Monday, April 04, 2005

Random musings on my fellow man

As I have probably described before, I’m always blown away when I contemplate the miracle of our existence; the complexity of the world, especially the human body and brain. It is all totally amazing and yes it is very difficult to accept that this is the produce of milliquillizillions of totally random events. It is a miracle that we exist as we are, by anyone’s definition. This is not to say I can happily swallow the idea of a creator God, especially not a creationist God; no offence folks, but that’s just silly. And pointless. I mean, what is there to fear from evolution? All manufacture has a process; evolution does not eliminate the possibility of a creator God. The whole Semetic thing about Adam and Eve and Kickmebot fits in to this; we became quite literally naked and when we did we discovered sin since everything before that point was innocent, instinctual.

Kickmebot? you may well say. My Dad used to offer us and any other small children present the following riddle;

“Adam and Eve and Kickmebot went down to the water to bathe,
Adam and Eve were drowned but who you do think was saved?”

I had a very violent upbringing… Anyway, no, the miracle of our existence. The thing I was pondering today is why we’re so amazed when things go wrong. I mean, it’s not amazing at all. It’s a wonder that any of us are walking upright – something we’re not exactly well designed to do. It’s a wonder any of us get past our first few months since this whole standing lark results in a narrow pelvic floor and a low birth weight so that we’re all incredibly dependent on our parents for a period of not months but years.

The most miraculous part or ourselves is our brain. I mean, science has barely begun to work out half the stuff it does yet. But it’s also the thing which malfunctions most often. Everybody has irrational thoughts, unnecessary worries, obsessions and then very many people – one in four, one in six, depending on your stats, has it go very wrong and becomes depressed, imagines their lot is to suffer and may even contemplate self-destruction – the most irrational thing in the world.

It’s all to do with emotion (duh - patience with me this afternoon, please). Emotion is another one which I find hard to believe developed as it is in a random way. Certain sorts of emotion make evolutionary sense; love for your child and love for a partner with whom you may bring up your child. Fear makes a lot of sense too. It’s all the in-betweeny crap that we have to go for, our domestic anxieties, our insecurities and grudges. I know it all stems from the same sort of thing, but why do our lives have to be so complicated? Painfully complicated.

Of course I am rabbitting on about this because of stuff going on just now, but today I find myself despairing and wondering at the human race in equal measure.

Hmm, [...] watched the Matrix films again this weekend and I think I have caught that bug of pseudo-profundity so bad I can't make a single salient point. I did find a great article though about how the Wachowski brothers are suing God. All true.

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