Enraged

I don't consider myself much of a dissenter, as much as I'd like to be in my secret heart, but I can't help but think that a few of the notions held by my professors are outmoded, if not completely without base.

The first came to light last night during Science: The Sciencing. My professor there is cool in a dry sort of way, was the first of his family to graduate any kind of school (elementary all the way up to college) and was the first Native American to ever recieve a PhD in Biology. So bully for him.

Holding a doctorate in biology, however, I would expect him to think his little theorums through to the final step, rather than just cling to obsolete notions of duty. For example:

He mentioned that he had three kids and that, were he to die, it would be okay, simply because he had already passed on his genes. His words were, "No tears." However, were one of us to die, then would be the time for tears, as we had not yet had the opportunity to pass on our genetic inheritance.

First off, that's pretty presumptuous. I myself have had plenty of opporunities to pass along my genes. Some that were actually too close for comfort, but steps were taken to PREVENT the passage of genetic material. So fie on you, o great spewer of lies!

Second, and infinitely more important than the previous japing, the idea of procreation as a duty to one's lineage, one's genetic material, or to one's species is ridiculous. The point is moot, and became so once humans effectively "defeated" evolution. The spread or termination of our particular bloodline is no longer important, as the continuation of our species does not rely on any one bloodline surviving.

There is no "fittest" anymore, as the idiotic and lame alike are protected and continue to breed within the gene pool. Complete morons can still have kids, the weak and crippled can still have kids, in fact the only people who can't have kids nowadays are the people who have some sort of condition where literally, physically, they can't have kids. And there's even hope for them on the horizon.

We beat evolution. We keep the weak and infirm alive, help them survive in our unending compassion, and weaken the gene pool. After so long doing so, left to the wild without our technology, the whole species could very well go extinct within a few hundred years, if that. We have back problems because we're not done figuring out how to walk straight. We have stomach problems because we're eating things we're not genetically used to, simply because we have to eat everything in sight, lest there not be enough food for us all. We have defeated evolution, and were created from such. Figure it out.

Also, he said that the universe was made out of two things; living and non-living things. I think this is an unnecessary classification if not outrightly incorrect, cimply because, as a scientist, he should be able to see the lack of a difference between these two things, especially when compared on a universal scale.

All matter in the universe started out as hydrogen, floating around in space, until enough of it gathered together to form a large area of mass which continued to collapse until it formed a star. There, in the superheated and super-pressurized heart of the star, hydrogen was basically squeezed together until it formed helium, then carbon, etc. Eventually, the thing would go supernova, spreading the elements to the far reaches of space. Stars are element factories, and all the elements, all matter, in the universe was manufactured by them.

Wherever you have "stuff" in the universe, it was made by a star. Subsequently, wherever you have living creatures made of "stuff," at some point, all those little peices that make up a person or animal or plant or whatever started out in the heart of a star. Such is the intimate connection between "living" humans on this planet (as well as animals, etc.), and "inanimate," gigantic, blazing balls of brilliant gas in the inconcievably vast vacuum of space.

So what's the difference? At what point does non-living become living? All living things are are a series of chemical reactions, from their start to their everyday operations. We began as a series of molecules, which combines to form amino acids, which combined to form proteins, which combined with other proteins and eventually made unicellular organisms, and up and up the evolutionary ladder we go until we end up with me playing Grand Theft Auto day in and day out.

So the matter isn't different. You can't call muscle more alive than dirt, it's all just elements. Chemicals.

So what about the beings? Physics tells us, simply, that inertia dictates a certain object will stay in motion unless something else acts upon it to make it move; say a ball on a table being pushed. We know, through the understanding of the rules governing the world around the ball, what the ball is going to do, because of the information we observe and of the rules we know to be true, there's only one logical outcome.

Were we capable of seeing all the angles, and had we the mental processing power, it would be just as easy to plot and pinpoint the motions and reactions of "living" creatures. True, to an extent we already can, if we scare a deer it will run away, if you confront a certain person, maybe you know they'll shrink away unless you mention their mother, then they'll tear your face off. Point being, all that living things are, needing to feed themselves, etc., is all a product of chemical messages in their minds, which are derived from observation, which through learning and understanding, and past experiences, are set off in predictable series. If we could figure out all the different things affecting one mind at one time, we could figure out exactly what the mind's going to do, simply because there's nothing else in there but what the chemical relays mandate there to be.

Really, there's no difference between living things and non-living things. They're just different structures of the same stuff, unless you want to get into a discussion about the soul, but that's not the issue here. You can argue the difference theologically, but not scientifically.

And, finally, my Gender in U.S. Politics professor said this today, "Politics is the highest human achievement. We practice self-government, animals don't."

There isn't one animal on this damn planet that doesn't practice self-government. Every living thing gets up in the morning and decides. That's all that self-government is, decision. Simply expanding that to include everyone else around you following the same decision at once is conformity and authority. There's nothing impressive about that. Sheep follow the herd. Wolves follow the largest member of their pack. It's the easiest thing in the world to point to something bigger than you, stronger than you, and say, "I'll follow that."

Insects have government, for God's sake! Bees and ants have whole societies! Politics is the lowest form of human achievement, solely existing to exert power over others. Period. Even democracy, in its purest form, is still a mandate for others to act like most do. It's a sad state to live in, but one we have to put up with now that the world's been divided up into its controllers. Thomas Paine said that government was, "at best, a necessary evil."

What about Art, madame? What about film? Point out the bear who can paint me a masterpeice. Point out the reticulated python that can conduct a symphony.

The center of human achievement lies in the frontal lobes. In speech, in art, in writing, in all the things that have formed our civilization and our cultures. The desire to push others to the bottom of your respective piles, or at least push them closer to the bottom than yourself, is the medulla oblongata. The primitive brain.

There's no great achievement in that.

There's hardly any thought to it.

State of the Union tonight. Veiled commentary?!? WHO KNOWS???