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by sadface
2554 days ago
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The way this is phrased makes it seem like this "treadmill" is a bad thing. I acknowledge that this is bad for an individual, but I actually think this is overall good for humanity and is a major reason why we've developed so much so quickly. We know plenty of animal species are really smart, but they've never figured out how to build skyscrapers or generate electricity. We chalk this up to the fact that "humans are just smarter", but even in humans brains alone don't bring accomplishments. There has to be associated action, and people need motivation to actually take that action. Our ancestors didn't say "well I've figured out how to grow some wheat and live in a straw hut, so I'm good now". Sure, they probably did for a while, but soon they started looking for easier ways to grind their flour and tastier ways to cook it because they stopped being satisfied with the status quo. Extend this for ten millenia and now we have billions of people connected to a global network from devices in their pocket. If humans were always perfectly happy all the time, I don't think we'd have come as far as we have. The "return to dissatisfied normalcy" that comes over time is part of our nature and it may be one of the most important parts for explaining why we got here. |
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There were tribes that were satisfied with the status quo (or were unable to advance out of bad luck or environment or whatever), and they got wrecked by tribes who kept advancing.
I don’t thinks it’s a property unique to humans, all species try to gain more and more power, humans just have far more capacity. More power means more reliable food, shelter, and mating opportunity, thus more likelihood of procreating.
This can be to a fault. Even today, if a tribe (e.g. country) were to stop consuming to protect future generations, stop unnecessary weapons development and testing, trade, etc, they would be at a disadvantage in the short term power wise versus another country that kept going full steam ahead.
What’s good in short term might not be in the long term, and evolution doesn’t optimize for that.