Alright, once again, lets chop it up...

>>First of all, no where in my last statement did I mention
>>anything about socialism -nowhere! Sure, I am a socialist
>>but could you at least wait until that comes up before you
>>decide that you are going to base your whole counter
>>argument on it?
>
>We've had another convo about this, I felt I knew where you
>were headed. I tend to jump the gun sometimes. My bad.

As you know I believe only through a system of consciously planned production, determined by those who actually produce goods and services in society, can we develop ourselves into full human beings who relate to one another as human beings and not market entities embedded with value on some mystical market. With that said, while I believe in socialism as an end I believe that building it is a long term project. Whether you share this view or not, my argument in this post is still valid as a means of build broad social unity among human beings with similar class interests. If you oppose the policies of right wing capitalists then you must support their one and only set of victims, labourers.

>>Second you make such strong claims about this phenomenon you
>>call "human nature". Human nature arguments are write off
>>statements for people who don't want to think something
>>through.
>
>Why do you think this? I believe human nature is not ever
>given enough credit. For some reason people like to forget
>that we are animals. If you want truth, first look to Allah
>and secondly look to nature. I believe you can find many
>answers in nature and social concepts are not excluded.

Well human nature is given far too much credit by people who have either not studies history or people who have studied history and have failed to understand anything about the changing nature of human beings throughout. This is why in the past you have had cooperative societies and slavish imperialist societies. Surplant yourself onto a plot of land nearly anywhere in the world 500 years ago. When people lived in societies that lacked the concept of individual private property and private ownership, the concept of sharing and producing in common dominated. This is why in America at the turn of the 19th century so many artisans, craftspeople and journeymen revolted against the emerging conditions of capitalism that concentrated wealth and property into the hands of a few wealthy landowners. Before the emergence of industrial capitalism these craftspeople lived in a very cooperative and symbiotic manner with their guild masters. They had views and ideas completely alien to us today and their transformation into wage workers is a testament to the malleability of the nature of human beings.

>Personally, I don't believe that there is such a
>>thing as human nature. History has shown us that we behave
>>according to our social structures.
>
>What are these structures based on? They are a mechanism.
>When you break down these mechanisms they are based on the
>simplest of things: 1.) Procreation 2.) Ensuring the next
>generation.
>no?

Again, read above as your reductions are overly simplistic. Yes, humans need to continue procreation and ensure their survival but your assumption implicit here is that these goals always had to be acomplished under hostility. That couldn't be more false. For thousands of years human beings had different structures to ensure survival, some cooperative and some competitive. Some societies like the Tainos of what we know today as puerto rico and the people of Easter Island before that society transformed where extremely cooperative and peaceful. Other societies like the Aztecs, the Romans and the Ottomans had very centralised and class divided societies that survived via imperialism. The fact that the ideals, morals, values and relations that these different societies had in regard to one another is a strong refutation of any inherent nature existent in human beings.

>There are as many
>>examples of cooperation and unity as there is for division
>>and conflict. In a society where the dogmatic view of human
>>beings is one of individualism and accumulation through
>>greed and competition we are going to have greedy and
>>competitive people.
>
>So greed is only born out of society? This isn't an age old
>problem found in many different cultures with many different
>ways of approaching life? Show me a group of people that
>have never had to deal with greed. Are they any? Do you
>have evidence of this? You are telling me that you know of
>or believe to be a group of people that nowhere in their
>writings, or oral traditions they encountered the concept of
>greed? Interesting. If so, there might be an argument.

No, greed is not only born out of capitalist society but its manifestation under capitalism has by far been the most brutal, alienating and destructive form of greed human social relations have ever known. Even if past societies had to grapple with the concept of greed, it was often looked down upon until the emergence of capitalism. Over the past 300 years of capitalist expansion there has never been so much expression in human philosophy expressing the virtues of selfishness and how greed can be harnessed for good. Of course, these are only justifications of the current regime. If you don't believe such litterature exists check out Ayn Rand, Robert Nozick, Adam Smith, Hernando de Soto, Francis Fukuyama and the list goes on. In fact, most religions are born as a means of resisting the greed impulse that commercial societies create. Just study protestantism in the 19th century to learn how greed was rejected in society.

>These are learned behaviours not natural
>>ones.
>
>Prove it.
>
> If you don't believe me then tell me why 14 hour work
>>days were acceptable 100 years ago but we would regard such
>>a work day with disgust today?
>
>In which countries, which county, and what particular
>people?

Are you serious? Are you seriously contesting my claim that we have defeated some of the most horrible work conditions in many parts of the world? You cannot be that dense! I mean, I understand abusive labour practices still exist in many countries but 200 years ago those conditions were universal. Today, world standards have changed, albeit not all over the globe.

> Why did American society
>>believe slavery was acceptable 200 years ago but is deplored
>>today?
>
>It was deplored then by many as well. Money is a powerful
>blinder tho. We don't need slavery money today. If folk
>needed a slave to pick tabacco in their front yard to make
>their mortgage TODAY- I bet you'll have some pro slavery
>folk RIGHT NOW.

Fine it was deplored by many then, but not to the extent that it is today! This is factual and if you don't believe it, trying chaining and whipping your neighbor for cotton and see where that gets you. Back then you could do that regardless of what you thought of the institute of slavery. And, yes, I understand the economic reasons why slavery was abolished. With the advent of many productive technologies, it actually became cheaper to produce with wage labour than slave labour. All the more reason to fight in favour of the working class. But in you statement is a great contradiction in what you said earlier. You said that greed and power is a product of human nature but right here you see a complete shift in values regarding slavery as the economic and social conditions of society changed, thus changing our attitudes.

>Why weren't women allowed to vote at the turn of the
>>20th century but now they can?
>
>In which country? In Islamic law women have had the right
>to vote as well have own title and property rights for over
>one thousand years. But Islam is supposed to be oppressive
>to women. So I guess I'm trying to ask, what is your point?

My point is that human beings are not static creatures bound to a certain type of nature. Islamic law was also born out of a highly classist and centralized system just as western misoginy was. However, you and I have a different value system in our treatment of women. Why do I have one view of women that I consider progressive while Osama Bin Laden basically treats women like slaves? If there was a common human nature, shouldn't we both have the same view towards women?

> Could these changes possibly
>>have anything to do with the consciousness of people
>>changing as we have collectively fought for them and
>>rearranged the way we live our lives?
>
>I think that every person is mentaly capable of everything
>the next man/woman is. I feel no consciousness has changed
>since the beginning of time. People always had the same
>core values. The only thing that changes is the power
>structure at the time and what can benefit it. If it wasn't
>beneficial for someone to allow the womens arguement in the
>door, it would not have happend. I'm sure folk had it on
>the brain for years but had no impetus to respond.

Okay think this through. What about before human beings had language, music, art, and culture? Think about it, there really was a time. Human beings are socially creatures whose consciousness is a product of the social conditions around them. Pre-social human beings did not have values because there was no language or communication to express and develop any such systematic thought. You don't believe in pre social human beings or socially defined human beings? Well, I have a little experiment for you. Stick a baby in a dark cave for the next twenty years and ensure s/he has food and water. In twenty years ask that grown person what s/he thinks of the catholic church? What are his/her views on slavery, the inquisition and industrialisation? Does s/he prefer the politics of Malcolm X or Martin Luther King Jr.? As him/her the social significance of the latest songs by Jay-Z, Mos Def and Talib Kweli. See if that grown creature does any more than gurgle at you lifelessly like a nothing more than a living, hungry collection of flesh and organs! That might teach you something about the reality of our nature as human beings.

>
>>
>>Your little claim about humans being nothing but mere
>>animals is as equally unprofound.
>
>We aren't animals? Why is that a put down? How do you feel
>about animals?

It not the fact the you say we are animals that annoys me, we are a type of animal. My issue is that you reduce us to nothing more than animals.

> First of all, if we are
>>the same as most animals, most species of animals do not
>>survive at the expense of other animals within their
>>species.
>
>Explain. Wolves will kill other wolves bordering their
>territory on sight because it effects competition for food.
>So do lions. This isn't a case of animals surviving at the
>expense of other animals within their species? The very
>existence of a wolf pup of a bordering clan in fact
>ultimatley means death to the next. They understand that,
>and will kill the pup.

Show me a wolf whose language and way of life has developed over the past fifty thousand years and I will buy your little argument.

>Most animals cooperate for survival.
>
>explain what you mean by "most".

For a good definition of "most", follow this link:

http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=most&x=0&y=0

>Furthermore,
>>human beings are different from other animals for the sheer
>>fact that we consciously produce things whereas other
>>animals produce instinctively.
>
>Explain your proof of this. I do not subscribe to the
>humans THINK but animals act instinctley arguement. It's
>hogwash. Explain animals doing great feats of THOUGHT and
>ACTION out of LOVE for either a human being companion or
>another animal companion. Explain a crow nursing a lost
>kitten to adulthood. You can't. Because by all rights that
>crow should KILL and EAT that kitten and share it with it's
>murder, but instead I know of a DOCUMENTED case where a crow
>decided to raise a kitten it found, it left it's flock or
>"murder" and raised the abandoned kitten feeding it and
>grooming it, never leaving it's side. and now they are best
>friends. Is that instinct? Can't be. There is no DNA
>strand for that. Meanwhile I see humans acting on instinct
>rather than processed though patterns everyday. You
>underestimate the animal kingdom.

Even if your crow story is true, would you be able to confidently apply the behaviour of this alleged crow to the entire population of crows? Would you wager on it? Personally, I WOULD wager on the likeliness of being helped by some passerby and taken to the hospital if I was to be hit by a vehicle tonight and left in the street. I wouldn't make a similar wager that if a kitten was ran over that some crow would eventually come to its rescue. Either the story you tell me is false, or there is some sort of animal conditioning there that made the crow familiar with the kitten. Anyway, you have just done a complete 180 degree turn in logic on me. First you argue that animals act upon nature, then you tell me this completely contradictory story of a crow that acted outside of its nature and behaved with social qualities to nurse a kitten to healt. Which one is it Firebrand, nature or social conditioning? I really think you need to think this through further, you seem like a smart guy but there are a lot of blanks you need to fill in.

Also, one proof that human beings think before they produce whereas animals just produce, is in the fact that the design of animal production never varies within a species. For human beings our tools and creations have been under constant evolution since time immemorial. Look at a bee hive or a beaver dam from 500 hundred years ago and you can pretty much assume that it was produced in the same manner and shape as the ones they produce today. The beaver does not ponder are the artistic significance of his/her current dam. The bees do not redo their hives because he would prefer a more impressionist or postmodern motif. These animals JUST produce, and as magnificent as nature is, that is all they will ever be able to acheive.

> How many wolves have
>>programmed computers?
>
>They have enough mastery of their enviornment and
>capabilities that they don't NEED to. They can tell you if
>you have cancer before a computer can tho...and they'll KNOW
>it's cancer that can kill you. Which is more brilliant?

No, they don't have mastery of their environment. We have mastery of their environment. They live in a delicate system of natural balance with other animals and plant life. But our slightest alterations of the natural environment drives the whole animal kingdom screwy! Changes in hunting laws all over has led to spikes and declines of animal populations that have absolutely nothing to do with the animal that the law concentrates on.

> How many lions have built enormous
>>bridges across large bodies of water?
>
>Not any I know of. But ants do it all the time. Beavers
>have made contraptions our engineers still cant get the math
>on.

Show me a society of beavers that can put the design out on paper and build a structure that crosses a body of water several kilometers long, then you may have something. Until then, humans conceive of their products before producing them.

> Come to think
>>of it, I remember you once said that you were once quite a
>>republican. I can see why, the logic is still there.
>
>This is unfair. In fact, it's downright crude. Just because
>I don't agree with socialism u doin all that? Wow. I
>thought u were bigger than that.

The reason I say this is because you subscribe to a very individualistic mode of thought that reduces that actions of individuals to some greedy form of human nature. This is what the whole doctrine of free market capitalism and the republican party of today premise themselves upon.