Do you have any faith in humanity?

[ThereWillBePayne]

I have a lot of faith in humanity, so much so that I feel joy just acknowledging life and humanity.

It irks me that people don't though, it seems so... misguided. We're doing better than we ever have before, and things always seem hard, but we're not going to fail anytime soon. People can be silly sometimes too, they can make mistakes, but the very fact that we acknowledge their misgivings and we learn from these mistakes shows that we're still human and more importantly, developing.

I used to call myself a misanthropist, but then I realized I was clinging to anger and being very judgmental, because things really are great overall and to think otherwise is to only view the negative aspects. Thing are going to be okay, just as we long as we stop getting this idea into our heads that the world’s a terrible place and we are without hope.

As for the environment, ect: well a temperature change isn’t going to wipe us out, war is becoming increasingly unlikely, and despite society's adolescent-like values and indulgent nature; we, like all living organisms on the planet, respond to change, both subconsciously and consciously and will adapt to resolve our issues, it’s only a matter of time. Not to be insulting, but I only really lose my "faith" per say, when I'm all depressed and "typical teenage angsty".
Things are pretty awesome.

[GoggleChild]

I have faith that we can overcome a lot of the crap we have before us now. Whether or not we will... I don't know. I don't think climate change or war will get us anytime soon, but I've noticed now more than ever that people just don't care about other people on a personal level. Something bad happens, and sure they feel bad, but most people wouldn't go out and help fix it.
I don't like to think of "humanity' as a collective anyway. Each person needs to get themselves right as an individual. I'm not saying others can't help him/her, but there needs to be a desire to change and then an effort made by that person to make it happen. (This is referring to personal problems like morals and choices, not hunger or things out the someones control. We should by all means go and help those people)

And now I take a step back and realize that a philosophical debate ins't going to do much of anything. Arguments won't fix problems, they just get everyone involved hot and bothered. So if I overlooked something or my words get misconstrued, oh well. This is just a bunch of text on a server anyway. What really matters is what I (and I guess everyone else) go(es) and do(es) after reading this post, whether they agree or not.

[Hatman Hatmyth Hatlegend]

Pretty sure they'd just fight over space shit then. It'd be nice if long-range space travel came bundled with civilization-wide peace and enlightenment, but I somehow doubt it.

At least, tech-wise, they'd be better than what we are currently.

[Rippentaire]

I have little faith in humanity as a whole, but I don't want to sit around complaining about it either. I believe it was my grandmother who once told me "if you don't like it here, you can always go live in North Korea."

[Eisen]

Humans don't live in North Korea...

Those North Koreans, they're...

... they're something else...

[Writersblock99]

I would think of it as kind of an invalid concept, having faith in humanity or not. First of all, although various levels of collective unconscious (visible as something similar to a hive mind within different levels of culture and subculture) do very much exist, humanity really exists on an individual basis, not any collective or set of collectives in which one can "have faith". I would also take that a political direction (because I take everything in a political direction) and argue that it's the politicians and entrepreneurs who control the world social climate and public opinion to such a great extent that faith or lack of faith in general humanity becomes somewhat void. It's all about what individuals choose to do, and to how great an extent they are controlled by the hierarchy (inc. culture) inherent in whatever country they belong to. All things that happen, happen intentionally, and yet at the same time, they were always an inevitability based on the characters involved (which ends up being all of humanity via a butterfly effect, and the fact that everyone is known by someone) - but I'm not feeling much like going in depth on the philosophical basis for any of these opinions and y'all aren't feeling like reading my in depth opinions anyway, so I'll just leave it at this already overly verbose post.

[Cinderthief]

Well, I'm reading this thread, admittingly with a mix of admiration and disgust.

And, surprisingly, Humans (the people whom are posting) are a part of Humanity. There is little else in the word that can make me feel two polarizing emotions at the same time.

As long as people make me feel, I can put some faith into them - or, should I say, us. After all, it would be a shame for such marvelous creatures to come so far on such a short notice then simply crumble into dust.

[Rippentaire]

I would think of it as kind of an invalid concept, having faith in humanity or not. First of all, although various levels of collective unconscious (visible as something similar to a hive mind within different levels of culture and subculture) do very much exist, humanity really exists on an individual basis, not any collective or set of collectives in which one can "have faith".

What about human nature, present in all of humanity? This would also be at the root of politics, your preferred topic, as it can motivate the decisions of individuals in places of power. Humans are born with the ability to feel pride, rage, envy, desperation. It's something you can point at and feel worried about.

Of course, when you think of it that way, you realize there's little you can do to change it. Human nature is terrible, but you have to accept this and move on.

[Writersblock99]

What about human nature, present in all of humanity? This would also be at the root of politics, your preferred topic, as it can motivate the decisions of individuals in places of power. Humans are born with the ability to feel pride, rage, envy, desperation. It's something you can point at and feel worried about.

Of course, when you think of it that way, you realize there's little you can do to change it. Human nature is terrible, but you have to accept this and move on.

That is somewhat true, but I would argue that even that is a little skewed. "Human nature", whatever that even means, comes out in different ways in different contexts. In the end, I think that you could theoretically break down humanity very roughly into those who lead and those who follow, with those who lead tend towards self-gain at the expense of moral values, and those who follow tend towards being overly trusting of authority. This isn't universal by any means, but at least in modern day superpowers which have democracy (whether actual or pretended - I ain't touching that one though, not here anyway), it's a reasonable rule of thumb.

Note that this is based primarily on my experience in America, but from what I've seen, it's also pretty much true elsewhere.

The funny thing is, while the selfishness is difficult to justify and can be interpreted from an evolutionary standpoint ("There is not enough to go around, so this is mine and no one else can have it" being the idea that early humans had going down this train of thought), I think it's actually having a much further basis in reason. Moves by the elite are very generally calculated and intellectual (though they all make mistakes, to the glee and dismay of pundits everywhere), and not based on instinct. Their instincts, their "human nature" you could say, have been abandoned in favor of power and money. This goes with saying that the more common folk who are lead are acting more in accordance with human nature by listening to others - namely in the point I'm making, those above them. This is why so many repugnant ideas are held by so many people (both right and left), and is definitely the origin of partisanship. This can also be evolutionarily defended ("Tomorrow, I may not hunt enough and my neighbor may hunt too much, so we should join together to make sure we always have enough"), and to me seems the most plausible idea. The more men you have in your hunting party, the better chance of taking down a mammoth.

So I guess sort of what I'm saying is, "human nature", referring to our instinctual habits including all those things you described, while certainly having its negative parts, is primarily founded in being part of a group, and negative traits and emotions which are not beneficial to the group as a whole are seen as the bad ones. Certain people away from these in favor of a life of reason and intellectualism, or at least a life of keeping company with the reasonable and intellectual. Out of those people, many of them get selfish and rule nations, and they are acting out of accordance with human nature, as shepherds rather than with the flock.

This seems to create a positive picture of human nature, for which I would say I do have faith in humanity, except for the fact that it creates a self-perpetuating system of corruption, which has formed relatively quickly in pretty much every great society, ever, because it creates a system in which people are easily taken advantage of by those who seek power. So that greatest benefit is also our downfall in a way that I strongly doubt we will ever be able to solve - at least in the near future. So in that respect, I do not have faith in humanity. So I kind of both do and don't, which leads me back to my original statement that I really don't think I have faith or don't have faith in humanity. I just don't think the idea is applicable to real life.

But I could also be totally of basis in my analysis here. XD

[ThereWillBePayne]

The moment you start dividing with humans you get into this rut where it's the strong vs the weak, the laborer vs the planner, jocks vs. nerds, ect. It's natural for people to divide things into twos, or at least I've noticed people have a prevalent tendency to divide things into twos, but it tends to lead to us vs. them mentality and generalization.

But I do agree somewhat, instincts defy logic for working in unison as they're more immediately suited to the individual's needs, which involves doing what's best for you. In order for a perfect society and world to exist, we would need to be completely void of instincts and emotion, because it leads to selfishness and human weakness, and would basically strip us of our individuality, making us little more than some sort of hivemind of drones working for the "greater good". Unfortunately that isn't realistic and bad things happen because that's part of living in a world of variety and experiencing the friction created between differing entities.

[ImperatorMortis]

Humans don't live in North Korea...

Those North Koreans, they're...

... they're something else...

What about those poor North Koreans being subjugated. You don't see them as humans?

[Xario1]

As an adult, I must say, I have learned a lot of things, and seen a lot of how people think.

I don't have much faith in humanity, as a whole. People too often tend to miss what is really important in life, and not being able to see it, has often made half of those people prey on weaker people, and the other half get preyed upon by people of higher positions of power than them.

That's not to say that I don't have faith in individual people. there have been at least a handful of people, who I know will most likely find what is important in life, like I have. But, even though I know what is important, I still have thoughts that disgust me, as I still have those thoughts, becuase I am human. Being human isn't easy, that's for sure :\

[Milskidasith]

I never, ever understood the concept of having thoughts that disgust yourself. That's who you are. As long as you aren't acting on it, thinking about the worst things in the world is not really problematic, and everybody has those kind of intrusive thoughts.

I also never understood why people revive two month old threads, either. What do people do, go back pages and pages until they find an interesting thread? Search for a certain word and post without looking at the post date? It confuses the hell out of me.

[ThereWillBePayne]

I do think people go back through threads looking for interesting threads to post in.

However, I will never understand why people think the age of a thread or last post needs to be recent, as if the moment they grow slightly old they become second class threads.

I can just imagine finding a thread you wanted to post in and going "oh no, because other people have failed to contribute to a thread for a certain amount of time, I am not allowed to post!" they're just numbers, it's not going to end the world if people bring up old threads. (I was banned once on a different forum for doing that, like; holy shit I am so sorry my god what was I thinking, now your entire forum is RUINED!)

People focusing on the little things kind of annoys me, and for a lot of us, it evolves into us becoming so self involved we miss the big picture, and progress slows after a while since we forget where we're going.

Fortunately, as easily as we lose our way, great people come along with inspiration to lead, which is another reason why humanity is awesome.

[Milskidasith]

The problem with thread necromancy is basically a cultural one; the forum has said "this topic is dead" and stopped commenting on it. It's generally a rule on most forums because, among other things, a thread having "front page" status is pretty important to getting any meaningful replies and part of what makes a forum what it is, is what gets displayed and replied to, so necroing old threads or constantly creating the same thread when the previous one dies is considered "poor form". It depends on the forum; this forum has no rules, some forums have rules saying that it's better to necro than to make a new thread, other forums have rules saying it's better to make a new thread than necro, etc. It depends on the culture.

Cut the passive aggressive shit, please. I don't care about necroing (it's not a rule here), I just legitimately don't understand how threads four pages back and two months old get posted in because I've never had the urge to search that far back, on the general assumption that if nobody cared to post in two months, it's probably not going to be a very active discussion.

[Xario1]

Although we are somewhat getting off topic here ._.;
You both have some good points, but you see the reason I have been reviving old threads is becuase of few reasons, such as
-The thread pertains to a topic that I find interesting or I would like to discuss my opinion on.
-Also, most of the parts of the mspa forums that I have made posts in, usually only have had 3 pages max of threads, and the posts seem to be separated by a lot of time, which tells me that there doesn't seem to be much activity in that part of the thread. Now, if there were threads like five or more pages back, I don't see any reason to revive those, unless I would have to, becuase of possible making a new thread too similar to it.
-Lastly, I can't make new threads yet, so I just try to participate where I feel like my posts might be welcomed.

[Green Sun]

I believe in myself.