ago

While I agree with most of your comment I don't think you give monkeys enough credit. http://ctrlv.in/109323 Yup. It's spear fishing.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

They're kind of like half people. They can wear hats, but I don't think a baby can own it's own bus.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

It's fetuses that cannot wear hats or own busses.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Yes, and they cannot wear hats or own buses because they are not people. Babies can wear hats but (to my knowledge) cannot own buses, so they must be half people.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Makes sense. I was so far into the comments I forgot that "they" would mean babies.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Colebowl are you saying that abortion is OK because fetuses aren't people? NOT Ok.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Go away Anon, your mother never loved you.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

I'm adopted (cry2)

by Anonymous 12 years ago

NAILED IT.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

hehehehehehehehehehe. I actually snorted from laughter cuz that last comment. And anon, yes, that is EXACTLY what my point is, cuz it's so relevant to this post.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

This entire time I was imagining a world of little babies in little suits, doing taxes and getting ready to go to their little job as a judge.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Ahem yes the jury agrees that the plane was indeed coming for your mouth and the mommy did indeed vanish and reappear with some use of her hands.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

You could say that about any animal.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

A cat grown up by himself will behave just like a cat who grew up with his family. No, it is not the same for other animals.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

actually that isn't true. Stray cats act completely different from domesticated cats. There are also other factors coming into play than just if it "grew up with it's family". Often times a kitten will even die if it is taken from it's mother too soon. A feral cat in New York city would behave differently than a feral cat in the country.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

I mean that it'll still be a cat and it'll still live 100% by its instincts. Just because he'll be fatter or comfier doesn't mean it's the same as the post. In the post I mean it'll stop acting like a human completely and will act like a wild animal, while cats will stay cats.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

A cat who grew up by himself will be fine because cats aren't social creatures. Take an ape or any other social animal and no, they will not act they same if they grew up with others of their kind or alone.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Also, the way humans act is because of human instinct. People aren't trained to be people, they are born to be people.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

A person who lived from birth 20 years in the wild will //not// act the same way as a civilized 20 year old who's finished 12 years of school and grew up in a city. No. It's the training.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

No shit about the first part, obviously people who grew up differently are going to be different. Just no about the second part.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

That is a terrible example, especially considering their point about social animals. That doesn't make people "trained" to act how they do, people are born to act like people not trained. Taking someone out of the normal human environment is obviously going to make them different. Is the stray cat trained to be a cat just because he acts in the way most cats do? Or is the cat with a home trained to be domesticated? Is the human who grows up like most humans trained to act like how they are, or is the one who grew up differently in the wild trained to be different? No one is fucking trained to act the way they do unless they were brain washed. Environment =/= training. People have the tools to be able to act the way people do in their brain, fish do not. You couldn't train a fish to act human and you don't train a human to act human, humans just //are//.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

@Nacklefoodle: Just because a human in the wild would be different from one living in our society doesn't mean that we are trained to be human. Sure, we learn what different things are, we learn to use electronics; but that's not what a human is. If you took a group of babies, and they survived in the wild, sure they might not be anywhere near as advanced as us, but a lack of technology and system doesn't mean they aren't human, it just means that they haven't progressed that far. The Amazonian tribes are no less human than us, they are just less advanced. Humans would still use tools, think (provided that they have a medium to do so with) and speak. Also, they would still have a great curiosity about their surroundings. It's just what we are.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Im not saying we're not humans I'm just saying we live far less by instincts and by nature than other animals. If you were born as any other animal without any technology or knowledge acquired already for you, we'd look like a completely different species. A cat grown up in a forest and in a home will act similarly: like a cat. But two humans grown up in different natural habitats would also act similarly: like humans, but this behavior wouldn't look like any normal human we see nowadays. I'm not being against anything I'm just saying this is a pretty cool thing I noticed.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Yes, that is called culture. When the Europeans came to --America-- (sorry) what would become the USA they thought the Natives were savages. They were absolutely different, and same with Africans. Both Africans, and Native Americans seemed totally different, and they were; but they still had all of the human characteristics.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Human instinct is to grow and create, even those in the wild do that. All humans follow instinct, it is impossible not to follow instinct. And a wild cat and a domesticated cat don't act similarly at all.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Yes, but we also form languages, and think, form opinions, and manipulate our surroundings. We also make most decisions based on emotion (not always good) and we do that regardless of "training".

by Anonymous 12 years ago

We have areas of a brain meant to do that. We aren't trained, we're meant to. Even someone who didn't grow up around society does all of those things.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

@anon That's what I'm saying, humans are humans; we aren't trained to do so.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

I agree with most other comments, babies are designed to become "humans". What I was most suprised about though was the statement about routines. If you've ever had or watched a baby you'd know that they are more strict to routines than most adults or young kids are. They eat meals at certain times, take naps almost the same time every day, they even poop on a routine. Babies can be like clockwork, you know when they cry at a certain time of day what is wrong. That is exactly why they are different than monkeys, even before they develop language they can somehow communicate their feelings. The reason they seem so much like neanderthals is that it is the mother's job to teach them and to raise them. What are we here for if not to continue the human race? I mean, that's the whole reason our sexual drive ia so strong, not because it "feels good" but because our bodies are supposed to make babies. Babies are hungry for knowledge. They don't become all "humanly" because we train them that way, they strive to learn. Now just because we lose that desire for knowledge the older we grow doesn't mean that it is forced upon them. Feral kids become that way because they aren't given a chance.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

So you agree, or disagree? I saw you making a lot of contradictory points here and there.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

And is there anything wrong with that? You don't have to agree or disagree, that's the whole reason for not voting

by Anonymous 12 years ago

It's all fine, it's just that I couldn't understand what you meant by saying that. Explain to me as if I were an 8 year-old.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Oh sorry, I'm not anon I just noticed how often people comment on how someone should agree or disagree and can't chose to do neither

by Anonymous 12 years ago

POTD?

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Just for me? You shouldn't have. I want to share this post to all the communites and jimy kimels out there. Rock solid hard, man!

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Good Guy --Greg-- Johnny

by Anonymous 12 years ago

What?

by Anonymous 12 years ago

You should read the wiki article on humans. It's pretty interesting.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

This is so science-y.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Not really, it's philosophy if anything. Science says practically the opposite of what this post is saying. Humans aren't trained to be human, they're designed to be human.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

This is only true to an extent. You can't take a dog or monkey and train him to be human, so there must be some sort of programming in the human that makes him //want// to become this way.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Yes but do they care whether or not their owner stops getting income? They don't care until their food bowl stops refilling. They don't care about taxes or jobs or self worth. They're an animal.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Humany wumany....

by Anonymous 12 years ago

4/10. This post isn't really an opinion, or a joke, it's just interesting.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc_LIR5ExIU I know, I know, sue me; I fed the troll.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

It's not a joke... this is a website for opinions, and I like leaving my opinions on other "opinions".

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Walking is not “taught". It is instinctively learntand perfected by the child.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

That's not true at all.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

Can you back up your claim? Here is a wiki source to back mine up: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primitive_reflexes#Walking.2Fstepping_reflex I'll provide some real sources once I am on a computer. The two uniquely human behaviours, bipedalism and language development are instinctive to humans. Although we are unable to either walk or talk at birth, the instructions on how to acquire those skills are present. A child will learn to walk by him/herself when the appropriate center of gravity is established, i.e. the head is not too big for the body and the legs are long enough. With language, it is a little more complicated and the child will only develop a comprehensible language if exposed to one. But the child already know how to distinguish between phonemes and segment words. He/she can simply observe and learn. Unlike in mathematics, where the basics need to be taught, in language, the basics are instinctively self learned.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

If walking isn't instinctive and it's only taught, then no one would be walking upright cuz there would be no one to teach the first person who started walking upright.

by Anonymous 12 years ago

So lets look at newborn animals. Many have to be taught things by their mothers, so what are they born as and are the things they are taught unnatural?

by Anonymous 12 years ago

But when the human race began, didn't we hunt animals with hand-carved tools, skinning them and building fire to keep warm? I think humans have always had a slight upper hand when it came to intelligence and competing with nature and the division between us and animals is just growing larger as we expand our aspect of life and their's seems pretty consistent. Also, babies are incredibly smart and learn at amazing speeds. It's less about adults "training" newborns and more about newborns learning from adults. They just mimic what they see until they're capable of being taught through language.

by Anonymous 12 years ago