AI’s Fatal Flaw
Chet Shupe
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Abstract
To regard AI as simply a more powerful intelligence than that of the human brain is to overlook AI’s fatal flaw: AI possesses only intellectual intelligence, while our human brains possess, both intellectual and emotional intelligence.
Intellectual intelligence is the thinking element of our brains. But, if all we could do was to think, there would be no life force, as exemplified by the powerful human desire to live, the inborn love that overwhelms new mothers, and the fearless motivation men have to put their lives on the line, to protect loved ones. Emotional intelligence is evolution’s most essential gift to humanity: Without the poignant desires imposed by our emotions, life would be without love, purpose, or direction.
But, as modern humans, we no longer live by the natural gifts we all receive, at birth. Civilization has taught us to look to rules, laws, and goals, for purpose and direction—not our emotions. To comply with cultural norms and laws, we routinely deny how we feel, in the moment. Thus, our emotional intelligence is so ignored—in terms of providing us guidance—that we don’t realize it exists. Believing that our minds possess only intellectual intelligence, we see ourselves as limited, relative to AI, because AI will eventually have far more processing power, and access to knowledge, than the brain could ever have.
But, knowledge, alone, can’t sustain human life, over evolutionary time. Knowledge is required to navigate one’s habitat, and that’s needed. But, even more essential are our instincts—the innate wisdom gifted to us by evolution. This wisdom is based on the successes and failures of countless generations that came before as it genetically accumulates, over evolutionary time. This innate wisdom, encoded within our genes, can neither be learned, nor forgotten, because it is part of each of us. But, most importantly, emotional intelligence is the only access to our innate wisdom—the wisdom required to participate in a sustainable way of life, by simply doing what feels right, given the situation at hand, whether that means to accept or reject, share or not share, express anger or offer forgiveness, fight or not fight…
All centralized systems of authority eventually fail, for two reasons. They depend on rules and laws, to maintain order, not the feelings of their subjects. Thus, they have no access to the wisdom required to manage a sustainable way of life. Sustainability is a product of evolution; it cannot be imposed by manmade laws. Secondly and more significantly, states fail, because they prescribe how people must behave, for social acceptance. Thus, they deny their subjects access to their own emotional intelligence, which is painful—so painful that their subjects eventually revolt.
Civilized people are taught, by word and deed, that our purpose is to control life—not live it! Life, as evolution created it, however, is a journey that can only be participated in—never controlled. Emotional intelligence, alone, gifts us with the ability to participate in life’s journey, with each individual guided by what he or she feels is the right thing to do. This is not to say that being true to our feelings results in an ideal existence, or one without conflict. But it does provide us with a sustainable way of life, as is evidenced by the fact that our species has flourished, on this planet, for upwards of three hundred thousand years, during most of which our feelings were our only guide.
We participate in life’s process, by being true to how we feel, in our relationships with the people around us. When being true to ourselves, we feel that we are an essential part of the scene. When not free to be ourselves, we feel like some misplaced stranger, trying to figure out how to meaningfully relate to a “reality” based on religious, or secular, beliefs—a reality that our emotional intelligence cannot possibly comprehend.
Given mankind’s present dependence on the services provided by civil states, for order, identity, and survival, how will humans ever again become participants in life’s journey? There is no guarantee that we can. If it does occur, however, the first step would be to recognize that emotional intelligence exists: Without that knowledge, humans can never do anything, other than what we have been doing, since the beginning of civilization: We have been depending entirely on our intellectual intelligence, to survive. Ironically, that is where AI’s fatal flaw might help: As AI progresses, it will become increasingly obvious that humans possess a kind of intelligence that AI simply cannot replicate! Our curiosity, regarding the issue, may inspire researchers to successfully investigate what that difference is: Their eventual discovery of emotional intelligence will mark the first time, in history, that humans have formally recognized the existence of emotional intelligence. From there, it is only a short mental journey to the realization of why emotions exist: Feelings provide the only guidance available to humans, for managing a sustainable way of life.
Many eminent thinkers and writers, such as Emmerson, Wadsworth, and Longfellow, have long sensed that, despite mankind’s remarkable accomplishments, as a species we are facing serious problems—problems so serious, in fact, that the issues may be existential. If that is true, then AI’s fatal flaw might give the life of our species a second chance at survival, by enabling us to recognize that our emotional intelligence provides the natural guidance we can always fall back on, if all our plans, beliefs, ideologies, and dreams fail. With our spirits again free to inspire us to take care of life, people will experience a degree of contentment that, as of now, we can hardly imagine.
* * *
It is generally anticipated that AI will soon be able to do everything human intelligence can, only faster and better. This leaves us in an existential quandary: What is the significance of human existence, if we can be replaced by a machine?
From the building of the great monuments of Egypt to our current space flights to the moon, civilized people have always measured significance, in terms of accomplishments. The greater the accomplishment, the greater the significance. From that perspective, if AI can accomplish more than the human brain, then, its significance is greater. But, is it really mankind’s purpose to accomplish things? If it is, then AI will increasingly take over the tasks that are now managed by our brains. But, what if we are not here to realize personal and collective ambitions? If that’s true, then we need to figure out what our real purpose is, if we are ever to escape the horrors we are likely to experience, at the hands of these all-powerful machines.
There has to be a reason for us to exist, or we would not be here. But we don’t know what it is, because, Nature, God, evolution, our creator—or whatever one prefers to call it—communicates to us, through feelings.
As animate beings, feelings tell us what we need to do, such as to eat, when hungry, to sleep, when tired, and to express our anger, angry. Though Nature reveals what we need to do, it can’t tell us why we need to do it, because it does not communicate in words—only in feelings. Therefore, we can only guess at the answer to the question, “Why are we here?” My own views, about life, are based on the belief that we are here to serve the life of our species. In other words, we are here to serve the processes of Nature, which gifted us with life. I base this on the observation that people feel most contented, when serving the needs of others, in communal relationships. It is with these feelings of contentment, I believe, that our emotional intelligence informs us of the most essential fact of human life—that, when serving others, within the context of interdependent relationships, we are serving our purpose.
But, a burning question arises: If we are here to seek contentment, by serving others, then why do we equate human significance with accomplishments? That misleading anomaly resulted from the creation of legal and monetary systems. These artificial systems of accountability reward us with money, for accomplishing things. But, they are not capable of rewarding us, emotionally, for anything, other than enabling us to survive within the artificial paradigm, called ‘civilization. Indeed, these systems harm us, emotionally, by forcing us to ignore our broad spectrum of emotional needs, in pursuit of personal wealth and privilege. Not only do we suffer, from this, but the life of our species is in trouble, because we humans are no longer serving its needs. And that includes me! Our fascination with AI is just the latest example of how we ignore our emotional needs—thus also life’s needs—in pursuit of personal wealth.
Monetary systems force us to pursue wealth and privilege, for the sake of survival, within the modern paradigm. We’re so focused on pursuing wealth, that we’re mindless of the fact that the human mind possesses two kinds of intelligence—emotional and intellectual—and that AI provides only the latter. Emotional intelligence can also be thought of as instincts, innate wisdom, soul, spirit, and intuition. Serving life requires that we be true to our emotional intelligence, an intelligence that doesn’t even recognize that monetary and legal systems exist. So, our instincts cannot find any gratification in pursuing wealth and privilege. When we live in a culture ruled by money and laws, we have no choice but to rely entirely on our intellectual intelligence, to survive. Hence the emotional quandary of meaninglessness that modern people regularly face.
In this world, our emotional intelligence has no place. As a result, while civilized people, like all animate beings, do experience emotions, we have not yet recognized that emotional intelligence exists, and that this wisdom—that is required to serve life—can only be expressed through our feelings.
Being free to honor our emotional intelligence is essential—both for our individual happiness and our species’ wellbeing. Emotional intelligence has genetically accumulated, via trial and error, since the first stirrings of life on earth—further perfecting, with each generation, the genome that defines the behavioral nature of each species. But, by routinely ignoring how we feel, in the “now,” in compliance with rules and laws, we are unknowingly declaring, as insignificant, all the feelings that evolved, over the last billion years, to better sustain animate life, on this planet. In nature, the genes most likely to be passed down have always been those of individuals who were born genetically predisposed to love doing things that contribute to their species’ wellbeing. These simple behavioral choices have made it possible for countless animate beings to live in sufficient harmony, for life to flourish on this planet.
But, as modern humans, our behavior is governed far more by rules, laws—and our need to realize personal ambitions—than by love. Simply stated, we are not free to do what we naturally love doing, thus, we cannot contribute to our happiness, or the harmony of life, on earth.
If our species survives the emotional repression imposed by civil rule, it may well be the result of people recognizing the pointlessness of any intelligence that is without feelings, thus, without a soul. This, I fear, is a lesson that AI is about to teach us, in spades. Intelligence without a soul may well take us to places that are far beyond our wildest imaginations. But there is a problem: Once we get there, where will we be?
People naturally take pride in technological progress. But, at the same time, people the world over are beginning to ask the same question, “Where are we?” But, why wouldn’t we be asking that question? For thousands of years, now, we’ve been functioning as if human intelligence were artificial, thus has no soul.
But keep in mind that we didn’t reject the wisdom of our souls, by ill intent. Rather, it was in response to our circumstances. As subjects of civil rule, we have never had any choice, other than to comply with the law. Our ability to sustain ourselves, as a species, depends on a general awakening to the fact that—despite all our accomplishments—we have, indeed, arrived nowhere—at least nowhere that makes sense. The key question, indeed, is: “Where are we?” It is the key question, because, until we realize that we are nowhere, we will have no reason to uncover the mistake that got us here.
Our mistake is being true to promises, instead of to our emotions. Keeping promises requires that we ignore how we feel, in the moment, whenever what we want to do conflicts with what we have promised. We cannot honor the forces of Nature that created us while ignoring the emotions through which those forces communicate to us.
Before the existence of rules, laws, and prescribed obligations, people had always been free to behave naturally. They had spent their time living in the moment, doing what they wanted to do. Of course, this is not to say that their lives were ideal. Many concerns, such as securing food, clothing, and shelter, needed to be addressed. Also, people had to avoid predators and defend the territorial claims that provided the resources needed for survival—all of this, while raising the next generation.
But our species evolved to flourish, in that setting. Thus, our spirits are genetically predisposed to enjoy life, in circumstances where we need each other to survive—notwithstanding the physical hardships, conflicts, predation, untimely deaths, and all. Without our need for each other, there would never be anyone to love. And, without hardships to overcome, there would never be anything to celebrate.
Of course, no matter how good things may seem, people can always imagine how things might be better. Thus, mankind’s ability to imagine what the future may bring eventually inspired us to turn our backs on living in the moment, and to begin living for the future. We don’t know how this happened, but it doesn’t matter. Here is a scenario to illustrate how such a dramatic lifestyle change may have occurred, without people realizing that anything of significance had changed:
Suppose one of the “improvements” people imagined was that they could eliminate the conflicts, jealousies, and other issues, regarding sex, by giving each man the right to claim a woman as his personal property. “That should settle the issues, once and for all,” they may have decided.
So, those men agreed on a system of laws, to authorize their right to own women, via, the sacrament of marriage. This solved some problems, I suppose, but it created many more than it solved. Soon, abstract values appeared out of nowhere—values that don’t exist in Nature. These values were assigned names, like paternity, legitimacy, adultery, and eventually, morals. By the authority of these imagined values, suddenly, people found themselves blaming each other for violating one another’s claims of ownership. In short, men claiming the right to own women—or to own anything, for that matter—destroyed the natural human social order required for our species’ survival.
Social order is as much a product of evolution as is every other detail that defines a species—particularly that of a social species. Consequently, destroying our natural human social order is akin to permanently tying our hands behind our backs. And—not surprisingly—we suffer. This suffering is evolution’s way of reminding us that, at the core of our being, we love serving life. We do not love serving legally imposed arrangements. Indeed, our instinctive distaste for verbally prescribed relationships is so profound that it is probably the reason that over half of American adults now live alone.
Like the members of all social species, individual humans are physically vulnerable. No individual human can survive the natural world, alone—nor can a couple do so, for that matter. Among early humans, therefore, each individual depended on all the members of the extended family for material and emotional support. But, once a man had to own a woman to initiate a family, everything changed. From then on, he was legally obligated to support his wife and children, both materially and emotionally. Consequently, no one else could depend on him, for anything! Indeed, if he supported anyone, other than his wife—particularly another woman—it would cause him to be shamed, for being unfaithful. And, once men began claiming women, as personal property, women could no longer socially bond, as sisterhoods, for mutual support in raising their children. Instead, they found themselves competing against each other, for the privilege of being owned by a man, so their children would be legitimate. From the moment men granted themselves the right to own property, people were no longer free to take care of life, by doing the things they loved most. Consequently, they had little choice, other than to seek satisfaction in imagined futures.
Seeking pleasure in the unknowable future transformed human existence, from an emotional experience to a cerebral one, in which emotions had no place. Ever since, we’ve tried to find the meaning of existence in the objective, or material, domain. This is a futile effort, because, by definition, meaning resides exclusively in the subjective, or emotional, domain, in which early humans once thrived. Our natural way of life is now ignored and long forgotten, when, in truth, our feelings—disowned by civilization—remain our only compass, in life—a compass to which modern humans have no access. Having to comply with rules, laws, and plans forces us into the existentially untenable situation of having to ignore the guidance of our emotional intelligence, the intelligence our species bequeathed, to each of us, for the sake of its survival—and we suffer.
A question remains. Since granting each other the right to own property forced people to live for the future, why didn’t they realize their error, and rescind those rights, so they could again live in the moment? While that did happen, in some instances—in general, it did not. First of all, early men never knew that a natural human social order existed—nor is it recognized, to this day. To them, owning women and property made sense, because they believed it gave them control of their futures. But that’s the problem: The future cannot be controlled—not for long. Just like all other animate beings, humans evolved to enjoy participating in life’s journey, not to control it. The tragedy of it all is that no one knew that. By the time the suffering began, trying to control the future had become entrenched, to the point that people considered it natural. To explain their suffering, they blamed people—spouses, bosses, leaders, bankers, conspirators, the wealthy, the poor, other races, and, most devastatingly, themselves. As a result of blaming people for their unnatural state of suffering, they overlooked its cause—the fact that they had been granted the right to own property.
In essence, those early people could not return to living in the moment, because, to do so, requires spiritual trust. How could people be expected to trust each other, after having competed against one another for property, thus for a place to live? The answer is, they couldn’t.
In the natural world, humans had always lived in extended families, where everyone’s sense of wellbeing, belonging, and identity rested on the strength of their emotional connections to the people around them, and to the land that sustained them. But, once people were granted the right to own things, their identities were based, for the most part, on what they owned—or, in the case of women—on who owned them. Those early people never returned to living in the moment, because, to do so, they would have had to surrender their right to own property, thus, relinquish their identities. This would have been, in effect, “dying” to who they thought they were. Even after thousands of years of acute loneliness, we modern humans have not returned to our original extended families, because, to die to who we think we are might be too much to ask of anyone.
In essence, men granting themselves the right to own women and property created the artificial reality, in which we live, today. Though this reality contains countless senseless features, we don’t leave it, for the same reason cult members don’t leave cults: It’s the only reality we know. For us, there is nowhere to go. But, no reality, in which our identities are largely based on what we own, can support the life of our species. So, eventually, we will have no choice, but to leave the “civilized” paradigm. I believe that when people do leave, and begin securing their lives in relationships, instead of what they own, we will find a far more comfortable, meaningful reality, “out there,” where we’ll be free to live in the moment, and the emotional intelligence of our spirits will regain control.
Our situation reminds me of the title of an Erich Fromm book, To Have, or To Be? Before anyone had the right to own anything, “to be” was the only state of existence. Once people were granted the right to own things, “to have” was required, even to secure a place to live. Ever since then, we humans have surrendered our freedom to be, for the sake of self-preservation, within cultures that condition us to believe that our lives belong to ourselves, instead of to our species.
In the current paradigm, people are not free to live in the moment. This reduces us to taking what comfort we can in dreams. Typically, men seek self-aggrandizement in wealth and privilege, while women seek gratification in realizing the dream of falling in love, getting married, and raising their children. There are countless other illusions in which modern humans take comfort. These range from the belief that God will save us, to the idea that AI will.
If we return to the reality in which we, again, can enjoy the contentment that is evolution’s reward, for serving life, it will never be the result of advances in AI. It will happen when humans recognize the significance of the fact that AI cannot experience feelings. Thus, the directives it produces can never comply with “The Law of Life,” which requires all animate beings to serve life, by doing things that feel good and avoiding activities that result in emotional pain. AI’s lack of emotional intelligence, thus its inability to comply with The Law of Life, is its fatal flaw.
Ironically, AI’s fatal flaw may well result in mankind’s salvation, when we become cognizant of the fact that intelligence without a soul cannot participate in the processes of Nature that gifted us with life. At that point, we may finally recognize our need to answer to our own souls. When we do awaken to the wisdom of our souls, spiritual trust—the feeling that our sisters and brothers will be there for us, come hell or high water—will spread quickly, even faster than spiritual distrust did, when men decided they could make the world a better place, by granting rights of ownership.
When we are again living in the moment, our hearts will be with us. We will no longer ask ourselves why we are here. When taking pleasure in placing the needs of our sisters and brothers above our own—as we were born to do—the wisdom of human nature will grace our lives, by preventing that question from ever crossing our minds, again.
Human Intelligence is More than Sufficient
Our fascination with AI raises a key question: Why does mankind place so much significance on intelligence, in the first place? For centuries now, beginning with the Renaissance, we have increasingly seen mankind’s ability to reason as the beginning and end of all things. In doing so, we are discounting almost entirely the myriad features of the web of life, and the relationships that thrive within it.
For instance, the human body has 78 main organs, all of which are part of the web of life. Thus, the liver is as significant, to our species’ existence as the brain. We would never expect a liver to do anything, other than what it evolved to do. Likewise, we should not expect the brain to do anything, other than to fulfill its assigned evolutionary role, which is to produce the behavior required for its species’ survival. The brain is as proficient in serving its evolutionary role as the liver. If not, our species would not exist. So, what is there to be gained by looking to AI, for life solutions, when the human brain is quite sufficient?
The answer is: There is nothing to be gained. We are developing AI, to survive a world ruled by money and law, not the human spirit. These artificial systems of accountability that secretly control us, like master puppeteers, ask only for our money, never the wisdom of our souls. Consequently, they are taking us nowhere! As long as people remain personally accountable to a monetary system for survival, we, as a species, will have no choice, other than to continue developing AI, as it takes us nowhere, ever faster.
Our emotional intelligence, which has evolved over millions of years, understands that the future cannot be controlled. As a result, it has no interest in money. Its main concern is for us to feel valued and necessary. Being subjected to a legal and monetary system, I don’t feel needed. As a result, I also seek solace in dreams. I dream of a time when people will awaken to the wisdom of their souls, and find themselves compelled to go back home—to the natural human way of life, in which we once trusted our lives to the spirits of our sisters and brothers—trusted our lives, entirely, without recordkeeping or prescribed directives. When participating in life, as Nature created us to do, what each of us does makes a difference, and we feel needed. My hope is that, once we’ve returned to our spiritual homes, we will find ourselves exactly where our species started, the place where all the other species have remained—at the very center of the only universe our souls will ever know. To grasp a sense of what it would be like to live at the center of the souls’ universe, read “Chief Seattle’s Letter.”
Emotional Intelligence Governs Community
“My favorite thing about being a flight instructor at Top Gun was the community. I know that sounds a little cheesy cause people think it’s about the airplane. But it was a group of people, whether they were maintainers, pilots, or support folks. We felt as if we were the biggest, baddest, best group of people ever. We worked hard, played hard, and took care of each other. There was a brotherhood and, later, a sisterhood. That aircraft is indescribable. But to work with people like that, to enjoy life with them. It was the best part of my life. I loved the community.” —An F-14 pilot featured in the documentary, “Tomcat Tales”
As subjects of monetary and legal systems, we are governed by our intellectual intelligence. If these abstract systems of accountability did not exist, our emotional intelligence would be in control, and we, too, would be experiencing community, right now. Community is not so much about the particular individuals involved. It has everything to do with their circumstances. Those Navy personnel were graced with the experience of community, because their joint effort in keeping the F-14 in the air provided them with a stage upon which they could relate, informally. Informal relationships are ones in which there are no prescribed expectations, like the ones we have with our pets, for example. To whatever extent people are free to informally relate, to one another, their emotional intelligence controls their relationships—and community naturally appears. No one knows how, or why, this happens, nor does it matter. What matters is how the members feel about one another, as the flight instructor so aptly described, above.
When we are again living in the moment, our hearts will be with us. We will no longer ask ourselves why we are here. When taking pleasure in placing the needs of our sisters and brothers above our own—as we were born to do—the wisdom of human nature will grace our lives, by preventing that question from ever crossing our minds, again.
Human Intelligence is More than Sufficient
Our fascination with AI raises a key question: Why does mankind place so much significance on intelligence, in the first place? For centuries now, beginning with the Renaissance, we have increasingly seen mankind’s ability to reason as the beginning and end of all things. In doing so, we are discounting almost entirely the myriad features of the web of life, and the relationships that thrive within it.
For instance, the human body has 78 main organs, all of which are part of the web of life. Thus, the liver is as significant, to our species’ existence as the brain. We would never expect a liver to do anything, other than what it evolved to do. Likewise, we should not expect the brain to do anything, other than to fulfill its assigned evolutionary role, which is to produce the behavior required for its species’ survival. The brain is as proficient in serving its evolutionary role as the liver. If not, our species would not exist. So, what is there to be gained by looking to AI, for solutions to life, when, the human brain is quite sufficient?
The answer is: There is nothing to be gained. We are developing AI, to survive a world ruled by money and law, not the human spirit. These artificial systems of accountability that secretly control us, like master puppeteers, ask only for our money, never the wisdom of our souls. Consequently, they are taking us nowhere! As long as people remain personally accountable to a monetary system, we, as a species, will have no choice, other than to continue developing AI, as it takes us nowhere, ever faster.
Our emotional intelligence, through which we would normally serve our species, knows, from millions of years of experience, that the future can’t be controlled. Thus, it has no interest in money. All it wants, for us, is that we feel necessary. As the subject of a legal and monetary system, I do not feel needed. So, I, too, seek comfort in dreams. I dream of a time when people will awaken to the wisdom of their souls, and find themselves compelled to go back home—to the natural human way of life, in which we once trusted our lives to the spirits of our sisters and brothers—trusted our lives, entirely, without recordkeeping or prescribed directives. When participating in life, as Nature created us to do, what each of us does makes a difference, and we feel needed. My hope is that, once we’ve returned to our spiritual homes, we will find ourselves exactly where our species started, the place where all the other species have remained—at the very center of the only universe our souls will ever know.
Emotional Intelligence Governs Community
“My favorite thing about being a flight instructor at Top Gun was the community. I know that sounds a little cheesy cause people think it’s about the airplane. But it was a group of people, whether they were maintainers, pilots, or support folks. We felt as if we were the biggest, baddest, best group of people ever. We worked hard, played hard, and took care of each other. There was a brotherhood and, later, a sisterhood. That aircraft is indescribable. But to work with people like that, to enjoy life with them. It was the best part of my life. I loved the community.” —An F-14 pilot featured in the documentary, “Tomcat Tales”
As subjects of monetary and legal systems, we are governed by our intellectual intelligence. If these abstract systems of accountability did not exist, our emotional intelligence would be in control, and we, too, would be experiencing community, right now. Community is not so much about the particular individuals involved. It has everything to do with their circumstances. Those Navy personnel were graced with the experience of community, because their joint effort in keeping the F-14 in the air provided them with a stage upon which they could relate, informally. Informal relationships are ones in which there are no prescribed expectations, like the ones we have with our pets, for example. To whatever extent people are free to informally relate, to one another, their emotional intelligence controls their relationships—and community naturally appears. No one knows how, or why, this happens, nor does it matter. What matters is how the members feel about one another, as the flight instructor so aptly described, above.
Before the existence of money and law, community was unavoidable, because the whole world was a stage for informal relationships, among humans. Though the values that create and maintain community reside exclusively in the subjective domain, I will try to put into words why those values exist.
When we’re honoring the values that naturally maintain community, emotional intelligence gifts us with the ability to take pleasure in serving our species. That is why participating in the life of a community is so emotionally—thus, spiritually—rewarding. Without community, our relationships are governed almost entirely by our intellectual intelligence. Thus, we’re not free to serve life, and, our emotional intelligence is so caged that it cannot emotionally reward us, for anything. We are thus reduced to taking whatever comfort we can in the promise of religious or secular beliefs, the only rewards our intellectual intelligence can conjure up.
Given that our emotional intelligence gifted us with the ability to serve life, what would everyone’s greatest concern be, in a world without money and laws? I am guessing the first concern would be for the women who were having babies, which they cannot provide for, alone. They would need a sisterhood, for mutual support, and the sisters need a brotherhood, to protect them from the dangers of the natural world. In fulfilling these needs, every member of an extended family plays his, or her, natural role, in serving our species’ most crucial need, which is to bring the next generation into the world. And, as a body of people, bonded by our inborn desire to fulfill that need, we would feel that we are the biggest, baddest, best group of people, ever. And we would work hard, play hard, and find our greatest joy in taking care of one another.
Community also requires something beyond informal relationships. It needs an objective. Maintaining F-14s provided the Navy community with its objective. For humans in the natural world, as with all other social primates, the objective of community is to provide the females with a viable home to bear and raise their children. I believe humans are as capable of realizing that objective as ever. But it will require that women cease believing in the future promised by institutions—religious, or secular—or the future promised by any man. Instead, trust your girlfriends, but not their promises. Trust that if you depend on each other for mutual support in raising your children, then your love for each other will only grow stronger with time. The human spirit lives in the moment. It seeks no guarantees, not even for another day of life. This is why relationships that fulfill real and present needs are far more satisfying, thus enduring, than ones based on promises.
Life, you see, is about taking care of life. But, to experience the emotional rewards, for doing so, requires the informality of communal relationships, not relationships emotionally constrained, by mankind’s futile, painful, and unfortunate attempt to control its destiny, by force of rules and laws.
Postscript
Should humanity come to agree that emotional intelligence exists, what do we do then? Our survival requires that we follow the law, so there’s little anyone can do. But this doesn’t mean that things cannot change. Once people understand that emotional intelligence is real, that can’t be forgotten, any more than knowing that the sun is the center of the solar system, not the earth. This knowledge will provide our brains with a new tool for evaluating our circumstances, especially why we suffer so from broken relationships, loneliness, and anxiety. With time, our feelings may change to the point that we are compelled to return to spiritual homes. Our role is not to figure out what to do. Only emotional intelligence provides us with access to the wisdom needed to manifest a spiritual home. We are commissioned, by Nature, to honor our feelings, if they do change—a change over which we have no control.
We cannot change who we are. That is fixed by Nature. We need family relationships based on emotional obligations, not intellectually contrived ones, so who we are will be free to emerge.
I don’t believe people are looking for the meaning of life as much as they are looking for the experience of being alive. —Joseph Campbell
