Saturday, December 07, 2013
Evolved. Think about it.
Don't they ever stop to think?
In a PRX feature on why video games are so addictive....
"As an animal we're evolved to delight in big explosions and big flashes of light."
It's unquestionably true that humans love big noisy spectacles. Fireworks, gladiators, NASCAR. Now try to imagine how natural selection "evolved" this delight.
Og is sitting in his cave gnawing on a big chunk of barbecued brontosaurus. Suddenly a thunderstorm approaches with big explosions and big flashes of light. Og is scared. Og moves back into his cave and hides behind a rock. Og survives.
Guk is sitting in his cave gnawing on a big chunk of tyrannosaurus T-bone. Suddenly a thunderstorm approaches with big explosions and big flashes of light. Guk is delighted. Guk runs out to enjoy the big explosions and big flashes of light. Guk is killed by a big flash of light.
Yes indeed. We've been "evolved" to seek out such things.
Raw tyrannosaurus-shit as usual.
Irrelevant sidenote: I wonder where we got the clichéd notion that primitive people talk in uvular grunts like Og and Guk? Some primitive tribes do talk that way, but some "highly evolved" people (eg Dutch) also talk that way. Most primitive tribes talk with plenty of music and vowels. If our proverbial caveman had a name, it would probably be more of a song than a croak.
¶ 3:13 AM 
