What is the strongest impulse of Nature? Around
which basic or core principle does life revolve? What is that central guiding
principle of life in nature? Have we ever thought about this? From the
knowledge gleaned from my limited reading, (and purely according to my opinion), the greatest
scientist / thinker / philosopher, of all times, is not Einstein or Socrates or
Newton. It is the renowned British Naturalist, Charles Darwin. Anyone who has
mindfully read his works, especially the seminal ‘Origin of Species’, will
realise that the theory he propounds is actually epoch making. It not only
explains the concept of evolution of life forms on Earth, it also answers a lot
of questions on a lot of seemingly unrelated stuff – like human and
animal behaviour - why people behave the way they do, why do they love certain
things and why they hate, what they act in a certain way and why they react in
set ways – and a lot many questions. If you really think deep enough, you
realise that the damn theory explains almost everything.
Sounds like an exaggeration? Let me try and explain
why?
The basic core principle of all life forms is
simple – it’s the survival and propagation of their own species. All of life is
geared towards this. Life, since its inception, has been revolving around this
core principle. Every other thing, be it actions, reactions, emotions,
genetics, evolution, behaviour, health, sickness, even death, ultimately serves
this core principle. Everything can be explained once this core principle is
assimilated and understood in its entirety. Here is an analysis of the two most
common human virtues to make us understand this principle in action:
Love:
Let us take the most popular perception of love. The one between a man and a
woman. Here is a preposterous alternative view for you to consider. There is
nothing called love. The male and the female of the species need to have sex in
order to procreate – to give birth to the next generation – which in turn, will
ensure that the species continues on this earth. This is pretty straight
forward in all the other billions of species co-habiting this planet with us.
They don’t fall in love. They don’t marry. They don’t hang out. They don’t
experience heartbreak over love. They simply have sex and give birth to the
next generation. Simple and pretty straight forward. The concept of love exists
only in one of the billion odd species on this earth. Humans. Why is it
so? Humans are just another species, albeit one with a higher intelligence
level. But are we really so different from all other (billions minus one) species?
We, like all others, get hungry and eat, get thirsty and drink, get tired and
sleep and so on. The only thing that distinguishes us from the rest is that we
have the ability to think, to reason.
For the species to survive, it needs to eat and
drink. It needs to sleep. Accordingly, nature has designed all life forms to
actively pursue and ensure that it gets adequate nutrition and rest. It has
accorded the highest biological urges to hunger, thirst and sleep. All life
form is helpless against these urges. Every life form dedicates itself towards
fulfilling these needs. To survive. In addition to these, nature has ensured
that all life forms are designed with accessories like pain, fear, aggression
and other traits that help it survive. In its most basic form, anything that
helps us survive will be pleasurable (think eating, drinking, saying warm etc.)
and anything that reduces our chances of survival will be painful (injuries,
sickness, physical fights etc.). Now, once the survival of the species is ensured, nature
turns its attention to equipping all species with traits which will ensure that
the species propagates and thrives – it creates the next generation. So here,
once survival is relatively assured (the initial 20% of a lifetime is the
riskiest and hence all the focus is on survival), nature turns on the sex
drive. The body gets pumped with hormones which lead to it becoming desirable
to the other sex within the species. The need to have sex, at least as observed
in animals, becomes overriding. At this stage, the highest pleasure (after basic
survival requirements like food and drink) is accorded to the act of sex.
Without the pleasure principle, no life form would make the kind of effort
required to ensure that the sperm reaches the ovum and fertilises it – a messy
and tiring process if you think about it. Here, it is interesting to note that
Nature doesn’t trust its life forms to carry out the bodily functions which are
the most important for survival, stuff like breathing, beating of the heart,
peristalsis and so on. It ensures that there are separate independent
mechanisms to carry these out without involving conscious effort. It just added
pain to notify us when something goes wrong with any of these. Coming back to
procreation, Nature, in her truest form, doesn’t give a damn about love. All
nature needs is that we procreate. That is the reason why the urge to
procreate, to have sex, is one of the strongest biological urges, almost at par
with hunger and thirst. And also, one of the most pleasurable ones. The concept
of love is a human invention. It was actually necessitated to enable the human
race to survive and thrive in an orderly manner. Think about this. Men, by
nature, are polygamous. Even if they are “deeply in love” with their partner
they will still ogle other attractive females and even fantasize about sex
with them. Women, on the other hand, generally don’t lust after other men once
they have decoded on their partner. Here is the evolutionary reason. In order
for the species to propagate, men need to fertilise as many women as they can. Hence
they have the ability to do so till a very late age. Hence they generally don’t
become too unattractive with age. Women, on the other hand, at least in humans,
need to nurture their offspring till a pretty long time as human new-borns are
absolutely incapable of taking care of themselves and surviving. Hence the
female gives all her attention towards ensuring survival of the next
generation. Hence maternal love is so powerful. Hence, even a pooping, bawling,
irritating child is the apple of his or her mother’s eyes and she will do
anything for the child – even sacrifice herself. Because it is an evolutionary
need – to ensure propagation of the species. Hence, a pregnant lady is
unattractive from a sexual view point – as sex at that time may reduce the chances
of survival of the baby inside the womb. Hence a woman is protected from a
majority of illness till she reaches an age by which her offspring is capable
enough to take its own care. Ever notice how a female chooses her mate? She
takes her time. She will flirt around if required. But she will only settle on
the male who gives her the maximum evolutionary advantage – stronger (in our
case richer or more powerful), fitter, smarter and so on. And stick with him once
selected. She unconsciously tries to improve the genetic probability of the
next generation to thrive. However, for a thinking species, this seems gross
and even selfish. So its given a veneer of love. And to prevent society from
descending in to chaos, the trappings of marriage and parenthood are added. The
emotional component of the ‘love’ is a learned trait. It is a conditioned
reflex. Not a natural instinct. Answer this – given a choice, who do most guys
fall in love with? The pretty voluptuous blonde or the noble mother Teresa types?
Love is 90% physical and, as an afterthought, 10% anything else.
Selflessness:
Again a myth. Again, only expected from in humans. Some might say that a dog’s
love for its master is selfless. Not correct. A dog loves its master because
the master feeds it. In a household, the dog loves the servant who feeds it
more than the mistress of the house who owns her. It loves because that helps
it survive. Selfishness is essential, even critical, for the survival of the
individual as well as the species. If, I selflessly gave up my share of food to
a hungrier person, I would die. And the weak, helpless person would survive and
replicate – leading to a brood of weak and helpless next generation. The
purpose of evolution is constant improvement so as to enable the species to
thrive. The above scenario doesn’t do that. Hence it is not allowed as an instinct.
By instinct, every living being is selfish. Because it’s a sine qua non for
survival. It is not as big an evil as it is touted to be. In fact, this is the trait
which has actually helped us evolve. It is this trait which constantly and
relentlessly weeds out the weaker and the defective individuals. The chain,
which is as strong as its weakest link, cannot be allowed to be broken. However,
humans again have gone against nature and made selflessness a virtue. Humans
need that trait so that a soldier can throw himself on a tank in battle
regardless to his own safety. The same way, a brainwashed suicide bomber will strap
herself with explosives for a ‘cause’. Here, the notion of a country or a
religion acts like that of a species. So, for the survival of a religion or a
country, these are the essential. Hence the conditioning. The problem with the ability
to think, which has a gazillion evolutionary advantages, is that the higher
intellect (the stronger sub species) can manipulate this trait and condition
the minds of the lesser intellects to serve their own purpose. Here too, if you
think about it, the weaker links are getting weeded out. That is the reason the
notion of selflessness has survived despite it being instinctively non
beneficial to evolution.
Nature is cruel. But there is a purpose behind its
cruelty. Nature is continuously strengthening the species and thereby,
strengthening life itself. Continuously and relentlessly. This is how it is. No
amount of angst ridden hand wringing will change this. The weak get eliminated.
The strong get stronger and keep propagating. The dodo bird gets eliminated
because neither it could attack, nor defend. It could not even manage to flee
(it could neither run very fast nor fly). Same for chicken. However, but for
humans, the entire chicken species too would have been long gone. Thankfully,
humans developed a taste for it and it was easy to manage and breed. As a
result, it thrives as a species – to be killed and eaten by humans. Sad – but that
is how it is. More on this later…
