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Bill Matthies

CEO, Coyote Insight, LLC

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Do humans find it easier to hate than to love?

Reading the paper this morning, which included the usual stories of war and personal violence that occur all over the world, I wondered if humans are more inclined to hate, disagree, dislike, fight, etc., than we are the opposite.

Whatever you think are we changing, getting better or worse, or are we pretty much what we've always been?

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Closing Statement from Bill Matthies

Thanks to all of you who participated in this discussion. This is one of those questions where no clear answer is likely, not at least one we'll all agree on, and I enjoyed reading opinions I hadn't considered previously.

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    Vincenzo Sergi

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    Dec 4 2012: The opposite of love is not hate but, indifference. Man has'nt had a natural and common enemy as adversary since prehistoric time. The common enemies of those times helped man to stay together, evolve, and become the top of the foodchain. Evolution has not left behind the ghosts that still reside within us at a biological level. These ghosts are the reason that we find it much easier to hate. We have no greater adversary than man himself. Hopefully, as time passes, science and education might help us rid of these destructive forces where ACCEPTANCE will replace both words, love and hate.
    Cheers.
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      Bill Matthies

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      Dec 8 2012: Vincenzo, rereading your comment makes me wonder how the threats we represent to each other has affected us over time. When we had a real common enemy did we still find time to war with each other or was the threat so great we had no time for that?

      Ironically we can look to fairly recent history to see how new threats create unions where none existed before, the USSR and the Alies in WWII being an obvious example. And when the threat passes often so does the alliance, which, to me, is an indication of change going in many directions as opposed to being linear.
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        Vincenzo Sergi

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        Dec 9 2012: Bill, the simplest way to answer your first question is, we are animals. As animals, squirmishes must have always happened to put in place the Alpha of the species. This is not because of hate but, a necessary solution for proper leadership. With proper leadership victory is possible. Was the threat so great?? Today as we sit in comfort we are constantly threatned by a chaotic Universe. We have always had threats and will probably always do. These threats come in different shapes... viral, biological, terrestrial just to name a few. On a positive note, I believe that overcoming these adversitiers has greatly contributed to the evolution of Human Intelligence.
        To further on the second part of your question/answer. Man beign egocentric in nature plus the cultural differences equal to non linear squirmishes that only common logic and scientific education is able to snuff out.
        Cheers

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