wellbeing

i really dont know where to put this...idea.
i am not vying for attention, though i like it as much as anyone else. nor am i trying to be noticed by a TM.
but i do hope it helps.
i really dont know where to put this thought, so i picked here, under well being.
regardless, i think the thought has merit, and couldn't really thing of a better place to put it.
i hope it shines a light, i know it has me reconsider the obvious.
i will call it One Percent.
we live, most of us anyway, in a majority rules world. there is a reason and a good one for this.
i could get about US constitution...but that is really not the point.
the point is quite common. but i wonder how many of us actually pay attention to it. i think a jedi will perhaps pay a bit more than most.
i would hope that most of you know that the DNA of a monkey and human are 99 percent the same.
that is astounding. we are clearly not monkeys, nor are they us.
all for 1 percent DNA difference.
a well known adage is, 2 outta 3 aint bad....but thats 33 percent! and thats good?
well, lots of times it is. it beats one out of three.
so who really cares about 1 percent?
that one percent is what makes all the difference. not can, but does.
that one percent is why humans went to the moon, and not monkeys or chimps.
i am not a biologist, i am sure those of you who are forgive me for the sake of making a point.
that one percent is why we will soon venture to mars.
that one percent is why we have been outside of our solar system (voyager and pioneer missions) 3 times.
that one percent is why we seek to connect with the force.
no other creature even attempts this, though the force is just a real and binding through and around a chimp, or a monkey, or a snail, as it is us.
so pay attention to that one percent. when you are upset. or failed to meet a goal.
when you are 99 percent certain that you will fail, pay attention to the one percent.
one percent is all it takes to make magic happen!

Intriguing thought, Ghosty. One percent can make an incredible difference in the world, but I don't think many of us will be able to use our own individual "one percents" to go to Mars.

One percent of our day can roughly be equated to fifteen minutes. Changing the world is a big idea, and big ideas need to start small. What can you do for fifteen minutes, every day, to change yourself?

i agree. that was sort of my point.
1 percent or 15 minutes requires a comparison.
i used mars as an example only.
i would respond by saying, what can one percent of 15 minutes do?
i would further respond that one percent of 15 minutes every day is small...but over time it equals a lot of time and a lot of change.
time is just something we humans invented anyway. it doesnt really exist.
it is necessary to us... i seek to move beyond that. statistics are very effective, but are still guesses.
as for myself, i will learn more. think more. and post more. share more.
if i understood 1 percent of the force, 15 percent of my life - that would be huge.
that is where i was headed with the whole thing.
hey, you are an apprentice lol. you out not be hangin out with the likes of me!
im kidding....
you are gonna be great knight. i can already tell.
some things...a person just knows.

Humans actually are monkeys - or do at any rate qualify as members of the taxa elsewise filled with species that we traditionally used to refer to as monkeys, back when we didn't have a taxonomy that takes genetics into account. Granted, most monkeys are not humans though.

But that little nitpick aside, if I may ask... Just what makes going to the moon, or to Mars, or beyond the bounds of our solar system so special anyway, let alone virtuous? A hundred years ago neither goal would have been achieved, two hundred years ago they wouldn't even seem remotely realistic. And yet we were still raising our noses up above the lowly chimpanzee, proud to be ahead of them in so many ways already.
Forming habits and performing purely tradition-driven rituals has been observed in other ape species and mourning and ritualistically honouring the dead is something apes do, but also elephants, and even magpies. Extinct human and proto-human species have gone as far as burying their dead together with artifacts, possibly indicating that they believed in some existence after death.
We are unique in the extent to which we have developed many of those things. When it comes to abstract thinking we are more proficient at it, even the weakest among us, than any other living species on earth, and by no small margin. Meanwhile honey bees are so unique in their ability to produce honey that we named them after it. Silk worms uniquely produce silk threads. It wouldn't shock me to learn that there are insect species as close to them genetically as just one percent of difference, and that happen not to make either honey or silk. So yes, the one percent makes a difference, sometimes only in scope, sometimes even in foundation, but at the end of the day, every fraction contributes to that difference, and it matters to us as little or as much, in good ways or in bad ones, by not a lot other than how we look at it.

At the risk of derailing the thread so early... ghosty, what do you mean by time not really existing and statistics being guesses? It may arguably not be vital to the point you are making, but still, it sounds like you threw this out there like they are obvious things and also somewhat important in getting to the actual point. Would you kindly elaborate, if so to do is fair in this thread?

that one percent is why we seek to connect with the force.
no other creature even attempts this, though the force is just a real and binding through and around a chimp, or a monkey, or a snail, as it is us

I disagree with this small point
I always figured its our 'one percent' that disconnects us from the force
If you think about it the animals around us live in harmony within the force, mainly because they dont question it, they dont necessarily seek to dominate or control things. They just exist naturally within the energy going about their lives.
Its humans with our minds, our brains our creativity, our spirituality that struggle so much to be 'me' in a world of other 'me's
We forget how to easily be
Blessing and a curse. We achieve so much and sometimes loose that basic trust in the force.

Good topic ghostly thanks

Double post

I actually used to keep honey bees - amazing creatures.
of course i do not worry about derailing the thread, thats why i threw it out there.
it was more a stream of consciousness thing, than a thesis.
and, im pretty sure humans are not monkeys, but that is not my point, nor yours if understand.
my initial point that if monkeys and humans share 99 percent of their DNA, then it seems that monkeys would have become space farers too - but they have not.t creatures of all sorts understand day and night, and even seasons.
but they do not create and measure as humans do. bees do not observe time zones. time, in our sense, is just that - in our sense.
we created it.
things would still change, whether or not we created "time" of course. but would they "expire" like a gallon of milk?
that one percent made all the difference that the 99 percent in common did not.
that is my overriding point.
feel free to derail if you wish! exchange of thoughts is a good thing!

i agree with you elizabeth, as to the force being real outside of human experience. my point was that monkeys - who lack only one percent of our DNA do not study the force.
i doubt they are even aware of it.
the one percent can very well disconnect us, as well as it can unite us and the force also.
i was mainly using monkeys in a metaphorical sense, though i suppose it could be used literally as well.
i was trying to start a conversation that i felt had merit enough to explore - it seems i succeeded!
ALL replies are welcomed and considered by myself anyway.
i rather liked skyyrms reply....it kind of sneaks up on me, how he used time, which i rather disregarded as important, and pointed out that 1 percent of a day is 15 minutes. what could i use this 15 minutes for? a really good idea that i was not even my intent.
i very much like your reply as well, and appreciate the time and thought.
i hope all of us continue to discuss things such as this!

ghosty wrote: ... im [sic] pretty sure humans are not monkeys, but that is not my point, nor yours if understand.

It isn't. Just a nitpick at another throwaway line. You are right in that normally, traditionally, the term monkey referred to all simians except apes (and thus humans). For purposes of consistency, however, modern taxonomies try to avoid defining clades by exception, so as to better reflect the underlying genetics. The closest term to "monkey" would be "simian" or the clade "simiiformes". All apes, including humans, are members of that infraorder. Interestingly, just so as to not call humans monkeys (and for no other reason), the old world monkeys are grouped on the level of family - as opposed to the ape family, but the five families of new world monkeys together form a parvorder, a sister to the parvorder that includes gibbons, great apes, and old world monkeys. Then again, the 99% genetic similarity is at most found with great apes anyway, not with old world monkeys.

my initial point that if monkeys and humans share 99 percent of their DNA, then it seems that monkeys would have become space farers too - but they have not.

Why would they have, though? You and I have genomes even more similar to other humans than any monkey does, yet neither of us are rocket engineers or space travellers. I for one could probably not even sail the waters between us. Of course, both of us could probably learn these things, at least in principle, with little effort or with lots. And most monkeys, you reckon, couldn't, which is fair enough. But if that is unexpected given our genetic similarity, how dissimilar would an organism have to be for this to be no surprise at all anymore? Bear in mind, many rodents still share well over 90% of our genome, and many insects hover somewhere in the 40-50% range. Where exactly is that line between space-farer and non-space-farer, and how come that humans half a millennium ago were not exploring outer space, if their genes were virtually indistinguishable from our own?

creatures of all sorts understand day and night, and even seasons.
but they do not create and measure as humans do. bees do not observe time zones. time, in our sense, is just that - in our sense.
we created it.
things would still change, whether or not we created "time" of course. but would they "expire" like a gallon of milk?

If all humans were to die out tomorrow, a gallon of milk would still carry on growing old, turning sour and fouling away, as bacteria kept eating and decomposing it. There wouldn't be any human around to count the hours, nor to mark the day on the calendar whenceforth the gallon shall be considered as "expired", but as you say, things would still change. Time would still carry on, even time dilation due to relativity would, regardless of whether there is any human to put a frame to it. The units exist for our convenience. But if there was no sense in making such assessments, we wouldn't have come to travel through space because of such inventions.

that one percent made all the difference that the 99 percent in common did not.
that is my overriding point.

What if that one percent just happens to be the one you most focus on, because the rest are not different and just not interesting? Genes do not live in isolation. Their share bodies with other genes. Sure, a lot of our genome is not coding for function, but the portion that does cannot help but function as a whole, so much so, that to even say what a "gene" is proves to be a profoundly difficult challenge if the final definition is to withstand any sort of rigorous application.

As I asked before, I don't see what's so special about space travel or - for that matter - even eating with forks. If that is all the difference we can point to, than little difference there is indeed. But even with so little difference as there is, surely the part of it that is by nature rather than nurture would have come about through much a greater part of the whole genome than the very few special human-ness genes.

i refuse to belabor this point with you any further. its clear that you only want to contradict, and intellectually unable to consider what i am saying.
as to your pompous (sic) correction, id like to point out that you could do with learning the difference between "then" and "than."
..."even eating with forks. If that is all the difference we can point to, than little difference there is indeed"....
additonally, my status as a rocket scientist is unknown to you.
as is my knowledge of the term simian.
our conversation is ended.

ghosty wrote: i refuse to belabor this point with you any further.

Which one? There's a number of them, considering different parts of what you said, elaborating on ways you could have meant them, general ponderings in response and in objection, a few queries for clarification... In a word, engagement, the thing I'm apparently doing such a poor job of.

its [sic] clear that you only want to contradict, and intellectually unable [sic] to consider what i am saying.

If I only wanted to contradict, then all I'd do is contradict. Instead I agreed to some extents, proposed objections to others, and inquired for elaborations. I don't know if I'm "intellectually able" to consider what you are saying or not - I leave it entirely up to you to question my intelligence or to insult it to any extent you see fit - but I made my attempt, for better or for worse. What substantive part of my post did you make any effort to engage with?

as to your pompous (sic) correction, id [sic] like to point out that you could do with learning the difference between "then" and "than."
..."even eating with forks. If that is all the difference we can point to, than little difference there is indeed"....

Thanks. I must have had a lapse in concentration at that point... It happens. I try not to feel too much shame over it and do better next time.

additonally, my status as a rocket scientist is unknown to you.

Perhaps I should have waited to see what you meant by statistics being guesses before I leapt to that conclusion. Point taken. My apologies.

as is my knowledge of the term simian.

Fair enough. I guess the lesson for me to learn here is not to try so hard to explain where I'm coming from next time and just cut to the 'yay' or 'nay' straight away. Perhaps that would have been the kind of deeper, more thoughtful kind of consideration you were hoping for.

our conversation is ended.

Alright. Sad that you feel this way. I'll carry on having it with whom ever else wishes, then. Be well.

I think the differences afforded by that 1% are huge, and that nature is just reactionary distraction from the potential syngeries of our various faculties as afforded by that 1% to look beyond being slaves chained to environmental stimulus, to an experience of inner imagination and creative embedding in that environmental stimulus. I think most animals have the faculty to some extent, but are 'inflicted' with tighter chains by virtue of their architecture and freedom (restricted, lack thereof) within the environment enough to look beyond nature (even if they can). Which is why scared people act like animals, and dominant people tend to act like predators.
I think the child mind experience often attributed to some spiritual experiences is akin to this bare reactivity but without the minds potential, when embued with both functional understanding and fullness in connection; ignorance yet knowledge.

This is a thought provoking thread. Like Ghosty's initial post, this one is just stream of consciousness - a hodgepodge of loosely related thoughts that arose with me by the inspiration of the previous discussion. There's no advocacy here, and this probably isn't my best-organized post ... it's just a set of points for consideration.

For starters, I wonder if that 1% difference between humans and chimpanzees represents an evolutionary advance or just a neutral difference between species. Some creatures not possessing our capacity for technological innovation or creative use of language - among the things that we typically point to as signifying our superior merit - have their own different capabilities that we cannot match. For example, I recall the writing of an author from the 1970's using the pseudonym Adam Smith, documented in his book "Powers Of Mind" this paraphrased conversation between himself and his six-year--old daughter:

Daughter: "Daddy, when birds fly south for the winter, how do they find there way back?"

Father: "Oh, I suppose they know what general direction to go, and use landmarks and the stars to navigate."

Daughter: "But, how can a bird fly four thousand miles over landscape that looks different in the spring than in the fall, when the stars are in different positions, and find the very nest they left the year before? Even a Pan Am PI-lot can't do that!" (Pan Am being a major airline in that era)

Father: <puzzled silence>

Proportionate to their size, ants are far stronger than us. Dolphins may be as intelligent, though their thinking is expressed in different channels. Dogs may be generally more loyal, and some - along with some cats - seem to have an ability to locate their owners after being lost, when their owners have moved hundreds of miles away into unfamiliar territory. Bonobo monkeys, bison, and lionesses have mastered the art of intra-species peace better than we have (though they can be brutal to other forms of life). Maybe the segment of their DNA that makes them unique is just as good as ours -- it's just different.

Then again, there are some remarkable traits related to our 1% difference. As far as we can tell, we are the only known species (again perhaps excepting dolphins) that prays, philosophizes, and likes stories. We are aware of the need to correct our deficiencies even as we often feel trapped by them. We leave records of our lives. We invent methods to travel in ways that our need to survive does not demand. We put great value on shiny metals and stones. We wear clothes, climb mountains for no apparent purpose, and every January many millions of us gather in our homes to simultaneously watch 22 men run around the grass in a mock battle over a piece of leather.

I don't know whether we are an advanced species. But we sure are a distinctive, curious one.

Well actually homosapiens' closest (relatives ) speaking in this matter is chimpanzees and bonobos . These are no ordinary monkeys , these monkeys have very complex social structure and can even feel feelings . The difference between us and them just happened because of mere genetic circumstance .These circumstance happened a few hundred thousand years ago . Well water level was a bit more up then . So I would guess since we have a better upright posture , we lived near water . To get food out of water our ancestors adapted to have an upright posture . Since our ancestors was getting fatty foods they developed a better fat layer which allowed them to lose much of their hair . Now since they lost their hair , and they had such nutrient rich food like fish and small game . They developed larger brains and better bone structure . After they have that larger brain , they began build tools and rudimentary houses . This leads us to around the end of the ice age around 10,000 years ago . Which we know little about because the largest library that had all that information got burned down . This leads us to speculate about back then , it also explains why we have a subconscious connection with the moon , the sun , and other planets . Why we look beyond what was there . Curiosity is a odd think isn't it ? It's what drove our species to what it has become . I think once a species has curiosity they can do anything .

Malicious wrote: The difference between us and [chimps and bonobos] just happened because of mere genetic circumstance .These circumstance happened a few hundred thousand years ago .

Do you happen to have a citation on this? Any place I look seems to claim that the evidence points to the youngest common ancestor living more like six or so million years ago. If this is what you meant by a few thousand, fair enough. I just intuitively expect less than some three orders of magnitude when I hear "few".

Well water level was a bit more up then . So I would guess since we have a better upright posture , we lived near water . To get food out of water our ancestors adapted to have an upright posture .

Chimps and bonobos have their nostrils point vaguely upwards. Or at least they are on the top of their snout, for what little that counts. If our upright posture is an adaptation for treading through water, why is it that our breathing holes point downwards, where they are more easily blocked by water and more cumbersome and awkward to raise above the water's surface? Don't get me wrong, this is certainly possible, I'm just wondering what kind of selection pressure would have pushed that development in spite of a lifestyle that was so richly aquaeus as to straighten out our body posture.

[The ice age twilight] we know little about because the largest library that had all that information got burned down .

The library did, though I wouldn't say it is clear at all how much it contained about the late ice age years. Artifacts and cave paintings from that time give us a rough pictures of what humans were like around that time, in any case. Written word is by no means the only way we track history, especially history this deep. Besides, there were other cultures at the time of the library fire that kept written records. India and China come to mind, and the Mayan civilization of Middle America went through in something of a golden age at the time. Though, the fact that not a single culture recorded anything about other human species (or subspecies) that lived besides sapiens during the ice age - Neanderthals come to mind - tells me one of three things: Maybe our ancestors couldn't tell that these fellow humans were in fact a different (sub)species than their own. Maybe written records did not survive to this day. Or maybe, they didn't have writing so early already or at any time soon enough for word of mouth to have bridged the gap.

... [This] explains why we have a subconscious connection with the moon , the sun , and other planets .

What do you mean by "subconscious connection" here? It sounds like you mean something non-trivial, profound, but if it's just curiosity, then there is hardly a thing we don't have a subconscious connection to. Also how is the destruction of Alexandria's library an explanation as to why we would have subconscious connections with the moon, the sun, or other planets? What part of that historic event... being a thing... leads us to predict that we would develop any such connection? Again, even if it is curiosity I think this is a bit of a stretch. Surely you don't mean to say that we'd be less curious if only Aurelius hadn't burned the Broucheion quarter. Cats are curious, and they never (to our knowledge) built any libraries for the burning to begin with. So what other subconscious connection might you mean and what does it have to do with the Aurelian conquest?

Altered Carbon wrote: Peace is an illusion.
And no matter how tranquil the world seems peace doesn't last long.
Peace is a struggle against our very nature.
A skin we stretch over the bone, muscle, and sinew of our own innate savagery.

Replace 'our' with 'their' to displace self, and retreat to the hallucination of morality

as the original post stated, it was more or less an observation that i thought could be important.
it was not meant to be a discussion about animal or human (we are animals as well) superiority.
it appears i succeeded in starting a conversation to be sure!
some i find silly, a very few nearing the offensive (to me).
99 percent of it, i find very interesting. much learning.
i really like what an apprentice said...his view that 1 percent of a day is about 15 minutes.
this somewhat goes against my postulate that time itself exists only within our own minds.
but, it is useful, as is the fake concept of time that we invented.
so, i spend about 40-50 minutes per day studying international morse code.
i have many reasons for this, which will be revealed over time i spose.
but this i can tell ya...it WILL help with learning patience, and focus.
and how only perfect practice truly makes perfect.
please continue on!
i feel ... happy that my silly little rambling has created such thoughts!
and may the CODE be with you!

cats are curious because that is their nature, as we understand it to be.
dogs are curious, as are skunks...whatever.
there are proven links to our study of the stars that predates the sacking of alexandria.
no other creature has shown this ability to not only read, but to record.
i pride my scientific mind, but there are things that we simply do not know.
however that one percent seems to be key...
to what, i dont know.
monkeys are quite intelligent. but in ...earth living things terms?
they are far far behind us. as are dolphins.
having said this, i can see where our intelligence as a specie could outstrip our understanding..
the whole thread was meant as a thought exercise.
what it becomes is not up to me.

i would add that if peace is an illusion, then so is war. one cannot exist without the other.
poetic, but useless i think, in any logical manner.

ghosty wrote: i would add that if peace is an illusion, then so is war. one cannot exist without the other.
poetic, but useless i think, in any logical manner.

Peace as the absence of war is literally existing without it.. but I get what you might mean that as concepts they'd have no meaning without the other concept. Concepts are fun because they are harmless so long as they stay concepts, but reality is more then just concepts. And not many pursue war compared to those who pursue peace, so in terms of practical import I think the point might best lie in not slipping onto a dream world where the inside of our bubbles shapes our understanding of what is actually going on outside it. Illusion is one thing, delusion is another. What we tell ourselves to sleep well in the dark night won't protect us from what might actually creep in.