4 ms·

"If you are a medical professional and have been trained in a “civilised” country you probably know next to nothing about the primate Homo sapiens and how they

"If you are a medical professional and have been trained in a “civilised” country you probably know next to nothing about the primate Homo sapiens and how they survive in the wild." But what is "wild"? Consider: https://books.google.com/books?id=LXmY3Q8qBngC&pg=PT74&lpg=PT74&dq=homo+heidelbergensis+france+structure+15+meters&source=bl&ots=OjlUErbR0u&sig=ACfU3U3f24Ipw1Clulwo9bCUefxCtLwblA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwia1Mn6iJX3AhXhg-AKHU3IDek4ChDoAXoECB8QAw#v=onepage&q=homo%20heidelbergensis%20france%20structure%2015%20meters&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=LXmY3Q8qBngC&pg=PT74&lpg=P... "Homo heidelbergensis (700,000 to 150,000 years in Europe and 600,000 years in Africa)... were probably the builders of one of the oldest known types of constructed habitations found so far, at a site called Terra Amata in southern France. Several large, oval structures, 7 to 15 meters long and 4 to 6 meters wide, date back 380,000 years." So it is possible that humans have been living in nice houses for 380,000 years. And who knows what sort of beds homo heidelbergensis slept in? It's possible humans have preferred comfortable beds for a long time. Who knows? We have not (yet) found examples of bedding from that long ago time period. Conclusion: be wary of anyone who makes assumptions about what constitutes "wild" in the modern context.

colechristensen 4y ago
Yup, although be careful not to engage too heavily with this argument. “What did our predecessors do before we had houses and made these kinds of beds?” is an interesting question and it’s important to not get hung up on wording that isn’t the focus of the question. At some point before we started controlling our environments to whatever level interests a scientist, our ancestors lived different lives, ate, slept, socialized, whatever… in much different ways. There might be things to learn from that. That’s not to say that what some hominid was doing a million years ago was the right thing to do, but being curious and having answers is valuable.
- giantg2 4y ago
  And, what may be implied in your statement, the things we do today may not be right either. Like how one year studies say eggs are bad for you and the next they say they are good. I think there's a lot of settled science that is less settled than we think, or is at least misapplied/misinterpreted.
  - colechristensen 4y ago
    "right" is a value judgement that just doesn't have a place in choices as complex as how a person should live and fulfill basic necessities. There just isn't one way that's the only way to do things, there's no optimum life, no strict ordering of "this > that" and thinking of things along the lines of "good for you vs. bad for you" is the wrong metaphor.
    - giantg2 4y ago
      Yet that's exactly what many studies set out to do - influence/force people through medical counseling, policy, or law.
aaron695 4y ago
refurb 4y ago
I mean, we're "living in the wild" now aren't we? We are living in our natural habitats, we just so happen to heavily modify them.
- mod 4y ago
  Only if you mean to make the phrase meaningless. Living somewhere that wasn't our natural habitat would be quite wild, and so we would cover everywhere and everything with the phrase. There's nothing wild about your house. We have erected a modern civilization over what used to be our natural habitat.
  - Kamq 4y ago
    > Only if you mean to make the phrase meaningless. I don't think it makes the phrase meaningless. Just a different conception of what is natural, and not one that's unprecedented. For example, the ancient greeks considered things like cities to be part of the natural world (because humans are natural, and humans naturally build them). In such a conception, an unnatural habitat would probably be something like living in isolation (without even close family), which we know has... less than good outcomes in many cases.
  - refurb 4y ago
    Disagree. "In the wild" infers "in a state of nature". Humans have constructed their own surroundings, no different than a beaver might build a damn or a bird might build a nest.

colechristensen 4y ago

Yup, although be careful not to engage too heavily with this argument. “What did our predecessors do before we had houses and made these kinds of beds?” is an interesting question and it’s important to not get hung up on wording that isn’t the focus of the question. At some point before we started controlling our environments to whatever level interests a scientist, our ancestors lived different lives, ate, slept, socialized, whatever… in much different ways. There might be things to learn from that. That’s not to say that what some hominid was doing a million years ago was the right thing to do, but being curious and having answers is valuable.

giantg2 4y ago
And, what may be implied in your statement, the things we do today may not be right either. Like how one year studies say eggs are bad for you and the next they say they are good. I think there's a lot of settled science that is less settled than we think, or is at least misapplied/misinterpreted.
- colechristensen 4y ago
  "right" is a value judgement that just doesn't have a place in choices as complex as how a person should live and fulfill basic necessities. There just isn't one way that's the only way to do things, there's no optimum life, no strict ordering of "this > that" and thinking of things along the lines of "good for you vs. bad for you" is the wrong metaphor.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    Yet that's exactly what many studies set out to do - influence/force people through medical counseling, policy, or law.

aaron695 4y ago

refurb 4y ago

I mean, we're "living in the wild" now aren't we? We are living in our natural habitats, we just so happen to heavily modify them.

mod 4y ago
Only if you mean to make the phrase meaningless. Living somewhere that wasn't our natural habitat would be quite wild, and so we would cover everywhere and everything with the phrase. There's nothing wild about your house. We have erected a modern civilization over what used to be our natural habitat.
- Kamq 4y ago
  > Only if you mean to make the phrase meaningless. I don't think it makes the phrase meaningless. Just a different conception of what is natural, and not one that's unprecedented. For example, the ancient greeks considered things like cities to be part of the natural world (because humans are natural, and humans naturally build them). In such a conception, an unnatural habitat would probably be something like living in isolation (without even close family), which we know has... less than good outcomes in many cases.
- refurb 4y ago
  Disagree. "In the wild" infers "in a state of nature". Humans have constructed their own surroundings, no different than a beaver might build a damn or a bird might build a nest.