Advanced Essay #4 Yafang Wu: Violence and Human Nature.

My goal for the paper is to make the readers think, think about whether or not violence is something embeded in the human nature, or is it something that is taught by the society. I think my process is fine.

The actual thing:

Is violence, the desire to fight, something that is embedded within the human nature?

Some might argue that violence is something we are born with.It’s something that make us human. Like Thomas Hobbes, an English philosopher, he argued that all men are born evil.

In the earlier days of human history, in the days of hunter gatherer, human had to fight other animals for our own survival. Slowly, it became a part of us. Violence is what lets us survive all these years. If we are not violent, we would not have survived given all these enemies human have in the nature. Violence is what has kept humanity alive until this day.

“Why are we seemingly so hard wired toward violence? Well, it might be evolution. It is possible that aggression is an innate trait in human. And under the right conditions, may be it finds its expression in violence and war. ”

Without violence, we are not complete. We could not consider ourselves human anymore. No matter what, violence is something that is hidden deep inside the human heart. More or less, it’s there, waiting to be triggered, explode, and emit. Once it explodes, it’s hard to collect them, and seal the all back up.

Some might argue that humans are not born with violence or anything of the sort. When we were born, we were like pieces of blank papers, pure and innocent. Society put emotions into us. Emotions of violence, greed, envy, gluttony, anger and much more. Like John Locke, also an English philosopher, who argued that at birth, all minds are blank.

When babies were just born, the babies wouldn’t know anything. The babies wouldn’t hate, or have any negative emotions at all. It’s only when they start growing up, when they start to get in touch with the society, did they start learn to hate.

But no matter what, love, the opposite of hate exists in our heart. It’s the human nature. More or less, there’s love in our heart, everyone has love somewhere in their heart. Love is what motivates us to help others, without love, humanity wouldn’t survive till this day, we would have kill each others already.

To me, everyone is born with violence, greed, and negative thoughts, somewhere inside. But they are all hidden away in a box, somewhere in their heart, masked by things such as love and happiness. Love, happiness, warmth, everything seem to be going so well. But when the right moment comes, the seal breaks, the Pandora's box flips open, and it will flood the heart with all kinds of negative thoughts. Violence, greed, envy……, waves of them, will flood the heart. Once the Pandora’s box is open, it will take much more of an effort to close it. And once the Pandora’s box has been open, it will be way easier to open it again and again and again, until the heart have soak up all the evil it can. It is so hard to close the Pandora’s box, most people give up trying really soon, or they didn’t even bother to try at all. But until the heart have been eaten up by negative thoughts, and starts to rot, there will still be love somewhere in the heart, somewhere.

Bibliography:

Crashcourse. "War & Human Nature: Crash Course World History 204." YouTube. YouTube, 31 July 2014. Web. 23 Mar. 2017.