Teenage Violence

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Originally Posted by The Atheist

Why do people drink?

Many substances affect our brains in ways we find enjoyable. Bit like sex, really. 99.99r% of animals that have ever lived have indulged in sex for no other reason than procreation. We do it because we like it, we drink because we like it and we jump off high buildings because we like it.

The only thing you could do about it is re-engineer human DNA to preclude us from taking pleasure. Whether a rush is natural, as in a base-jumper, or manufactured, as in someone smoking crystal meth, we look for it in search of pleasure.

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This is wherein exactly people who call themselves rationalists, empiricists, atheists, scientists make hypothesized propositions. They make so many baseless theories out of just imaginations. How do you prove that animals indulging in sex do so out of the desire for procreation? This is simply a dogmatic idea, a hypothesis with no scientific proof.

Maybe you may say man has more sexual hormones and enjoy it more than animals. But this has things feelings and feelings, emotions, passions, compassion are immeasurable attributes and no scientific instruments can gauge them.

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Originally Posted by Neely

I concede that people drink for pleasure certainly, but do people smoke crystal meth for pleasure or as a means of escape? That is not to say that people don't drink to escape, of course they do, but I would argue more people turn to hard drugs as a "way out" - as a way out of a society that they don't feel they have a stake in perhaps?

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I think that's a common fallacy; that only flawed people take up drugs. It certainly applies to some, but most drug addicts and alcoholics still work for a living, so I can't buy the "opt-out" theory.

I agree with your logic on crystal meth - you'd think only the insane would want to try it, but the thing is, it has an unbelievably good high and many people who are hooked on it started out with an "I'm not going to get hooked..." attitude only to wake up one morning and find they are. Just like alkies.

Look at the damage alcohol causes in society, let alone drunk driving. I figure people must be insane to drink more than a glass of wine with dinner, but they still do it.

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Originally Posted by Paulclem

People take drugs for pleasure in the same way as they drink. The attraction is the illegality, and it also inculcates a fellow feeling between the takers initially. Imagine the pride of doing something you assume hardly anyone else knows about or can enjoy. This is the very Devil in my view. It makes the slide into hard drugs easier. "If cannabis isn't so bad, perhaps everything I've heard about coke/ heroin is wrong..." may be the kind of thought process, along with an "I can take it" feeling.

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Just that.

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Originally Posted by Paulclem

The other thing of course is that there is an implied acceptance and promotion of drugs in society. The law says one thing, whilst celebrities, films stars, rock Gods etc clearly flout the whole thing, as does the local dealer. It is implicit in the term rock star lifestyle.

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Two in a row!

When you've grown up in a trailer and see one of your pals driving around in a new BMW, the lifestyle looks pretty damned good.

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Originally Posted by blazeofglory

This is wherein exactly people who call themselves rationalists, empiricists, atheists, scientists make hypothesized propositions. They make so many baseless theories out of just imaginations. How do you prove that animals indulging in sex do so out of the desire for procreation? This is simply a dogmatic idea, a hypothesis with no scientific proof.

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Part of science is observation - quite a major part, actually, because everything has to be recorded so it's available for others to check - and believe it or not, quite a few scietists have spent collectively thousands of years studying the sex life of just about every animal known to mankind.

So far, there are three species whose members do not engage in sex for procreation only: humans, bonobos and dolphins. There may be others, but they're the three I know for sure.

Of every other species, they only have sex when the female is fertile. That's it. The only time animals other than our couple of mates above, is when the female is likely to get pregnant. As soon as she does, that's it, no more sex until next time she's fertile.

Animals' "desire" to have sex is 100% evolutionary, embedded information. No sex = no species.

No theorising involved - you can either believe the evidence or not.

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Originally Posted by blazeofglory

Maybe you may say man has more sexual hormones and enjoy it more than animals. But this has things feelings and feelings, emotions, passions, compassion are immeasurable attributes and no scientific instruments can gauge them.

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Mate, I do mean this in the nicest possible way, because I think you're one of the good guys, but I would recommend getting some basic scientific knowledge.

We can indeed measure emotions and what they do to a human body. In fact, thanks to MRI scanning of human brains, we can even watch emotion working in the human brain, where they're created.

We don't understand them, sure, but we've only been able to discern some of them in the brain for very few years, so we need a bit more time before coming up with all the answers.

Science rocks, mate! I guess that's one of the things that drew me to materialism - science is so much more exciting than fiction. Instead of someone drawn representation of a mythical being, we can look at actual pictures of animals that live thousands of metres below where sunlight penetrates the sea, or others that are only microns in length and live on our bodies, unbeknown to us.

Some things, like atruism aren't measurable in the way that human emotion is, but I think we can make pretty convincing logical arguments as to why animals are conditioned to it.

But then I'd be turning it into the evolution thread!

:D

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Originally Posted by The Atheist

I think that's a common fallacy; that only flawed people take up drugs. It certainly applies to some, but most drug addicts and alcoholics still work for a living, so I can't buy the "opt-out" theory.

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I don't know. I'm not saying that only flawed people take up drugs or that drug takers don't work, but that for many low income, unemployed, abused, whatever - drugs do represent an alternative, in dealing or taking to forget. I'm aware that there are many drug takers who are well in control of what they take, not all drug takers are addicts, but of the drug addicts and dependents how many of them are taking to escape?

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science is so much more exciting than fiction. Instead of someone drawn representation of a mythical being, we can look at actual pictures of animals that live thousands of metres below where sunlight penetrates the sea, or others that are only microns in length and live on our bodies, unbeknown to us.

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I'm not going to pick spots on what is obviously a passage of passion (which is definitely good) but some people prefer fiction regardless. The old art Vs science debate is never dead...thought I'm sure somewhere they can coexist...

"flawed person"...




ahhhh.


Very weird term..

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Originally Posted by Neely

I'm not going to pick spots on what is obviously a passage of passion (which is definitely good) but some people prefer fiction regardless. The old art Vs science debate is never dead...thought I'm sure somewhere they can coexist...

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Don't get me wrong, it's not a case of prefrring non-fiction, or art vs science. I don't see any contradiction between art and science. What I was getting at is the sense of wonder, aweand amazement that people often seek supernatural means for. Some of us can get those kicks from the natural universe, and art's a part of it. Salvador Dali [/insert favourite artist] neither proves nor disproves anything, his paintings are just brilliant.

[QUOTE=Neely;810078]I don't know. I'm not saying that only flawed people take up drugs or that drug takers don't work, but that for many low income, unemployed, abused, whatever - drugs do represent an alternative, in dealing or taking to forget. I'm aware that there are many drug takers who are well in control of what they take, not all drug takers are addicts, but of the drug addicts and dependents how many of them are taking to escape?



I don't think it starts so much like that, but it may come to it. Remember, the initial attraction is the social thing - at whatever level - rock god or young kid. It takes a few years to become beaten down. Drug takers initially choose, but then gradually lose the choice, like alcoholics.

You may be right about some unemployed people, but a number are unemployed because their habit already makes them unemployable until they're straightened out.

One bloke I know currently is on a methodone programme. He's definately trying by coming to classes etc. He's also a nice bloke. He's definately not trying to kill himself, but he was back on the heroin over the summer, partly due the crowd he was hanging about with - the socialising. It's a terrible shame.

The OP (you can read an excerpt in the first post of this thread):

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8366113.stm

Is it true that teenagers are becoming more violent?

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