I have noticed that people most often say that it is "just human nature" when someone is aggressive or power seeking. I do not remember hearing the term used when people do acts of kindness.
Susan - acts of kindness become natural to you/me/others when someone has first visited acts of kindness upon us. It's not a genetically inherited trait, in my observation, it's the effect of particular environmental conditions.
For the more fortunate, this occurs young in a family, so they think it is 'natural', 'human nature', because it was their parents doing it to them.
That doesn't happen for every infant, though. There's plenty of studies showing what happens e.g. in orphanages.
You will also find that the propensity of men to hit women is increased amongst those who were physically abused as children. Just as children abused sexually tend to seek out abusers as partners when adults, for some reason that most people wish could be easily reversed.
Human nature in general is learned, although there are genetic predispositions involved too.
Some of us learned far more human kindness than we learned dominant power games. Others learned to manipulate, to coerce.
Our human nature usually results from what we happened to experience in the first 35 years of our lives.
Tribalism, selfishness, hunger for power, aggression, and greed are well known entities, present in human nature and corroborated by our long history. This what drives behavior, if you wish to split hairs.
I don't think people are either kind or cruel as part of "human nature". I think most of us underestimate our ability to learn. If anything is part of human nature, it is that ability to learn how to behave. The behaviour itself, whether positive or negative, is an aspect of our ability to learn. Who knows what is actually in our "nature"?
Sure, but that doesn't contradict or challenge the existence of human nature. No amount of learning can control the power of passionate outbursts when conditions arise. And they will in everyone's lifetime.
Alcohol and drugs are among means to subdue those. People using/abusing them often don't realize they help controllers quite a bit. Instead they should channel them into something productive. But again, that's in an ideal world which this one isn't and never will be.
In a sense you're treating the neuroendocrine system as a probabilistic complex dynamical system with bifurcation points. Perfectly valid, but still skirts the question of the limits of that system's operational parameters; or as Susan frames it: 'Who knows what is actually in our "nature"?'
I would not contradict or challenge the existence of human nature. I only question some of the behaviours that people excuse or dismiss as being human nature. I don't know what is actually human nature any more than you do.
Human nature is something manifested in life and can be readily observed. And not just in others, every single one of us is quite a specimen. It cannot be used as an excuse or dismissal, just something to be recognized and acknowledged.
I have noticed that people most often say that it is "just human nature" when someone is aggressive or power seeking. I do not remember hearing the term used when people do acts of kindness.
Susan - acts of kindness become natural to you/me/others when someone has first visited acts of kindness upon us. It's not a genetically inherited trait, in my observation, it's the effect of particular environmental conditions.
For the more fortunate, this occurs young in a family, so they think it is 'natural', 'human nature', because it was their parents doing it to them.
That doesn't happen for every infant, though. There's plenty of studies showing what happens e.g. in orphanages.
You will also find that the propensity of men to hit women is increased amongst those who were physically abused as children. Just as children abused sexually tend to seek out abusers as partners when adults, for some reason that most people wish could be easily reversed.
Human nature in general is learned, although there are genetic predispositions involved too.
Some of us learned far more human kindness than we learned dominant power games. Others learned to manipulate, to coerce.
Our human nature usually results from what we happened to experience in the first 35 years of our lives.
The dark side of human nature is a fact, not an excuse.
Marci: It seems to me you are talking about human behaviour. Human nature is a kind of unknown entity, really.
Tribalism, selfishness, hunger for power, aggression, and greed are well known entities, present in human nature and corroborated by our long history. This what drives behavior, if you wish to split hairs.
Because it's assumed that people are by nature kind, caring etc. So it feels redundant to say that.
Cruelty etc are assumed not to be part of a human nature when viewed idealistically. The expression is used as a reminder therefore.
I don't think people are either kind or cruel as part of "human nature". I think most of us underestimate our ability to learn. If anything is part of human nature, it is that ability to learn how to behave. The behaviour itself, whether positive or negative, is an aspect of our ability to learn. Who knows what is actually in our "nature"?
Sure, but that doesn't contradict or challenge the existence of human nature. No amount of learning can control the power of passionate outbursts when conditions arise. And they will in everyone's lifetime.
Alcohol and drugs are among means to subdue those. People using/abusing them often don't realize they help controllers quite a bit. Instead they should channel them into something productive. But again, that's in an ideal world which this one isn't and never will be.
In a sense you're treating the neuroendocrine system as a probabilistic complex dynamical system with bifurcation points. Perfectly valid, but still skirts the question of the limits of that system's operational parameters; or as Susan frames it: 'Who knows what is actually in our "nature"?'
I would not contradict or challenge the existence of human nature. I only question some of the behaviours that people excuse or dismiss as being human nature. I don't know what is actually human nature any more than you do.
Human nature is something manifested in life and can be readily observed. And not just in others, every single one of us is quite a specimen. It cannot be used as an excuse or dismissal, just something to be recognized and acknowledged.
I think you are talking about human behaviour but if you think that is human nature, then fine. I am not here to tell you what to think.