The other day I was having a coffee with a friend when he said that he believes people are good but with all happening around us make him doubt it though he believes deep down "we are good". This has been the question I have always been asking myself, a question I failed to answer without extending my thoughts to the whole idea of our existence, morals and self-interest. Questions raised during my whole life and I was unable to answer them until recently.
I am sure anyone reading this has asked
themselves that question many times during their lives and most probably they were
unable to find a definite answer that describes humans as collective groups and
give a general concept of what we really are. You shouldn’t feel bad about not
finding the answer. Philosophers and thinkers have always discussed the human
nature and the natural law; Plato, Aristotle, Micaville down to Hobbes and
locke and no one was able to achieve a consensus on the subject, so why should you bother!
The truth I bother, and I can die in my search for
answers. I have always been that way, sometimes I felt like losing my mind in a literal sense not metaphoric in any way but I couldn’t stop and I didn’t. and I
can say years of reading philosophy, psychology and neurology add to that
experiences and observation gave me a personal understanding of the human
nature that adds more mystery and vagueness to the whole concept but for me it
is a step closer, it is better than to accept what John Locke believed or agree
with Tomas Hobbes thoughts. Eventually, they might be right but for themselves
not necessarily for others.
I
think no one was able to achieve consensus regarding human nature because there
isn’t one. There is no such mold that we can describe as “this is the human
nature” I think human nature is unique as a fingerprint or as humans
themselves, no matter how many patterns we share or features we have in common,
our true nature still fluid, can be shaped and reshaped differently as much as
we are willing to and as much as how our environment shaped us. Social structures
may have always tried to manipulate our human nature and shape it into what is
common by creating norms and trends that might make ordinary people think what
they have known and experience is the true rightful human nature, which is somehow
correct but not completely. It is right because it is what they chose to
believe but something totally the opposite can be what other people is believing
the true rightful human nature.
The
one reality here is that we are born blank, like a white paper, there is no
good and no bad, there is only our belief of good and bad that is completely influenced
by our background, soundings, and society around us. It is shaped by what we are
exposed to and what we absorb depending on our abilities and circumstances.
Nothing more nothing less, but we are unable to understand this or accept it
because it makes us feel out of control. Maybe what is scarier is to admit that
we have nothing in common as humans except for what we created and believed.
For
so many, this might sound very incoherent, not understandable or worse complete
madness. And who am I to judge J I think
the problem is that we are slaves for our social and political norms which help
controlling the masses and create the civilizations we have created because
honestly not everyone is privileged enough to investigate such ideas, not every
person has the capacity to understand this or even more importantly utilize it.
It is way easier to believe that we are pre-molded to good or bad than to
discover the true you, to dive so deep in the caves of your existence to know
what kind of human you are, challenge the norms if they don’t fit you and
accept the difference in others. It is way simpler to think there is some truth
in concepts, than to get lost, and it is way more comforting to think that
things do exist for a reason because honestly speaking I don’t think there are
many people who can handle the idea of “no purpose” in this life. It is freeing
to know that concepts are just illusions but it can be so damn maddening for
some people, they will go crazy if they thought there is no purpose for their lives
or that our whole existence is just an explained empty space; that so simple to
understand yet so complicated to comprehend. It is so fascinating to know that
we are NOTHING, yet so crazy. For me, it is fascinating because it opens unknown
doors and give us freedom and more options to explore not only ourselves but
the whole universe but for another person, it is crazy to understand that we are
literally, nothing, our concepts, values, and ideologies are just illusions of
what we were somehow designed to adapt and accept because that shatters what
they know and put them in the dark, and let’s face it, the majority of people hate
the darkness!
I
think the best way to describe my idea is using the atoms as an example, although it
is made of 99.9% of empty space but still, we know it is there and it still forms
and shapes our whole universe and existence, the same with human nature,
although it is not molded in any shape or measured by any concepts it is still
there making us who we are; as great as the atom limitless but as well misunderstood.
We develop hypothesis and theories in attempts to understand but we won’t, at
least not fully. It is so different and changeable that every time you look we
will see it differently, affected by so many things that we are still can’t
fully comprehend.
Is
that an easy idea to live with, of course not, such thoughts can make your head
spins in circles. Acknowledging that you are nothing can be both freeing and
terrifying idea, mainly depends on your character. You can see yourself as
limitless nothing and be whatever you want to be or you can be whining nothing and
cry that your whole life was a lie and struggle to find who you truly are. From the other hand, I personally believe not
all people are psychologically or mentally capable of accepting such harsh
reality, after all for centuries we have been building these ideas and concepts
that all became the only truth some people know and that serves other people to
keep the current structure of the world and humans as collective groups and so
far I don’t think we are ready for such drastic change. Imagine a person who
has been fed on hate and intolerance for their whole life, believing that killing
is not bad nor good? That’s a nightmare no one would like to even imagine and
that example why the world is yet not ready now for the freedom of not molding human nature into concepts, ideologies, and morals.
To
sum up, although crazy ideas can’t come to an end. My belief of the human
nature, our existence, and morals is simple, we don’t have any, we struggle to
create a common sense of what it might be but it is all just illusions we
believed in and they are just as real as we want them to be, there is no good
nor bad in this life. What is good is what we came to believe is good for us
and our surrounding and what is bad what we have usually told is bad for us and
our surroundings. Is that the best way to live, maybe for some but in general sense
it is not because we have way more potentials than what we have been told to
have, and we are cuffed by what is the best for the collective groups not what
best for us, and guess what? What is best for the collective groups is to stay
ignorant and tied by some ideas someone in the seventeenth century believed to
be right because it serves the elite to stay where they are as long as
possible. Some will argue that is working for us in general sense. I won’t
disagree with that but the truth is, that it is working because we created a the whole system that established on the current ideas of human nature, morals,
structures … etc and we are unable within these circumstances to see beyond
that or proof otherwise and any drastic change in this understanding will
create disaster because we still not ready for that sort of change that gives
humans that kind of freedom and I am not sure we will ever be ready for that kind
of freedom!
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