11/09/2009

No greed in the animal kingdom

My experience in watching the animals and birds at Sungei Buloh told me one thing, there is no greed in the animal kingdom. The crocodile will not kill more than one prey. It kills only when it is hungry. So are other predatory animals. Even the stray cats will not kill unnecessarily. And the birds do not build more than one nest. They are contented with just one nest. The only specie that exhibits greed to the extreme is man. They not only want $10m, but $10b or even more if they could get their hands to it. And houses, the more the merrier. 10 houses, 20 houses or 30 houses, there is no limit to this acquisition. There is no such thing as enough in the mindset of man.

4 comments:

Speedwing said...

Hi Redbean, you are a Singaporean yourself, therefore you know very well that this desire for wanting more than ones need is a very Singaporean thing. This very thinbg is what makes Singapore what it is today. There are many Singaporeans who own more than one property, with some owning half a dozen or more. On the other side of the coin there are many who struggle to keep even a box in the sky. As an observer from a foreign land I see this as a very Singaporean situation. I pass no judgement.

Ⓜatilah $ingapura⚠️ said...

The idea of "greed" is a human invention.

Greed doesn't exist. Humans invented "morality" because they have free-will or the idea/illusion of free will and i=overtime decided that the human species needed "rules" in order to live. These "rules" were created by a political class -- rulers and priests in order to control "lesser" human beings.

One of the first things they told these "lesser" human beings is that selfishness and greed (which they defined) were "bad". However the ruling classes themselves had no problems being selfish and greedy -- acquiring all the wealth and power for themselves, as the "lesser" humans truly believed in the nonsensical "morals" given to them.

There is no such thing IN REALITY as "greed" or "selfishness" because they are just the "output" or results of neural correlates of consciousness -- processes which happen in the mind.

Anonymous said...

motherly instincts are also very strong in the animal kingdom. i'v watched mother stray cats sit hungry while their kittens eat first. but the most touching was watching a mother cat dash to the middle of a road, bite on the neck of her kitten and attempt to pull it to the side of the road and to safety. at that point the kitten was twitching to death. it had just been knocked over by a car...

Anonymous said...

Mother Instinct(nature) are naturally strong. The sad thing and it is very sad, is that career instinct and financial independence have takened a toll on the motherlove.

The even sadder thing is children brought up by maids, childcare centres and nannies have difficulties sensing the mother's love. And they tend to abandon their old folks when they(offsprings) become independent.

Human Instincts have corroded and eroded like wear and tear.

patriot