Are humans getting more pathetic in the western world?

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I think this is straying from my OP, I wanted to disregard technology and just look at the human being. We are not as robust now as we were then. And I was actually thinking of more ancient times, perhaps between 20,000 - 50,000 years ago.

I would not class the concept of "gone soft" as cultural. The concept is much more basic than the words I used make it seem. Our ancient ancestors would have had the concept of "weaker", "less strong", or "used to be strong, now is weak", or even, "was brave, now is not", or "these people would not survive in my world".

Our lack of robust build and condition is a function of the technology. We do not have to work as hard to stay alive.. One hundred and fifty years ago people were in better shape (at least in North America). There was little in the way of "labor saving" devices and more people were involved in agriculture which has a large labor component.

ruveyn

I do agree that people 50,000 years ago would have the weaker/stronger concept and also the used to be "stronger/braver, now is less so" concepts. But I think those are very different from the "gone soft" concept. Going soft, in the sense that you are using it in this thread, is becoming used to always finding the necessities of life to be available. It has become easy to get food and find warmth and shelter. Even homeless people can get these, although it will be of terrible quality since it will be the donated food found in the homeless shelter. But it's still there.

We flip a switch and there is light and heat. We walk into a store with money and there is food. If we have literally no money there is even discarded food in dumpsters (people do subsist as dumpster divers, eating the food that restaurants discard). For those of us living above the homeless level, there is always shelter, reasonable food, reliable warmth. We do go soft in that we have never had to go so literally without these things. Would we be able to figure out how to feed ourselves and not freeze if we were in a forest with no tools for months? A truly soft person wouldn't.

But that's rather a different thing from the physical weakness and cowardice that would be active concepts 50,000 years ago (and still are). A lot of people today really are physically strong and would appear so to the paleo man. In parallel to the obesity epidemic, there are an awful lot of people that spend lots of time working out and keeping in shape. A paleo man who saw athletes playing football wouldn't think of them as weak (and they aren't) but these same athletes might be absolutely unable to survive a harsh winter outdoors (as the ancestors of many of us did). But that wouldn't be apparent to the paleo man. He'd see the big muscles and the ability to throw something a tremendous distance.

The same with bravery. Of course the paleo man has the brave/cowardly concept. But why think that the people he encounters would seem less brave to him? Sure, they are soft in the sense that they probably couldn't survive that ice age winter, but they are still brave in the sense the paleo man would understand- willing to do something crazy dangerous. After all, a huge source of venting here on WP is how the world seems filled with men who are just like that and they stomp on milder AS men. So there must be no shortage of men the paleos would describe as strong/brave.

You know that soft living has made it unlikely that many of us could survive an ice age winter without our technology. But that isn't something you could tell about us just by this sort of time travel observation. It takes cultural knowledge to realize that decades of buying in a supermarket leaves you with no concept of how to get food from a forest. It's not something that a time traveler would be able to figure out just by visiting supermarkets.

And soft as we are, I don't think this is irreversable. People do toughen up when the circumstances call for it. Soldiers in the field get tough. People who find themselves trapped in the wild get tough (there was that guy who cut off his own arm to get out from under a boulder, immortalized in the movie '127 Hours' ). Some people don't toughen up. They die when the going gets tough. If the situation were reversed and the soft person who always had central heating and endless food suddenly found himself in an ice age winter, he'd definately die if he were all alone. He might still die even if he were discovered and taken in by a tribe. But maybe not. Maybe this softness is just circumstantial and not irreversable. The person who always sat on the couch will be at a major disadvantage having to walk 20 miles a day, but he'd get in shape.

We may be soft, but we could harden up in a hurry if the circumstances changed. Not everyone. Some would die. But not all. Maybe not even most. We are an adaptable species after all.

Try telling a U.S. Marine of the 21 st century he has "gone soft"

ruveyn

Exactly! Just because they eat packaged food in the field (and at home, presumably) doesn't mean they are less tough than a paleo man. If they couldn't bring down a wooly mammoth with a spear it would be lack of practice, not lack of will.

Unfortunately, the club can cause the brain - mixed with chunks of skull - to be splattered against the wall.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Ancient people likely lived through periods of plenty, where land was fertile and climate favorable. They would have the concept of "becoming used to finding the necessities of life to be available." The so-called "fertile crescent", which is assumed to have triggered a population growth just before true civilization got going was probably such a time. It is also known that the land where the Sahara desert is was once very fertile and would have supported many animals and humans. These times and locations could be what "the garden of eden" from the bible was. So I think ancient people would understand that at times things can be difficult and they must toughen up, but at other times this was not required and life was easier, and because they lived closer to nature this would have been more apparent to them. Whereas with us a lot of us have no real experience of nature.

I agree that if circumstances changed for us now that a lot of people would toughen up and survive, and that we are highly adaptable.

Last edited by Robdemanc on 29 Sep 2012, 3:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

No I would not assume the US marines are soft, nor a British troop or any other army personnel. I am talking about the general drift of the masses towards a less natural and more clinical/sheltered life.

Brings to mind a famous quote by Robert E. Howard, who gave us Conan the Barbarian, and American heroic fantasy -
"Barbarism is man's natural state, and civilization is unnatural. And in the end, barbarism must
ultimately triumph."

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

yet so much has been gained by blatantly disregarding such statements.

not that i think any of us are above barbarism under the right circumstances.

Yes, or read Lord of the Flies. Without our childhood training in the norms of civilized society we would be savages.

No. We'd be grown children. 'Civilisation' contains within it much barbarity.

There's little more natural to humanity than towns and cities. Certainly, they are not 'unnatural'. Through a number of processes, we find ourselves removed from the land-as-provider, and from a more direct contact with natural cycles. It is a matter of knowledge and skill which some people in some regions don't need at the moment.

I would wager a lot of those looking to bring down a woolly mammoth or the like were scared s**tless.

Many would see aspies as beneath barbarism.

If barbarism is the "natural state of man" how did we ever become civilized in the first place?

ruveyn

Yes, yes we are.

Now, I have MLP to watch. Brb.