Biological Limitations of the Human Race

It must, I think, be admitted that the evils of the world are due to moral defects quite as much as to lack of intelligence. But the human race has not hitherto discovered any method of eradicating moral defects; preaching and exhortation only add hypocrisy to the previous list of vices.  —Bertrand Russell 

     This is a topic that has occupied my mind a great deal lately. I am reminded of it hourly, from various directions, inward and outward.

     Realizing one’s limitations can be very disillusioning, even traumatic. Sometimes an entire civilization can be shocked into disillusionment or worse by suddenly learning that it’s not as great, even in potential, as it had considered itself to be.

     For example: The late 19th century, and very early 20th century, especially in the West, was a time of great optimism. The empirical rationalism of the Enlightenment had won its culture war, and people smugly believed that the human race was well on its way toward some utopian Heaven on Earth. Diseases would soon be cured, politics and economics were developing into a science, wars were becoming more “civilized” and less and less expedient as a means of settling disputes, and people could all look forward to smoother and smoother sailing into a future Golden Age of science, rational inquiry, peace, justice, and prosperity. Naturally so, as reason had replaced superstition and blind adherence to obsolete traditions.

     And then, catching almost everybody by surprise, the first World War started. Almost every nation on earth was drawn into the most nightmarish bloodbath the world had ever seen. The optimistic ideal was smashed to pieces. When the war finally ended people flung themselves into manic, hysterical celebrations, and then sank into a sort of disillusioned cynicism. The loss of faith in the Enlightenment ideal of assured progress led to the bleakness of modern art and literature, existentialism, fascism, unrestrained hedonism, and moral decline. To this day western civilization has not fully recovered from the traumatic shock of the Great War.

     The fact is that every living thing is limited. Everything that exists is limited. Consequently, we all have our limitations, limits imposed upon us by nature, by our own constitution and genetic material, let alone our own cultivated habits and poor choices. The highest ideals are not necessarily within our reach.

     As a Buddhist monk I’ve been seeing this plenty lately, within myself. The primary purpose of being a monk is to practice Dharma intensively, to attain enlightenment in this very life. So, for many years I really went for it, meditating several hours a day, following the monastic code very strictly, going out into tropical forests and “wrestling with the devil in the wilderness,” being damn near a fanatic. I really tried. First I tried to be a saint, as described in ancient Buddhist texts. When that didn’t work out I tried to become a less saintly but still wise sage. When that didn’t pan out so well either, at least not to my own satisfaction, I figured that going back to America and interacting with others might help; but for various reasons that plan also didn’t prosper. So, I returned to Burma, and have been trying to reconcile myself to the fact that I may simply lack the pāramī, or “talent,” or whatever, to make much more progress than I’ve already made. I have reached a point similar to that of the Red Queen: I must strive for all I’m worth simply to avoid losing ground I’ve already gained. It’s not just me. I am unaware of a single western monk who has succeeded. A few have reputations for great attainment (including me, in some parts of Burma at least), but I don’t know of a single one who might really be an Arahant, and just a very few Asian monks who might plausibly be called enlightened. (A wiseguy guru called Jed McKenna has declared that spirituality/Dharma is one of the most dismal failures, based on success rate, in the history of the human race.) The Burmese are much more humble, I suppose, than we westerners are: They are quite willing to see Dharma practice as a multi-life process, and may be content to believe that, maybe a thousand lifetimes from now, they’ll finally attain Nirvana. But as I’ve said, the Buddha taught us that we should strive for enlightenment in this very life. In my case it seems that only a miracle could effect that now, but I do think that miracles are possible. Maybe it always takes a miracle—“Divine Grace.”

     I am reminded of the limitations of our poor humanity by looking outward at the world also. The evidence is fairly stark actually. Here we are, well into the 21st century, and the situation overall seems to be degenerating rather than progressing: mass hysteria, riots, increased racial strife, increased political strife, terrorism, howling hatred and rage, moral and spiritual bankruptcy masquerading as righteousness…the whole situation appears considerably worse than it did 30 years ago. It seems to me pretty damn obvious that despite our technological advancements we are no wiser and no happier than people were 200 years ago, or 2000 years ago. With regard to wisdom we appear long since to have maxed out at a sort of shoddy mediocrity, with even that possibly in decline now. Attempts at wisdom are failing. Same goes for happiness.

     It seems to me that some realism is called for, some acknowledgement of our human limitations, of our humble humanity. We are, all of us, quite literally a species of animal; a primate; a kind of upgraded ape, but still emphatically an ape. Our thoughts and feelings, our hopes and dreams, and thus also our behavior, are limited by 1300cc of gooey grey meat soaking in hormonal secretions. Different individuals have different limitations, and different groups of people, speaking generally, also have different limitations; and we are all of us stuck being just who and what we are—we are stuck being animals, apes—and no amount of “blank slate” postmodern ideology (“it’s all a cultural construct”) or Social Justice idealism is going to change that. We are stuck being relatively clever yet nevertheless foolish ground-dwelling apes who don’t know how to be happy.

     Heaven on Earth is probably not a realistic option for the human race, except maybe for a few extraordinarily gifted individuals (only if you have a perfect mind do you live in a perfect world), but the closest we are likely to come to it will not be through social and economic reform—not through feminism, not through multiculturalism, not through socialism, not through globalism, and certainly not through political correctness and progressive “social justice” (which is more likely to lead us into an Orwellian dystopia, judging from the intolerance and hysteria it inspires); but perhaps through what Dostoevsky dreamed of in his Siberian prison camp: through a transformation within the individual human heart, albeit within the scope of human limitations.

     Heaven on Earth, or even a crude approximation of it, will not arise from fixing things on the outside. It will never be mandated by a government or fed into our minds through social engineering and propaganda. It would have to be something nurtured within; and cheerfully, benevolently encouraged by wise people who love us and have already made some progress in that regard. It would involve greater acceptance and forgiveness, not grievances and victim culture; it would involve greater love for one’s neighbor, not just support for an in-group and silencing or persecution of anyone who disagrees; it would involve some sort of moral self-discipline, not unrestrained sensuality and glorification of weakness and dysfunction, or a discipline of hate. It would have to involve a revival of the very concept of wisdom, and can never arise from some kind of bogus morality—political correctness—forced upon a population from outside the heart.

     The trouble is, though, that this has all been tried before. Christianity in the West, for example, especially towards the beginning, was a much wiser, more spiritual, more compassion-oriented attempt at Heaven on Earth than the attempts to refashion the world nowadays, and it didn’t work so well either, even though it arose in a much more faith-oriented, less skeptical and lukewarm age than the one we are stewing in now. Some people were ready for it; but the majority just followed along sheeplike and couldn’t really appreciate it. And it eventually, inevitably, was corrupted into something thoroughly mundane by the foibles and foolishness of human nature. For the most part Utopia just doesn’t work with us, especially in the superficial, materialistic West. In order to live in a perfect world, we ourselves would have to be perfect; even to live in a wise, just, and peaceful world requires us apes to be wise, just, and peaceful—and most of us just can’t grasp it, even though we may sincerely try. 

     Consequently, bearing the limitations of our humanity in mind, it may be that the most realistic, most practical option for the human race, aside from more gentle encouragement toward genuine spirituality, would be the adoption of lifestyles suited to the tendencies of a ground-dwelling ape with instinctive family and tribal sentiments, xenophobia, aggressiveness, greed, lust, jealousy, envy, and every other emotion you can think of. It would be messy sometimes, much as it is now, and multiculturalism might prove to be a lost cause, but that’s the way we are. The only way for us to be completely satisfied and happy in life would be for us to transcend our own human limitations, our ape humanity—but that’s mysticism, and neither science nor progressivism can come near it.

     

cyberpunk dystopia
(welcome to the postmodern world)