(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .
Bug Brain Simple: Have we become the mice? [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-06-04
In a classic experiment, mice were raised in a mouse utopia with all the food and water they could desire. They lived and reproduced quite happily until the habitat got crowded. Then the mice turned quite nasty, and their mouse society collapsed. I have always believed that most people are basically good and try to avoid hurting others. With all the cruelty that is now occurring around the world, I am being forced to reconsider that belief. While my usual goal for this column is to distill out a simple truth, today I have to ask a possibly not so simple question. I see three possibilities. Number 1- Nothing about people has really changed. We are just living in an unfortunate period where there happens to be more cruelty in the world than had been occurring in the recent past. Number 2 – A certain percentage of people have always been cruel. The recent past had been a period during which social pressures restrained them from exhibiting their natural tendencies. We now live in a time when those social constraints have been removed. Number 3 – We have become the mice. Something about our current era has caused more people to develop a cruel nature than in the recent past. I am at a loss in deciding which of these possible explanations I am observing in today’s world.
[END]
---
[1] Url:
https://dailykos.com/stories/2025/6/4/2325839/-Bug-Brain-Simple-Have-we-become-the-mice?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web
Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.
via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/
