Monday, January 7, 2008

The desire to procreate

Certainly from an evolutionary perspective the organisms that have some desire or instinct to procreate will be more successful than those who just don't care. For most organisms it would be sufficient for evolution's purposes to give the animal a sex drive since sex under the right conditions will result in conception. Humans, clever as we are, have decoupled sex and reproduction because nature did a great job with our desire for sex. We have done this, if for no other reason, because reproduction might result in less sex in the future, not to mention imposing a host of other demands on our resources that not all of us are interested in having.

In addition to the physical urge to reproduce we do seem to have some sort of behavioral/emotional one as well, or rather many of us do. Many men and women who at twenty are certain they never want children find themselves picking out cribs and bibs ten or fifteen years later. Why do people change their minds?

Certainly there must be many reasons for this, but one in particular that is slightly less socially acceptable than many explanations that are put forth, has occurred to me. This has mainly come about because of changes in myself whereby I find dogs frolicking to be devastatingly cute and endearing. Pets are often thought of as dependents in much the same way that children are and people frequently have their first pet before their first child. The question is then, why have I become more and more joyous at the sight of a dog playing fetch or romping with its companions?

I think its a safe generalization to say that most people get more jaded and cynical as they age. There are certainly exceptions to this, and I think its becoming less and less the norm, but its still the dominant pattern. My theory is then that at least one motivation to have children is to have something around us all the time that reminds us of optimism and innocence.

Children start out with no knowledge of pain or failure. We certainly work hard, as their caretakers, particularly in the early years, to insulate children from the "harsh realities" of life. As a result children are optimistic, adventurous, and "full of life". Similar things can be said of pets, in fact they often remind perpetually childlike. In the absence of abuse dogs are likely to remain energetic and loving until they are mangled by age or infirmity.

Is a key behavioral driver of procreation the desire to make ourselves happier with the child as a constant reminder of how innocent and optimistic we once were? If so, is there a better way to fulfill this desire? It would be interesting to study the average number of children that self actualized individuals have versus the general population.

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Happy 2008 to me

I go out to my car this morning to get in and go to work. When I get out there, what do I see, but the words "Fuck you" etched into the front and rear driver side doors. Do people have nothing better to do, seriously? I wonder if it actually happened on New Year's Eve and I just didn't notice it earlier, similar things have been known to happen.

It made me think about violence that sometimes occurs after something like a sports victory. What is it about celebration that drives an urge in people to destroy things? How does, "Hooray, the Patriots won the Super Bowl," turn into "Let's overturn some cars"? (This actually happened when the Patriots won the Super Bowl, I lived in Boston at the time.)

The only thing I can come up with is that the elation and energy created by some joyous event needs some sort of release. You could run a marathon, but somehow destruction is more satisfying, its certainly faster. If you've ever smashed something in anger you know it seems to release some of the energy boiling inside you. Why this is, I don't know. I don't really know where I'm going with this, I guess its still much more of a question than a thought.

Why does happiness sometimes give us the urge to destroy?

Tuesday, January 1, 2008

Factoid in The Age of Turbulence

I asked for and was happy to receive a copy of Alan Greenspan's, The Age of Turbulence for Christmas. I've been a long-time admirer of the former Fed chairman's policies for quite a while. He is also inextricably linked in my mind to the sunny economic weather that the United States saw in the 90's and the relatively mild economic shocks following the dotcom bubble bursting. (Yes, its debatable whether Fed policy after the bubble helped inflate the housing bubble whose deflating we are now dealing with.)

The book is excellent, its smart and insightful. I've been interested in economics and finance since I was about twelve. For me, the book also gives me a more in depth accounting of many financial events I've heard about or lived through from an insider's perspective. I think its great because its one of those accountings of events where half the names I might have heard Tom Browkaw say. The other half didn't make enough noise to reach the thirty minute script that America takes to be the sum of what had occurred on that given day.

One fact that I have a feeling will stay stored in my brain for quick cocktail party recall is that from 2000 to 2007 Venezuelan oil production fell 25% from 3.2 million barrels per day to 2.4 million. This is due primarily to Huga Chavez's installation of political cronies in the national oil monopoly. Chavez's government has been saved by rocketing oil prices. As a result, he is free to placate the public with bread and circuses while biting the US hand that feeds him. (America is Venezuela's largest buyer.) Due to our dependence on oil for transport we are currently scarcely able to act to counter Chavez's arms building and rabble raising in South America. Hopefully Venezuela will find a new leader or we will free ourselves of dependence on it for oil and therefore be able to act before Chavez becomes violent, which I fear is where he is heading.