I'm dressed for warmth
in jeans and t-shirt etc. And it doesn't make sense since there are other reasons for all the things you've mentioned. I seek out friends for decent conversation and fun, rather than warmth and security. Etc Etc. It simply doesn't make sense that every argument reduces what we think and feel down to basic animal emotion. Yes you can do it, but it's a massive oversimplification, and like Kroney doesn't really address the point of why
( Amberl was stripey and dominated Europe, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:50, 2 replies, latest was 16 years ago)

You seek companionship
because you're a social animal. We're not predators like lions, we're opportunists like chimps. We have need of the same security a herd provides because of our hilarious lack of natural defences. We evolved intelligence as a means to defend ourselves and to hunt. Sentience was an accidental by-product.

Yes, there are more esoteric explanations, but they don't make sense from an evolutionary viewpoint.
( Kroney, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:54, Reply)

I like mine better

(LongJohnBaldry, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:56, Reply)

You know what?
So do I.

We should totally become an evolutionary tag team duo.
( Kroney, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:58, Reply)

so you're taking a sort of Occams razor viewpoint
the simplest explanation is right?

I don't think it fits. Too many bits are missing, too many assumptions made, too many exceptions elbowed out of the equation
( Amberl was stripey and dominated Europe, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:56, Reply)

Ok, and not meaning to be arsey about this, I'm just enjoying wading in the middle of the debate
But which bits are missing, which assumptions are being made, and which exceptions have been elbowed out?

I admit, you have to take some rather convoluted routes to explain some of the more 'human' aspects of emotion or behaviour in these terms, but I do believe it can be done.
(LongJohnBaldry, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:59, Reply)

Occam was a very clever man
You are more than entitled to have that opinion of course. I'm not enough of a scientist to convincingly argue otherwise on a message board.

The fact here is that we did evolve successfully to become the dominant species on this planet. We didn't do that because sentience was useful for naval gazing and questioning our existence.
( Kroney, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 17:02, Reply)

Well, to take your counterexample
Aren't "decent conversation and fun" just extensions of "warmth and security"? I am, I admit, very cynical, but I don't think it is a gross oversimplification. Humans are possessed of a remarkable degree of intelligence, but I wouldn't put them on any pedestal that puts them above base drives.

As for this point of why - why what?
(LongJohnBaldry, Tue 24 Aug 2010, 16:55, Reply)