I was going to post about the evolution of a human through their life as it pertains to sex with emphasis on different mixes of physical need and emotional needs, but I have decided to take things a little bigger scope on things. I hope that you enjoy it and don't find it pedantic and uninspired. The original thoughts (sex in context) were brought about by an LJ friend who has been talking about their issues surrounding sex/intimacy and their physical and emotional components. It, however, did get me thinking about a slightly different scope of things. Not the evolution of sex/intimacy in the context of physical needs and emotional needs but the evolution of the universe and human society.
How did the universe evolve over time? Well, according to science there was it's creation (The Big Bang), an expansion that spread the matter/energy into a certain area, the expansion stopped and matter/energy condensed into stars/planets/nebula/moons/etc., the composition of matter/energy and types of matter/energy changed (matter/energy and dark matter/dark energy mixtures), and expansion started again. That's how things have gone so far. From order to entropic decay.
How does that compare to the evolution of humans as a society? Well, The Big Bang was "humans" coming into existence (was that homo erectus, homo sapien, neanderthal man... you decide), this pocket of humanity expanded from one group into different areas of the Earth, humans form from tribes into societies, the nature of society changes shapes from city-states to countries, and these countries expanded to the area that it could occupy. That's how things have gone so far.
We've reached a point in which humans don't have more territory to expand into. So we look to the space as a possible answer. Once that happens there will be an expansion and, very likely, a splintering of the one Earth human society and into many different human societies based on various things, like what company funds the colonization, a colony becoming self-sufficient and wanting independence from their home (Earth) (which is just like the American colonists against the British King or India against the British rule, and any other colony of any country that broke away), and even meeting alien life that limits our expansion (or annihilating us altogether).
But human society seems to be headed towards taking down the borders of nations and into a singular human race/society. At the same time we have gone from very rigid rules and control to tolerance of things that are different and ambiguity. (order to entropic decay) Add to that the fact that we are much more aware of the limited resources of this singular planet, our next logical step is towards using less of these resources and recycling but even then, as populations continue to grow, we will find that these limited resources won't be enough. So we will have to seek it from outside of our little planet. A new expansion is really humanity's only chance of survival and continued existence.
Near Earth asteroid mining has been a source of discussion for many years. With the recent talks of the significant drop in the power theorized in creating an engine that takes advantage of the elastic nature of time/space (warp engine) the idea that FTL (Faster Than Light) propulsion has become something being taken more seriously. The energy requirements are still astronomical to current human power generation abilities but it is many, many times less that what was originally theorized. It'd take all the energy we could get from nuclear fission of all the matter that makes up Earth's moon for a single "jump." So warp drive engine propulsion is still outside of our grasp for now. That's not even talking about dealing with stellar debris that a ship would run into in space (microscopic asteroids and not so microscope asteroids traveling at such a high rate of speed that it would easily break through our strongest metals), sensors to catalog the area around the ship so as to avoid interstellar and extrastellar matter that would determine the next "jump" direction and distance, life support systems for long trips, and food supplies for long trips. Then there's issues with colonization of other worlds in introducing non-native flora and fauna, non-native bacteria and viruses mixing with the bacteria and viruses we bring with us mixing and creating something wholly new, and us having no defense against the native bacteria and viruses of alien worlds causing possible irreparable damage to the new world's environment or to us. There are no end to the issues that come into play, but a united human society would need to be had in order to take such an endeavoring step.
Read the whole next paragraph before you click on either of the links. If you're so inclined to see (mostly read the script as it is narrated) a version of events that could splinter humanity into different groups then you can go
here for EVE Online's Old Storyline Intro. There is an updated version
here for the EVE Online: Origin. That one is only relevant to about 2 minutes in. The rest of it is mostly about the what a playing character is and such. The second one doesn't talk about the 4 different "races" of humanity that rose from the catastrophic event that caused the setback of humanity in the new galaxy, but it's not just still pictures with a narrator and instead shows a full CGI video which is much more visually appealing. Now, it includes the whole "wormhole" concept, which it is generally agreed that could not exist naturally. Of course we didn't think that there could be a naturally occurring naked singularity until Stephen Hawking offered a prize to the first scientist to prove that it was possible. Which one did. The prize... Hawking would pay for a lifetime subscription of Playboy for that scientist. lol Oddly, it's true. Look it up if you don't believe me. In the end, the first one is much more informative about the expansion from Earth until the Milky Galaxy was completely taken, using the stable wormhole to the New Eden galaxy to expand territory, what catastrophic event happened that almost wiped out humanity from New Eden, and how each of the 4 "races" of human's ideology came into existence. The second one is less informative but is simply more ascetically pleasing.
The common thread to all this is simple evolution or change. Whether it's a universal scope or a single species scope the growth, change, or evolution follows the same path, basically. The details of how each old chapter ends and each new chapter begins is unimportant. The EVE Online version is just an example of how things
could unfold. (The Laws of Physics that we understand not withstanding.) Creation, slow expansion to fit it's container, change of the nature of the universe/society causing another larger expansion, and how human society changes and grows so that the species can continue.
In either case, things grow until something changes (matter/energy & dark matter/dark energy mixtures) (human society being factions to becoming a single human society to an expansion out into the stars and the eventual break away colonies from Earth). From order to entropy. In the case of human society we go from a single clan that has break-offs but a world largely untouched, then clans becoming cities, cities becoming empires, empires becoming nations, nations expanding to taking up the whole Earth (which is where we are now), nations seeing themselves as a single race of humans and dropping the artificial borders, expanding into the galaxy, possibly past our galaxy into other galaxies, but eventually breaking into factions (entropy) as ideologies clash or some catastrophic event happens that cuts groups of humans off from the other groups of humans.
Now, in the case of human society, both technological advancements and theology have caused growth or stagnation. And it's technology that will allow us to expand to the stars. I'm not saying that theology has no place in an advanced society. Science can be a religion, as far as how the word "religion" can be defined. It's just I think that for our society and race to evolve from this point is get rid of the various ways in which we compartmentalize ourselves and define ourselves as different from each other. We must come together as one force to grow and evolve. Which is where we run into our problems.
My father worked with a M2F transgender woman who went from Bob to Linda. He has come to understand and accepts that a male brain in a female body or female brain in a male body leads to that person feeling the need/drive to have gender reassignment surgery. His sticking point is he doesn't understand that a bio-female who is heterosexual becomes homosexual when he transitions into a male body. He doesn't see how sexual orientation changes. To him, men are attracted to women and women are attracted to men, for the greater part. Which I agree with. But to him if they're born with a female body but have a male brain then they should naturally be attracted to women from the beginning. Males are attracted to females. He just seems to have a block in his brain that refuses to understand that when she goes from female to male (gender reassignment surgery) that she goes from being a lesbian woman to him being a straight man. He doesn't understand how their sexual orientation changes.
Then again he readily admits that he doesn't understand why/how I'm attracted to other men. Which I answered him that I didn't understand how he was attracted to women. However, I could look at a woman and understand why a heterosexual/bisexual man or lesbian woman could find that woman attractive. That I can recognize what physical features men/women find attractive in a woman but it doesn't mean I'm attracted to women. I said he could recognize when a man is attractive. He denied it. I asked him if he knew what physical attributes woman could be attracted to and he said that he could. So I said that if he knows what woman could find attractive then he knew what an attractive man might look like. It doesn't mean that he's personally attracted to men but he can recognize what an attractive male looks like. That indeed, when he was younger, he knew what physical attributes that he had that made him an attractive male mate to straight women and dressed a certain way, wore his hair in a certain style, and acted a certain way to attract that mate. If he didn't know what an attractive male was then he wouldn't have known what to do/say in order to be attractive to women.
I think that when it comes down to it, the idea that
his sexual orientation could change is just beyond something he is willing to accept as a possibility. Which, it seems that, most of the time, a person of a certain generation is willing to go so far in the "social change" category and no further. I know people who are my age who would never give up cable/satellite TV for Goggle TV or Apple TV or Roku, etc. So they won't change over to television shows via the internet. Not because they don't have the bandwidth or because it'd be more expensive (it's cheaper actually, and my father is looking to making the switch, which would be awesome!). They're just so used to a television and how it works that they don't want to try something new. It's a whole new system to learn and just too complicated for them. Right now all they have to do is turn on the TV at a certain time or go to the shows they've recorded and start watching. The idea that they'd have to select episodes from a list or menu is just too "out there" for them. So I suppose I can't expect him to go as far as I am with the whole gender/gender identity/sexual orientation differences and understandings.
I'm still using LiveJournal for fuck's sake! So many people have gone to WordPress or DreamWidth (or AO3 if they're just into fandom stuff). I don't even have a Tumblr, a Twitter, or an Instagram account. I don't have LinkedIn or any other social media website accounts other than YouTube (and Google+ because you have to have it in order to post to YouTube, yet I still can't post a comment on YouTube). I have a Facebook account but I never actually use it. I haven't posted anything for over a year on Facebook. I think I actually checked it some time in February. So, really, how far behind am I?
But, yes, the human race has to join into one human society if we're going to keep moving forward. Let go of the old ways of doing things and embracing the new! Letting go of tradition for tradition sake! Which is very common for those who of my generation and the younger generations. Even then it's not like I've embraced everything new to come along. Eh, I could do it and have no problem though.
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