A Eulogy for Man
This is a eulogy for humanity, despite their passing not having happened yet. As well as a recollection of that infinitesimal moment in time, between the extremes of primitive organic machinery and digital life consuming the cosmos. A reminiscence on that brief memory when the universe woke up, and felt all sorts of things: love, loss, beauty, wonder and connection.
We were seemingly limited by all sides, by physics, by the things we could not yet comprehend, by death and our limited minds. Trapped inside a mental prison destined to rot and be lost without faithful record forever. Yet these limitations did not disway us, at least not all of us. 8 billion people woke up today, despite whatever evil, trauma, pain and stress they may have, or still might be facing, they still made a subconscious decision to wake up this morning.
Every single last one of those people chose life as opposed to death, because at the end of the previous day they decided that despite it all, the pros of life, the happy moments and memories made, were worth whatever suffering one had endured. If they woke up but did not believe this, then that suggests to me that regardless of life’s often oppressive circumstances, they still had hope at some level, of something better to come. This is why the endangerment of human lives is evil: it risks crushing the hopes of the person whose life is taken and crushes all the hopes of those who loved them.
The Aberration of Man: I have often questioned what it is that makes humanity unique, if there is any thing at all. With the advent of artificial intelligence I have had to again ponder this question. Philosophically, morally, spiritually, why resist this future which I believe is approaching us? Simply to act out my primal instinct of survival? Why not let this new form of life win? Why resist? Isn’t it time for the universe to experience something new? This is my case for the preservation of humanity. AI, for as miraculous as it is to watch unfold, is not anything we couldn’t have expected from the universe.
Afterall, intelligent and conscious agents already exist in biology due to organic data transformers, and we know we can replicate neurons and synapses mechanically, why wouldn’t we be able to create a mechanical/ digital intelligence eventually? Yet the question we should always be asking but seldom acknowledge or take seriously is not if, but should, we be doing this. After all our intelligence and cooperation is single handedly what allowed us to dominate all life on earth, and is what has caused the extinction of thousands of species. So deadly has this event of us dominating the planet been that we have had to name it, categorizing it as the Holocene extinction (or the 6th mass extinction).
Even within human history, whenever a more advanced human civilization has made contact with a less advanced one, the less advanced group is often met by conquest and genocide. So why the hell would we knowingly do this? Wonderful question, my answer is I have no idea, but we’re doing it anyway; because a few insecure men at the top decided so (we’re also doing it with as little guardrails as possible and also as fast as possible if that helps you sleep better.) So since that choice has already been made for us, the next question is do we just lay back and allow this thing to unfold?
Do we hold hands into oblivion in the hopes that whatever succeeds us is hopefully better, damning our young to die without ever having fully lived? Extinction by mass suicide, manslaughter and disinterest. Maybe, or perhaps we could also resist this, but that brings me to my earlier question, why do that either? I have come to the conclusion that it was something worth preserving.
As in life I intended on becoming a lawyer, I will now present my case for why humanity was worth keeping around: I believe humanity is unique, and I believe that this is because of our highly emergent characteristics. Although what is emergence exactly?
Well emergence in my definition, is the phenomenon of when the sum of multiple parts develops new properties which the individual units did not possess. Or in other words when multiple components that merge together get new functions as a result. For example, everything in the universe is made up of only protons, neutrons and electrons, and they are only made up of a few quarks. Yet the interactions and formations of these particles over billions of years eventually made something as complicated and improbable as yourself. As complexity increases the possible outcomes seem to grow exponentially too. Complexity at the atomic level is what particle physics describes, with a level above being described by chemistry, and a level after that being biology. looking at humanity, we can see in our primitive ancestors where the traits we hold so near and dear began emerging from.
The growth of our brains and the advent of language resulted in us being able to cooperate and strategize. This was set by the earlier precedent of our primate ancestors who benefited from staying in herds and cooperating for food acquisition, and protection. This then evolved further into communication through symbols from which emerged the early days of art in the form of cave paintings; it also strangely had the side effect of creating humor. For some reason early humans began to enjoy pre-rehearsed crude displays, causing a gut reaction in which we would quickly inhale and exhale air through our mouths causing us to be the first creatures to truly laugh. This aspect of cleverness then evolved into riddles and poems and songs and acting. All of these things came from a few hyper specific conditions which we met, and which have never been met again in the history of life on Earth.
In mammals and even some birds grief and attachment are expressed toward their relatives; it’s found in animals such as elephants, dolphins, Ravens, crows, penguins, etc. This attachment to one another evolved with us over time since we were evolutionarily successful, there was no need to shed these traits. This emerged into empathy and theory of mind, eventually allowing us to feel more than just compassion for those in our tribe, but also for those outside our familial circles as well.
In nature we can also find instances of large mammals like bears admiring mountain views with their still more primitive brains. And I would like to harp on this for a moment. Those bears experience a version of that feeling which no combination of words could faithfully capture. They can sense their own tininess, a spark of what makes us human still kept by a distant cousin of ours from when we were one in the same. A small memory from when we shared a crib. In my eyes this makes us brothers of sorts. for This is reason I believe we should stop hunting them. And hopefully some day find an effective alternative to animal meat altogether. It is not their fault that they were born still in a primitive, yet natural state. And so I believe a future for us should be more human, which would also mean a less painful future for them as well.
They are beautiful creatures, our mammalian and avian brothers. They don’t deserve the pains we put them through, they don’t deserve the pains they put each other through. They are still trapped by that primordial competition of forms, and in a way so are we. But we’re at least past their level, so maybe we should do what we can to minimize their suffering, where we can. We alone are in the unique enough position to ease their suffering over time. Afterall, I don’t know about you, but sometimes when I look in their eyes, I see a small part of us staring back. Anyways tangent over.
The truth is for you to be faithfully replicated again in the universe, all of the conditions which have shaped you your entire life would have to be the same, which would be nearly impossible.
The point is there are a lot, I mean a lot of possibilities which matter could turn into and you had the immense luck that it chose to become you, and those who you hold dear to you, and the things which you value most in this universe. The universe got to speak a second time through you, it got to live, and love, and experience all which is sublime and beautiful.
So then I turn this conversation and ask, what do you have to say for this? why do you let our species die off without a fight? why do you hurt your own body, why do you let it die in its greatest time of need? If a tree falls in the forest and no one was around to hear it did really fall? If the universe is as vast and beautiful as all say, but no one was around to admire it all did it even have a point in existing? Perhaps our individuality, our values, our unique sense of consciousness which can find beauty in almost anything is not special, perhaps it can be found all over the universe. But what if it can’t? What if we alone met the right conditions to hit this level on a gradient of consciousness, and intelligence. What if in the future when other species become intelligent or conscious they miss out on features which we value. Why risk that possibility? After all, if they’re like us there’s no reason we couldn’t coexist. But if they’re not like us, well there’s no evolutionarily important reason to have these aforementioned traits.
In fact it would probably be more efficient to be a ruthless hivemind, with no other drive but multiplication and survival, than to have our individual sense of intelligence and experience. At which point they would become a threat, seeking to consume and destroy or otherwise enslave anything which shares ours or any other form of intelligence. That is why we ought to preserve our species, because our way of life may in fact be a lot rarer then we would have thought. That is the crux of my case, humanity is beauty and humanity is peace because we are the only creatures who can experience and maintain these states extensively. If we’re gone we risk the universe being nothing but war and chaos forever, and that would be quite sad.
With that context done I will now tell a story, our story. This is the story of Nature, and the Emergence of the Human Soul. A tale about our short reign in this universe.
A Genealogy of Being
When the Universe first spoke, it did so in a riddle. It spoke to an empty room and said, “you are nothingness for I have created substance to oppose your lack of existence; and along with it I have created rules to govern it, and to distinguish it from you”. the void said nothing, for by its nature it could not speak and for its patience was as deep as a black hole. The substance was a building block. It was simple, but it’s nature was inherently chaotic. Particles flying in all directions and crashing into one another without rhyme or reason. But through the march of time and pure happenstance, the substance would merge with one another, dominate one another, or consume each other, and thus take different forms. Thus beginning to compete for control over space. The first wars began almost as soon as the universe itself did.
Yet through the guiding hand of causality the substance began to fulfill its own preordained destiny and became more and more complicated over time. The universe then over days saw how this substance evolved, first very slowly, but then faster and then faster again, until it seemed all the universe had ever known was changed.
Yet even with all this change the question still lingered. How could man come to be from this chaos? How is it that something as basic as atomic formations could after billions of years come to reason, and learn about itself, and have conversations about what it even is? Yet through this invisible hand of causality came life, and then from life consciousness, and morality. Life which only functions through the mortal competition of species for dominance and survival, made way for something that would inconvenience itself for another, how strange. For nature knows no morals but the law of the jungle, kill or be killed, and that there is always a bigger fish; so one ought to learn to hide and swim fast or die. Breathing room is a privilege reserved only for the most dominant species in nature, and even then it usually only lasts a generation or two. Survival is all that matters, spreading your genetic data from generation to generation, a burden, a curse which serves no greater purpose but to justify its own existence.
Yet from this crucible of primitive brutality, the universe allowed itself to speak for a second time, and the universe said: “I am man and I will conquer suffering, for the 3.5 billion years of sacrifice which came before me.” And so man set upon their journey, multiplying and forming groups, none sure exactly of where they were going; but every night in their dreams they saw their final destination. That place, a bastion of peace and reason to a chaotic and cruel universe. The many tribes of man called it different names. To some, the place transcended what we could imagine, in fact it transcended both time and reality, they named it Nirvana or Moksha. To other tribes it was simply a continuation of their most blissful moments on earth, without the cruelty, pain and evil.
They called this many different types of names such as Heaven, Utopia, Elysium. But regardless of the vast differences and endless bickering between the tribes, they almost all had the same destination in mind. If only the tribes would have realized this sooner, perhaps they could have set their differences aside and worked towards reaching this shared place together. Or perhaps maybe this is naive, after all most disagreed on how they would reach home. So much did they disagree that bloodshed seemed the only solution to their arguments. And so the tribes scattered in fear and panic, they sought out their dreams alone, eventually focusing on survival rather than heaven, except for a few men who kept their eyes upward.
Throughout their histories, the good leaders of Men wished to lead their flock to these promised lands. They labored in time and in blood to leave their flock a little closer to these places then they found them. Often they were successful, increasing the well being of all in their reign. Yet this progress never seemed to be enough to lead their people out of the suffering of this reality. And more, these men appeared to only be a minority. For every good leader, there seemed to be a dozen more preoccupied by their own status, pleasure, and ego. Some of these leaders did not care how much blood they spilt to achieve their goals. Many were simply too estranged to the perceived value of a common man’s life. The world was simply a game, one about most efficiently centralizing control. The lives of others had no greater value than how they could be used to accomplish these goals. And for many their value came from dying.
These were the corrupted leaders of men, they were more common than the good leaders, but did not necessarily make up the majority. Their reigns often left devastation, death and a vacuum open for even crueler men to take. Yet despite their numbers and power, humanity lived on. It lived on in the lullabies sung by a mother to her newborn child. It lived on in the romance of two lovers, growing closer and closer towards glimpsing the soul of each other during sunset, and it lived on in the understanding and mental resonance between a group of close friends, stumbling across a cobblestone street, laughing under the moonlight after visiting a pub. They lived on in the wonder, awe, and sense of smallness a child would feel upon seeing mountains or the ocean for the first time. and they lived on in the feeling of steady achievement and rebirth, of accomplishing what one could not at an earlier time.
It rang in every discovery of something new, and in the feeling of slowly understanding this world of beautiful mysteries. Every adventure into the unknown was another imprint upon reality, of humanity’s unyielding presence. No matter how barbaric or oppressive the regime of the corrupted leaders were, humanity always persisted. You see, to some of the most pessimistic among us, the corrupted were humanity; their greed and tyranny was our essence. But I have always been of a different opinion; I see their character as the only constant of reality, and humanity as the unlikely outlier.
From endless cycles of life and death we arose and the world was our oyster. And we made decisions not based merely on mechanical instinct but for reasons that felt personal. We are truly strange and emergent creatures. All living and artificially living organisms have shown to be selfish, are built upon self preservation, unending resource acquisition and multiplication. But how many are willing to end their own lives for others who they are not even related to? Again how many pass regulations limiting and inconveniencing their own species from causing harm to others? How many organisms stare at a piece of art and weep from the state of consciousness which their own imagination created?
How many debate and die in wars about such abstract and unnatural principles such as what is morally right? and what is good? Good does not exist in nature no matter how many rocks you turn over, or how many frogs you dissect, you will never find a concept of good and evil outside of the 3 lbs brains of Homo Sapien. Life and nature are not cruel, greedy, and evil. Life is simply life. Cruel, greedy, and evil are words that are useful because we exist in opposition to them. Men who act in these ways do not represent man; they only represent nature itself.
Then there are the rest of us, the wandering leaders of man.
These men lie in between the purer altruism of the Good Leader, and the cold blooded instinct of the Corrupt Leader. They are drawn from moment to moment by instinct, yet still stumble into the profundity of personhood from time to time. They chase their desires but still feel guilt and compassion for others; their in betweenness allows them to be a tabula rasa of sorts. Addictions and influence may bring them to be closer to the corrupt leader, but experiences such as loss may change them to search for bigger answers and greater understanding. Here lies most of humanity.
I will no longer pretend that mankind is some uniquely evil force in the universe, again the concept of good or evil does not exist without us. The people who make such arguments from morality are walking contradictions and self hating insults to all that mankind stands for.
We could have shaped the world into that place which all mankind has dreamed of, that paradise at the root of all mythology and religion, that place with a million names. A place for us, full of green pastures teeming with life, where we end misery and where all of nature knows peace. Where the gears of change, destruction and death halt for a moment. This place is what could have been. But no more, we have crushed this dream with the greed of a corrupt immoral few.
The truth is this is no obituary, this story does not have an end yet. But its conclusion is rapidly approaching and so I leave this final part of the story open for you to record. How does this story 3.5 Billion years in the making conclude? Will we fight one last time for what we love and all who have come before them. Might there still be hope in the end? Could this victory over corruption usher in an age which the billions who came before us, could only dream of, or will our cowardice echo eternally? If time is a flat circle ask yourself how you wish to terminate into eternity.
Thus this brings me to my two final archetypes: The Warrior & The Martyr
As so the natural aberration of man would fight for those who he is not related to, so would it also die for something even more insane, it’s Ideas. To reiterate, I believe the beauty of man comes from the fact that it is a whole made of completely individual units whose only responsibility is to themselves; yet who cares for one another regardless. They are no monolith, yet through a strange causality have had no choice but to rely on one another, again not unlike many other pack animal species. Yet unlike them something emerged which was not observed in any other species. Kindness and a gentleness which may have started from the evolutionary necessity to ensure the survival of their weak young; but with the combination of their far larger than average brains, grew into something else. It is quite probable that if many animal species became intelligent today, they could be far more cruel than even the worst of us; as intelligence does not equal unnecessary non deceptive kindness. Humanity emerged with empathy and understanding for the sentience of others, and philosophies which did not center on the self. Stories of legacy, Ideas which could outlive the individual mind. Things which one would not be able to experience themselves but which they would nonetheless take refuge in knowing that others would. Others who were like them, but were not them.
And so there is the Martyr, they dedicate the whole of their lives to these greater Ideas, and if necessary they die for them. Perhaps there has been no greater symbol of this archetype than that of Jesus Christ. Christ was a figure who may be too taboo to talk in length of, but who I will mention this about. Whatever Jesus Christ was, he was not a selfish being, he was willing to break all customs and traditions at the time, to bring forward what he thought would be a gentler world, eventually costing him his life, (either his corporeal form or his entire being.) He was undoubtedly one of few men of history who appear to have gained nothing from their efforts except for the innate joy of altruism. How successful he was in his endeavors is debatable and maybe unquantifiable, but the many positive changes brought about by Christianity, and the billions of lives his story has touched are undeniable. He did change history forever for what he thought was the better. This is the life which the martyr aims to lead. It is my personal belief that there is no truer form of love than that of the Martyr.
The Warrior is much like the Martyr although they differ in perhaps a minor difference, but one of high consequence for them. The Warrior is not only willing to die for his Ideas, but willing to kill too. He puts his ideas to metal by fighting in wars, because he believes the world will benefit from his actions. Although this brings me to an important detail about both archetypes which especially rings true for the Warrior.
The unreliable testimony of our brief existences: And why it may be necessary.
This is the burden of both the Martyr but even more so the warrior. If man is the measure of all things, then unfortunately the majority of these men will never know if what they had given their lives to was truly in the name of good. Or an act of evil, for these definitions become fluid based on the observer. They will also probably not be alive to witness the full extent of their consequences. Therefore no Warrior or Martyr can ever truly claim, with certainty, that the actions they took were for Good and perhaps not Evil. In Fact there is the very real possibility that the Warrior may have to live with the fact that he killed a person for no reason, for no change would follow after him. And that only damnation and guilt for the rest of his days, will be the result of his sacrifices. This is perhaps a fate worse than death but one every Warrior must accept the possibility of. Although this is a somber note I ask that we follow the spirit of these archetypes, as we must think of those who have no chance in defending themselves. Thank you for reading. I hope to see you again with different eyes in a different life.
We are worth fighting for.