Monkeysphere
Dec.08, 2007, filed under Miscellany
A while back I got into an argument on Munky’s LJ about humans being apes. Every so often someone rants about how stupid people are, and their inability to comprehend that we live on a closed system; or their capacity for being infected by dumbass memes like the Holocaust denial. On this particular occasion the provocation was the Oxford Union playing host to Nick Griffin of the BNP; and David Irving, proponent of aforementioned Holocaust denial.
It has been my long-held opinion, probably as a result of immersing myself in the philosophy of the sadly missed Robert Anton Wilson, that humans are just great apes.
Yes. Just great apes. I say that quite deliberately. Sure we’ve got art and science and culture, but then our particular evolutionary trick has been to develop a brain that gives us the capacity to change our environment rather than, say, being restricted to one particular niche. Everything that humans claim sets us apart from the animals is a result of that evolutionary gambit. If we fall into the trap of believing that humans are anything other than great apes, we immediately start thinking that somehow we are separate from our biology and a whole pile of shit ceases to make sense. Memes don’t exist in a vacuum: they exist in our monkey brains. Monkey brains are biological and subject to both localised current biochemical process and the neurological structure that has resulted from evolution.
Many things can be explained to at least some degree by the fact that humans are apes: from road rage to religious war to gang culture to Bush being so damn slow on the uptake with climate change. Humans are not some sort of higher spiritual being driving around in a vehicle made of meat from which they are somehow separated by virtue of their intelligence. They are apes.
To me this seems self-evident, however most people would disagree to a greater or lesser extent. Presumably they have not experienced the mood swings that come from blood sugar crash when one hits the wall, or even the slightly more prosaic post-prandial torpor that results from blood being diverted from their ape brains in order to deal with a heavy meal.
I’m not the only one to think along these lines, however. Luckily for me David Wong has addressed this with far more verve and humour than I’ve ever been arsed to over at Cracked. I seriously recommend it. Next time you find yourself wondering why in the hell that driver cut you up apparently without a second thought, just remember you’re not part of his monkeysphere.
I found Wong’s article, incidentally, after being directed by Greg Smith to the 9 Most Badass Bible Verses. I’m still chuckling over the idea of the earth saying “OM NOM NOM”.
Leave a Reply
-
Singularity
~something that is singular as (a) a separate unit, or (b) unusual or distinctive manner or behavior; PECULIARITY;
~the quality or state of being singular;
~a point at which the derivative of a given function of a complex variable does not exist but every neighborhood of which contains points for which the derivative exists;
~a point or region of infinite mass density at which space and time are infinitely distorted by gravitational forces and which is held to be the final state of matter falling into a black hole. Sight
