StarDestroyer.Net BBS

Can human beings be domesticated, given enough time and effort?

And I mean domesticated in the way that cows and dogs have been domesticated.

CROM

We are ready are in a way. Take two domesticated animals who don't know each other and with a only a little bit of aggression, nothing much is going to happen other then them trying to figure out what the other one is. Take two wild animals on the other had and put them together, its probably going to get nasty. When you meet a stranger, is your first reaction going to be 'I have to rip out his throat, he is threatening my bloodline'? I doubt it.

Now if you mean domestication as in being submissive, just look at just about every cult there is.

Humans are sheep already. But seriously, domestication of a whole population to be submissive to authority has pretty much happened. We don't go around looking to be the alpha male of the country. We aren't totally domesticated to the level of blind submission but we aren't wild.

All the government needs to do is bathe its citizens in luxury and cash and pretty soon all resistance will crumble.

Crap, I've given away the secret plan! Curses!

Yeah the govt just needs to set luxuries to 80% and the people will rejoice.

I wouldn't mind too much... but after I got bored I'd go bring the govt down.

Some people are never satisfied.

Yes we can. However while animal training is mostly a product of positive reinforcement, for humans it’s a matter of a rather huge amount of negative reinforcement and torture.

Of course bribery is much simpler, though not as effective in many respects.

In a way, haven't we domesticated ourselves? I mean, we've gone beyond swinging from vines and grunting. And, we are "tame" in comparison, with something we call "being civilized".

If humans can follow religion, humans can be each others' pets, if not those of aliens (provided they come).

*thinks of the Simpson's episode with humans as a slave trade....

Homer: Don't blame me, I voted for the other guy!
*whip snaps*
Homer: ARUGH!!!*

What aspects are lost through domestication? Do we get less aggressive and more docile?

I was just thinking about what a wild human may have that we may have lost.

CROM

Crom wrote:What aspects are lost through domestication? Do we get less aggressive and more docile?

I was just thinking about what a wild human may have that we may have lost.

CROM

What's the difference betweeen a domsetic dog and a wild dog? I'm sure we'd become more docile, less hardy, and less independent, perfect for a pet.

Well you know what they say.

Civilized men are less polite than savages, because they know that they can, as a general thing, be rude and insulting without having their skull split.

TrailerParkJawa wrote:Yeah the govt just needs to set luxuries to 80% and the people will rejoice.

Ahhh, good ol' CIVII

Yes. It's called marriage.

GREAHSIAM wrote:Yes. It's called marriage.

I bet that's why most of us here are single.

The level of Human intelligence does kind of prevent just taking a random person and "domesticating" them.

You'd have to start at a very early age, like before three, and have it go on for several years.

The shear amount of what you'd have to do (zero communication, restriction on mental and emotional developement and exposure to media, severe isolation, physical and psychological punishment/negative reenforcement, etc...) is the problem. It would be the worse form of inhumane abuse I can imagine.

I'm not sure what you mean by domestication - dogs and cows have been domesticated in that humans have created a new popualtion more acceptable to human usage through artificial selection. Now, since artifical selection in selection by humans, than we're already doing it.

I'd have to say that there are two forms in which humans have already been domesticated - as GREAHSIAM points out - one is marriage ('coz it's fun to keep and train your very own human)

The other one would be 'civilisation' - take a random Hunter Gatherer society - that's a wild human population. Take a random poster on this board, lets say Evil Sadistic Bastard, 'coz he's pretty random - he's domesticated.

Did I helped?

Domestication would require the destruction of Free Will, instead being totally obediant.

That's really not possible without doing what I proposed would be required.

Spanky wrote:Domestication would require the destruction of Free Will, instead being totally obediant.

But doesn't that imply that dogs and cows originally had free will?

edited for bb tags, 'coz I forgot to preview

First you have to bring man to the level of animals. That involves the destruction of Free Will.

Next you have to shape them into being totally obediant.

Aaah, now we're gonna quibble about what Crom actually meant by domestication.

Or end up in a debate over Free Will, neither of which I want to do.

Nor do I.

I am leaving for Cedar Rapids in a few minutes, and as such I will no longer be able to continue this discussion for the next two and a half days.

Yes.

My reserch and experiments have confirmed this