Quote:
Originally Posted by spanktehbadwookie
My child: “does knocking the ant bed with a stick kill the ants”
Me: “probably not, they rebuild their ant nests”
My Child: *knocks the ant bed with a stick* “look how beautiful they are running around”.
Now empathy 101
You: Now imagine if a giant came and pounced at our home roof and we started running out in all directions how beautiful it would look to the giant and how awful losing all our tools and games and favorite things at home and our home as well itself would be. Sure we can rebuild it and get all of it back in a few years...
Your Child (years later): but ants are not exactly sentient at a deep level to understand the despair of the strike and the consequences and all the labor they have to endure to recover, they simply act according to basic rules and it all feels natural to them without frustration. You simply enable them to run from a different sequence point what they like to do 24/7.
You (then): Prove it!
Your Child (then): In the lab this morning we were running some tests on the compounds they release when they sense...We are still trying to establish if the release is associated with a form of pain and suffering that they are consciously aware of.
Your Child (today): Its like Roomba, it doesnt get sad when you throw in the floor all kinds of little dirt and dust, it just does its job.
You: But are you really sure?
Many years later.
Dad: I was wrong to have taught you to be kind and caring and have empathy. The world is a terrible place and you needed to be bad to survive and win.
Kid: No you were not wrong. The victory is in place precisely because of the struggle that comes with caring. It is possible to care and win in style for all complexity. The world is a beautiful enough place to care for and still tough enough to need to be less naive than most idealists. The correct process is not to give up on raising your kids ethically but also teach them how to be efficient and how to survive in a cynical world without ever becoming cynical. You do that with the respect for the truth, science and math and a little game theory lol.
Last edited by masque de Z; 04-24-2019 at 06:58 PM.