Now I have a Title :D

This will be the final installment of this blog post. In this section I will discuss the problematic behavior and my hypothesis.

The problematic behavior, the one that drove philosophers to look somewhere "pure" and "real" to try to cure it, is materialistic greed. Humans have a problem with being selfish and hoarding materials. The definition for greed is simply someone excessively collecting one or more items. To say that nature can cure this is wrong. Nature is the one who nurtured this behavior through natural selection. To survive in nature, you need to have the food, water, and shelter. Typically, it would not be just for you, but for your tribe. So, instead of an individual keeping any of these resources for themselves, it was a tribe that hoarded it from other tribes (Breugelmans et al., 2015; Seuntjens, 2016). In fact, it was probably do to societal changes that people are more selfish than ever. Either way, a love for nature is not going to help someone become more open to other people. Actually, it is quite the opposite. People use nature to escape from others, some of which will threaten another just for coming near their property. Others who own vast amounts of wood will even refuse to let people hunt on their property. A great example of people not wanting to share is Savage River State Forest in Garrett County, MD. This used to be public hunting grounds for local families, but someone tried to privatize the land and make it illegal for people to hunt. Although they did not privatize it all, they were able to restrict access to some of the area.

My solution is that we should not be turning to outside forces to find a cure for nature, instead we should look towards our own behaviors, specifically empathy. Humans have a great capacity to empathize and help people, even if they are not kin. Sadly, this, too, is not unique to humans. Vampire bats are known to feed other members of their group if they did not have a successful hunt. Normally in the wild, it is uncommon for an individual to help another member of its kind, but it does happen. The only thing is that they only help others that are genetically related to it. A study from Carter et al. (2013) found that allow there is a moderate skew towards feeding kin in vampire bats, it is not restricted to them. This is unusual and there has not been a solid explanation as to why this happens. Bonobos also treat strangers kindly. They are not aggressive towards their species. Interestingly, there has been only one documented case a one bonobo killing another. To test just how kind they are, they put the bonobo through an experiment. They placed a bonobo in a room with two doors. Behind one door was the bonobos favorite food, and behind the other was another bonobo (either its group member or a stranger). The bonobo was allowed to only pick one door of its choosing and then it would be giving its meal. Every single time the bonobo chose the other bonobo, and then it would share its meal.

Bonobos are not are closest relatives but we share a lot of common traits. So bonobos have been studied to find explanations for human evolution. The theory is that humans and bonobos self-domesticated themselves, which has lead to a loss in aggression and better communicative and cooperation skills. Some similar characteristics between are two species are the feminization of the skull, release of stress hormones instead of aggressive hormones, and an ability to understand nonverbal body language. Of these the biological change in hormones is the most prominent feature. If a bonobo gets into a stressful situation it will not respond aggressively. Instead it will become anxious and use play or sex to try to calm the situation. If a bonobo becomes aggressive, it risks getting kicked out of the group. This threat of abandonment is probably what spurred the change in hormones, and could be what caused humans to become less aggressive towards each other. Studies on human hormone releases show similar patterns as the bonobos. The only difference is that we evolved into two ends of the spectrum. As we became nicer to our friends and family, we became more aggressive towards strangers. Thanks to evolution, we are biologically disposed to hate people not part of our inner circle. This can be seen in children that bully those who are not like them. An experiment was done to examine brain activity in a patient as they were shown images of their family vs strangers. When their family came up, regions of the brain responsible for the feel-good hormones became active. When a stranger appeared, regions that were responsible for bad feelings, like disgust, anger, and/or fear, became active (Hare; 2017).

My hypothesis turned out to be incorrect. Biologically, we are not different from nature as many other animals can be demonstrated to possess the things we thought made us unique. If we wanted to separate humans from nature, we would have to go from a spiritual or psychological viewpoint. But, I still stand by the idea that empathy is a valuable trait. Empathy alone though, does not combat the fact that we are predisposed to hate strangers. It should be combined with self-control. Controlling emotional responses gives us the power to control and train our hormones. Techniques such as controlling your breathe are commonly practiced in therapy sessions as they force your body calm down and, if performed enough, can actually change your hormonal responses. Even if we do not want to admit that we are not unique as a species, we can still say that we have perfected these traits, allowing us to climb to the top of the food chain, and giving us the power to do help not just us but other species as well.

Previous

Since it is time consuming to go over every single human trait and behavior to determine if it can be found in the wild, I have decided to narrow it down to a few major areas that stand out. From behavioral traits, I decided to use the problem established by the Ancient Philosophers and my personal solution, materialistic greed and empathy. A few other areas I will focus on is hand tools, cognitive thinking, problem-solving, and self-control.

First up is hand tools. This used to be the defining feature between humans and animals, but due to recent research this is no longer the case. Dolphins have been shown to use sponges as protection as they rifle through a coral reef for food (Mann et al.; 2012). Chimpanzees and orangutans use sticks to spear fish. Capuchins use rocks to crack open nuts. Humans are not unique in category by any means. If anything, our cognitive thinking abilities are what allow us to go from simple to complex tools.

Unfortunately, it is hard to determine if an animal is using cognitive thinking skills during a lab experiment. One main skill of cognitive thinking is planning ahead. A lab experiment performed on corvids claimed that they were planning hours in advance, but another study evaluated their claim, suggesting that it was not cognitive thinking but cognitive flexibility that they were showing (Hampton; 2018). A good example to define the difference involves the strategic hunting of African Wild Dogs. In a Nat. Geo. Wild Video, it shows the dog hunting a prey animal. The strategy involved driving it directly down the hill to the rest of the pack. Unexpectedly, the prey ran to the left instead of straight down. Even more unexpectedly, the pack shifted to the left to greet it. Were they doing this instinctively? Or were they prepared for this (National Geographic)?

Problem-solving is technically part of cognitive thinking, but I wanted to include it separately. Many species have been shown to problem solve. An experiment involving water displacement was given to ravens. They were placed in front of a clear tube. At the bottom of the tube was a piece of food floating in a bit of water. To retrieve the food, they had to drop rocks into the water to cause displacement, which elevated the food within their reach. They were able to perform the task with little problem (Video). Chimps have also been shown to complete problem solving tasks, although they go through a learning curve (Video).

The last one is self-control. This is an important topic that I will revisit later. I just want to point out that humans are not the only ones that can restrain themselves. A good example is any animal that hunts. To catch prey, one has to remain patient. Another example involves a passerine bird. This small bird was placed in front of a clear tube that contained a piece of food in it. The openings to the tube were perpendicular to its position. To show self-control it would have to withhold from trying to pluck the food from the middle, and instead walk to either opening on the side. It was able to do just that. Other types of animals have past this experiment as well, like corvids (Isaksson et al., 2018).

Beginning

Humans are a cocky species. Everyone has heard or said that our species is superior to nature, that we are nothing like it. Somehow our species is significantly different from the world that created us. Yet, as we claim superiority, we also admire the beauty of nature. As much as we try, we fail at creating tranquil and calming environments that capture our breath and make us feel whole. Instead, we draw inspiration from it, build our societies with it, and praise it with terms endearing terms like "Mother Nature".

With this in mind we have to really wonder, are we separate from nature or are we a part of it? The hypothesis that we as a species stand out from the rest, that human nature itself is different from nature, has been floating around since the Ancient Greeks. The Sophist's, a radical group that spoke out on the social injustices in their country, decided to create this concept of nature to combat greedy politicians. They idea was that if they could find something that was untouched by human sin, then society could use that as a means to restrain itself. They decided to call the physical environment physis. The act of altering physis was called nomos. So for example, a tree is physis, but when converted into a bed it became nomos. Other Ancient cultures were developing this idea as well, but with a more spiritual outlook. In China, a guy named Li Ehr came up with Daoism. Essentially, everything has dao, which is untouched by humans, but we can use it to guide our life. This dao is where our de is channeled through. De is our defining quality or trait, like charisma or ambition. If we let our de occur naturally, then that is called wu wei, but if we deliberately exploit our de, that was called yu wei. After the fall of Greece, as Rome was in full swing, they adopted Greece's idea of physis, but changed its name and meaning. It was now called natura, and it was not just physical items but the concept of nature itself. A soothing presence that could provide something that living in the city could not.

These ideas are ingrained in today's modern culture. Many people, use nature to contrast against human sin, as if somehow it will cure us. But there is major contradictions for every concept above that fails to separate us from it. For the Greeks, they claim that changing the environment is uniquely human. This is not true since beavers build dams, bees make honey, and elephants change the landscape. These are just but a few examples, but it shows that changing the environment is natural across habitats. Rome's idea of nature is similar to Greeks, but instead of focusing on changing the environment, it was more focused on what is considered typical today, like wanting to live in a log cabin near a stream, far away from society. How can we know for sure that living in an urban environment is unnatural? Sure other animals don't make brick homes, but they do build shelters. Although our methods may be uncouth, it is just an updated version of living in dugout holes like the Pueblo people. For Daoism, it is hard to determine whether someone is altering their de or if they are letting it occur naturally. If someone's de is ambition, how do we know that their "sinful" behavior is them altering it (Bell, M.M. et al.; 2021)?

I wanted to see if there is anything unique to humans that could not be found in the wild. Something that was the dividing line between us and it, and if we could use that as a logical method to cure our "sins". Instead of approaching this in a spiritual way, I chose to use studies that focused on biology. I do not think we will be separate from nature, but I do believe we should be looking within ourselves. My hypothesis is that our empathetic tendencies is what sets us apart from other species, and is the defining feature we should use to combat human nature.

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