GTP Alternative Cool Wall: c. 195,000 BCE-present Homo Sapiens

[2clicks]

We can't even sustain ourselves because we take things for granted, and put ourselves before others, because we want everything to be easy. Seriously uncool.

 

[Exorcet]

Whether they care or not is irrelevant. Humans have done far more damage to the environment than any other animal.

I'd say it's rather relevant, if they're the only ones who care, then it stands that they would be the only ones to mitigate or reverse damage done. The good and the bad are part of the total impact, so why is the bad getting all the attention?

There's also another layer to the question, if you aren't able to care about the environment, how do you discern what is good or bad? The concept of something being bad for the environment at all is something only humans can grasp. Nature is certainly not balanced with a lack of humans. There have been 5 mass extinctions, humans have been responsible for 0 of them. Between all five, extinction and climate change has been prevalent anyway. Humans have had a large impact on the planet, but not nearly as large as nature itself. Humanity marks the first set of organisms able to recognize its impact and account for it. You could only look at the bad if you want, but to me it doesn't make any sense to talk about our total impact and ignore half of what we've done.

 

[PeterJB]

I'd say it's rather relevant, if they're the only ones who care, then it stands that they would be the only ones to mitigate or reverse damage done. The good and the bad are part of the total impact, so why is the bad getting all the attention?

There's also another layer to the question, if you aren't able to care about the environment, how do you discern what is good or bad? The concept of something being bad for the environment at all is something only humans can grasp. Nature is certainly not balanced with a lack of humans. There have been 5 mass extinctions, humans have been responsible for 0 of them. Between all five, extinction and climate change has been prevalent anyway. Humans have had a large impact on the planet, but not nearly as large as nature itself. Humanity marks the first set of organisms able to recognize its impact and account for it. You could only look at the bad if you want, but to me it doesn't make any sense to talk about our total impact and ignore half of what we've done.

None of those mass extinctions were caused by animals either. Obviously yes we can discern between what is good and bad for the environment, but a lot of the 'good' things we do such as creation of national parks, safaris and protection of endangered species' have had to have been done to reverse the effects of 'bad' things that we have done prior to this. I.e. destruction of forests and woodland and hunting animals or bringing in foreign diseases or other species that disrupt the ecosystem. Look at how many species have driving to extinction by humans within the past 500 years, or the amount of rainforest that's been torn down to make way for farmland and urbanisation in the past 100 years, or how much the Aral Sea has shrunk in the past 50 years.

 

[Liquid]

Think of all the things which have ever brought suffering into your life. The pain, the hurt, the aggregate of all your shattered dreams.

Now think how many of those things were because of humans.

Seriously Uncool

 

[Roger the Horse]

There have been 5 mass extinctions, and humans are currently at severe risk causing a sixth one, be it through nuclear fallout, climate change, deforestation, or any number of other artificial factors.

Consider this possibility.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Anyway, if I had to pick a single reason as to why I consider humanity seriously uncool, it'd be a toss up between the Armenian genocide, the Holocaust, Tony Blair, the situation in Israel and Palestine, the Rwandan genocide, Margaret Thatcher, the British empire, the Japanese empire, George W. Bush, Saudi Arabia, Guantanamo Bay detention camp, the dirty war, Nisemonogatari episode 8, the Holodomor, the British empire...

OK, I could go on listing atrocities all day.

 

[Exorcet]

None of those mass extinctions were caused by animals either. Obviously yes we can discern between what is good and bad for the environment, but a lot of the 'good' things we do such as creation of national parks, safaris and protection of endangered species' have had to have been done to reverse the effects of 'bad' things that we have done prior to this. I.e. destruction of forests and woodland and hunting animals or bringing in foreign diseases or other species that disrupt the ecosystem. Look at how many species have driving to extinction by humans within the past 500 years, or the amount of rainforest that's been torn down to make way for farmland and urbanisation in the past 100 years, or how much the Aral Sea has shrunk in the past 50 years.

But that just makes me ask again, why is the bad getting all the focus? If the good is done to reverse the bad, I don't see why that would take anything away from it. We didn't arrive here enlightened. We had to learn that there are consequences. If there is a criteria to judge on whether we care or not, I'd think it would be our action after we learned how things work rather than our action when we were ignorant. It's not like people evolved and then immediately decided to wipe everything else out.

Bringing up the extinction events wasn't an attempt to directly blame the animals, it was just to show that humanity hasn't really done anything that hasn't been done before. Nature shapes itself and it always has. The difference now is that at least some part of it is taking responsibility.

Also, going back to what is good and bad, I think it's fair to question whether either label is justified when it's brought up. People say that humans are causing a lot of damage to the enviroment, usually it boils down to damage = change. However that's what nature has been doing for 3 billion years. It has been taking the status quo and shattering it. The casualties that result are never a concern. Humans causing change isn't unlike the case where humans don't exist at all.

Consider this possibility.

Yes, humans have the power to impact the environment, but it wasn't like there was ever such a thing as a stable environment. I was pointing out that disasters, or more generally change, doesn't require people.

I'd also argue that extinctions themselves don't have to be bad. There has been talk about driving mosquitoes to extinction. I have nothing against that. We've already started down that path with vaccines and bacteria. The world of today isn't necessarily the best world that could possibly be, so we shouldn't try to hold onto it like it is.

Anyway, if I had to pick a single reason as to why I consider humanity seriously uncool, it'd be a toss up between the Armenian genocide, the Holocaust, Tony Blair, the situation in Israel and Palestine, the Rwandan genocide, Margaret Thatcher, the British empire, the Japanese empire, George W. Bush, Saudi Arabia, Guantanamo Bay detention camp, the dirty war, Nisemonogatari episode 8, the Holodomor, the British empire...

OK, I could go on listing atrocities all day.

Whatever could be listed would probably also go on to the list of things humans have stood up against and/or corrected.

 

[Roger the Horse]

But if humanity were cool we would never have had to stand up against or correct those things to begin with. Human beings regularly and consistently behave awfully towards each other.

Sometimes said awfulness comes from good intentions but are clouded by humanities tendency to take action based off of reactionary animalistic instinct rather than rational thought. Support for the death penalty is a great example of this. The majority of humans will support the judicially backed murder of criminals in spite of the fact that it has never been shown to act as a deterrent to others who might commit such crimes, the risk of killing an innocent individual (sad to say, three instances of this happening in a short space of time was the primary reason for abolition in my country), and the fact that it implies that performing an act of violence on a defenceless individual can ever be acceptable.

Sometimes, however, human awfulness can only be explained by pure malice. Be it the holocaust, the rape of Nanking, or the only people who pay any attention to an individual having a panic attack in a train station being those who stop to laugh, human beings are fundamentally nasty, and this nastiness can only be overcome by an extreme dedication to rational thought, which sadly, most humans are not in a position to maintain.

Yes, I'm a misanthrope, but I feel that humanity has fully earned my disrespect.

 

[Exorcet]

But if humanity were cool we would never have had to stand up against or correct those things to begin with. Human beings regularly and consistently behave awfully towards each other

That makes it sound like only something that is flawless could be considered acceptable, which would make more than one good rating on the cool wall redundant. For a lot of things polled, flawed but still good seems like an acceptable consensus. I'd think humanity would be a good fit for that grade, but apparently the majority here finds that idea far fetched.

Humans have had plenty of opportunity to mess things up, yet have managed to constantly progress. Generally happiness and quality of life is what goes up with time.

Sometimes said awfulness comes from good intentions but are clouded by humanities tendency to take action based off of reactionary animalistic instinct rather than rational thought.

That itself is another thing people are trying to change. Given that species can exist for millions of years and we're already trying to cut off the problem after about 150,000 years it could very well be that the vast majority of human time is spent ignoring unreliable instinct.

Support for the death penalty is a great example of this. The majority of humans will support the judicially backed murder of criminals in spite of the fact that it has never been shown to act as a deterrent to others who might commit such crimes, the risk of killing an innocent individual (sad to say, three instances of this happening in a short space of time was the primary reason for abolition in my country), and the fact that it implies that performing an act of violence on a defenceless individual can ever be acceptable.

Even if true now, that can change later. The trend over time is that people choose rational behavior. If the death penalty does not deliver what is promised, and this is shown to be the case, people will most likely do away with it. Historically I'd say criminal punishment is a good case to highlight the human tendency toward being rational.

Sometimes, however, human awfulness can only be explained by pure malice. Be it the holocaust, the rape of Nanking, or the only people who pay any attention to an individual having a panic attack in a train station being those who stop to laugh, human beings are fundamentally nasty, and this nastiness can only be overcome by an extreme dedication to rational thought, which sadly, most humans are not in a position to maintain.

Yes, I'm a misanthrope, but I feel that humanity has fully earned my disrespect.

Half of the world went out of their way to stop the holocaust, and then took a look at themselves and asked if it should be allowed to happen again and decided no. Nanking isn't exactly celebrated anywhere in the world that I know of. It happened and it was horrible, but it was not condoned by humanity as a whole. I've never really heard of the situation you described in a train station, but I do know that every so often one person will risk their life for another if someone falls onto the tracks. That's a story I've heard many more times.

When it comes to inherent behavior I'd be extremely hesitant to call humans nasty. Cooperation is at the center of society itself. Philanthropy is in our genes. Care and concern are things that set people apart from other animals, it's not something we lack.

I have always had the hardest time understanding why people would view humanity as negative. Flawed is a different story, and from what I see most of the time people don't let flaws completely dictate their opinion of something. If they did, nothing would be good at all. For someone reason though when some people try to self critique their own kind, it all goes out the window. I would agree that humans have done wrong, but I can't see you would characterize them as a whole by a few mistakes.

 

[Roger the Horse]

Half of the world went out of their way to stop the holocaust

OK, your post was rather long, and I don't feel like arguing, so I'm going to leave it as this. Even if half the world went out of their way to stop the holocaust (they didn't. Stopping it was just a convenient by-product of the war they happened to be fighting for other reasons) that still wouldn't change the fact that it was an atrocity committed by humans. It is a perfect reflection of just how awful humans can easily become.

Want yet a better example still? Colonialism. Something that as far as I can see many DO still celebrate, albeit to a far lesser extent than we once did. How many indigenous peoples had their culture and their ways of life completely destroyed by the disease and violence bought upon them by colonists, and continue to live in far worse conditions than the the descendants of their invaders?

Humans are awful. The world is an inherently unfair and unjust place, and although humans have done many wonderful things to try and rectify that over the years, sadly far too many of us have done the opposite.

Anyway, this is worth looking into:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis

 

[C-ZETA]

I actually think we average out to a meh overall.

The way some of you all look at it though, sounds like some of you are off to Tumblr.

 

[Akmuq]

I don't know of any other species that makes pizza, so Sub Zero for me.

 

[a6m5]

How depressing. Personally, I've seen - read - heard - experienced too many amazing & beautiful things to vote below 'meh'. Even with all the valid criticism mentioned in here, looking thru my "homer" glasses, I voted "cool".

 

[Wolfe]

Humans do and accomplish cool things, but those are the actions of great individuals, not a great species. Get enough of us together and the outcome is almost always Seriously Uncool. It takes careful guidance (by individuals) to avoid that.

 

[Sage Ages]

I'm a human being. Seriously Uncool.

 

[Roger the Horse]

The results for this poll will be defaulted to 0.000, in order to take into account the anthropic principle.

 

[ClydeYellow]

I would've rated the H. Sapiens model a solid "cool", has plenty of nifty features (like very advanced sapience, opposable thumbs and the like), but I've had several problems with this platform. Some I can think of are:

• It has an efficient immune system - as a matter of fact, it's so efficient it will sometimes attack parts of the body;
• Vital organs can shut down without any notice, requiring extensive emergency diagnostic analysis;
• It is crammed full of unnecessary organs that may actually develop infections (read pt. 1) and require surgery to be removed;
• Important parts lack any sort of protection from harm;
• Many useful functions the older models had were removed;
• I know it may sound very specific, but it happened to me and I feel the need to report this: both kidneys will shut down when overloaded, and there's no back-up homeostatic organ. Hopefully they will fix this with the next bugfix instead of caring about useless things like increasing yet another time the average height of the body.

But the list of issues I have with this particular model are not limited to those I listed. I hope whoever was in charge of its design is already looking for another job! I'd rate it 1.5/5, the good is outweighted by the bad by a fair shot.

P.S: am I the only one thinking the guys in charge of the hardware and the software don't talk to each other very much? I mean, I admire the effort it went into having different exterior shell colors and shapes, I really do... But the current firmware doesn't recognize it, so you have people freaking the hell out when they see someone of a different color. And the fact that hardware-wise males and females have roughly the same sexual drive, but software-wise only men freely express it... It's also annoying. And that's just two examples of the clear disconnect between software and hardware design we, the loyal customers, had to endure for the past 150,000 years.

 

[Roger the Horse]

Hardware-wise males and females have roughly the same sexual drive, but software-wise only men freely express it... It's also annoying.

That's just because the software's not being used properly. Nothing wrong with the software itself.

 

[ClydeYellow]

That's just because the software's not being used properly. Nothing wrong with the software itself.

Yeah, you know what they say, "design a software for idiots..."

I may switch to (being an) Android if the next evolutionary step doesn't fix those issues, to be honest.

Oh, and I haven't even touched the whole ecosustainability issue, but you guys have already discussed it, and I didnt feel like I could've added anything of note to the debate.

 

[Exorcet]

Humans do and accomplish cool things, but those are the actions of great individuals, not a great species. Get enough of us together and the outcome is almost always Seriously Uncool. It takes careful guidance (by individuals) to avoid that.

I can't help but feel that this is backwards. What great individuals would have accomplished anything near their historical claim to fame without belonging to a technically advanced society built on the knowledge and contributions of many, many, past generations?

Keep people from getting together and you get a bunch of scared, hungry individuals in caves.

 

[Wolfe]

@Exorcet -- I didn't mean that we should all be loners or that having a society is bad, but you've hit upon something else: most of us get a free ride on the knowledge and contributions of the great individuals of past generations. On an individual basis, you could say that we haven't "earned" it. To be clear, I'm not saying you have to change the world or invent something to be a good person, but our accomplishments and progress as a society still require leaders.

What that means in terms of the poll is open for interpretation -- a species that births great leaders could be considered "cool". I simply disagree with the idea that we can collectively take credit for the accomplishments of the best and brightest.

 

[Pupik]

We made most of the Super Cool things so we must be pretty good. Only problem is that we can only survive in meh to uncool temperatures.

...I'll turn it over to Bobby at the Sports Desk.

 

[Exorcet]

@Exorcet -- I didn't mean that we should all be loners or that having a society is bad, but you've hit upon something else: most of us get a free ride on the knowledge and contributions of the great individuals of past generations. On an individual basis, you could say that we haven't "earned" it. To be clear, I'm not saying you have to change the world or invent something to be a good person, but our accomplishments and progress as a society still require leaders.

What that means in terms of the poll is open for interpretation -- a species that births great leaders could be considered "cool". I simply disagree with the idea that we can collectively take credit for the accomplishments of the best and brightest.

That reads a bit differently than the first post, at least to me. Might still be arguable, but I can understand the point a bit better this way.