Are Humans Good or Evil? (Ben Goertzel) | AI Podcast Clips with Lex Fridman

Duration: 10:17 1557 transcript words EN summary

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Ben Goertzel challenges the notion of a single, pure objective function driving human behavior, arguing instead that humanity is shaped by an unholy mix of evolutionary forces. He explains that humans are subject to both individual selection and group selection, concepts familiar in biology regarding social animals like ant colonies versus solitary predators. Individual selection drives selfish behaviors aimed at propagating one's own DNA, while group selection encourages altruism for the benefit of the tribe or social unit. Consequently, what society often labels as "evil" is frequently rooted in self-interest, whereas "goodness" stems from actions that support the collective survival of a group. This duality means humans are neither purely selfish nor purely altruistic but exist on a spectrum where these opposing forces coexist within our brains and value systems. Goertzel illustrates this internal conflict through personal anecdotes regarding his own behavior while working in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He describes witnessing severe suffering among people dying of curable diseases yet admits to spending money on frivolous activities rather than donating everything to aid them. He questions whether such actions make him evil or simply reflect the natural human balance between selfishness and altruism that everyone must navigate individually. This perspective extends beyond individual morality; he notes that while our biology provides a baseline, culture significantly manifests these innate traits in diverse ways. For instance, pre-civilized tribes like the Yanomamö of Venezuela exhibit cultures focused on inter-tribal violence, contrasting sharply with other Stone Age groups known for peace and taboos against killing, demonstrating how cultural context shapes biological potential within certain limits. The discussion also touches upon historical debates regarding human nature versus social structure, specifically referencing Goertzel's past disagreements with his Marxist great-grandparents who believed the state would eventually wither away as humanity became more compassionate under socialism or communism. As a cynical teenager, Goertzel doubted that humans could naturally become selfless without structural enforcement, fearing people were inherently "jerks." However, he now acknowledges that culture plays a far more significant role than he previously thought and believes human society can be dramatically dialed toward greater compassion if material abundance is achieved alongside shifts in consciousness. He critiques Marx for missing key aspects of societal evolution but agrees that humanity possesses the capacity for a fundamentally positive and joy-filled mode of existence, provided powerful forces pushing people toward negativity are countered by cultural development. In a lighter moment illustrating the absurdity of human endeavors, Goertzel recounts an amusing incident involving his work with Jeunesse Inc., a company in Southern California evolving fruit flies to have five times the normal lifespan through artificial selection. The irony lay in housing these super-long-lived insects in a spare room at an elementary school named after Ayn Rand, a philosopher famous for her advocacy of radical individualism and "selfishness." Goertzel uses this coincidence to highlight how humor fits into existence itself, bridging serious philosophical questions about human nature with the unpredictable quirks of reality. Ultimately, he concludes that while psychopaths and sociopaths represent exceptions who derive gratification from others' suffering, they do not define the core human condition, which remains a complex constellation of values rooted in our specific evolutionary history yet malleable through cultural evolution.

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worrying about the world to power do you think human what do you think drives humans is it is it Oh an unholy mix of things IIIi don't think there's one pure simple and elegant objective function driving humans but by any means what do you think if we look at I know it's hard to look at humans in an aggregate but do you think overall humans are good or do we have both good and evil within us that depending on the circumstances depending on the whatever Kin Kin Kin up perfectly to the top good and evil are very ambiguous complicated and in some ways silly concepts but if we we could dig into your question from a couple directions so I think if you look in evolution humanity is shaped both by individual selection and what biologists will call group selection like tribe level selection right so individual selection has driven us in this selfish DNA sort of way so that each of us does to a certain approximation what will help us propagate our our DNA to to future generations I mean that that that's why I've got to have four kids so far in the probably that's not the last one yeah on the other hand I like the ambition tribal like group selection means humans in a way will do what what will advocate for the persistence of the DNA of their whole their whole tribe or their their social group and in biology you have both of these right like it and you can see say an ant colony or bee hive there's a lot of group selection in the evolution of those social animals on the other hand say a big cat or some very solitary animal it's a lot more biased toward an individual selection humans are an interesting balance and I think this reflects itself in what we would view as selfishness versus altruism to some extent so we just have both of those objective functions contributing to the the makeup of our brains then as Nietzsche analyzed in his own way and others have analyzed in different ways I mean we abstract this as well we have both good good and and and evil within us right because a lot of what we view as evil is really just selfishness a lot of what we view as good is altruism which means doing doing what's good for that for the tribe and on that level we have both of those just big baked into us and that's that's how it is of course there are Psychopaths and sociopaths and people who you know get gratified by the suffering of others and that that's that's that's a different thing yeah those are exceptions but yeah but I think at core we're not purely selfish we're not purely altruistic we are a mix and that's that's the nature of it and we also have a complex constellation of values that are just very specific to our evolute evolutionary history luckily you know we we love waterways and mountains and the the ideal place to put the houses in the mountain overlooking the water right and you know we care a lot about our our kids and we care a little less about our cousins and even less about our fifth cousins I mean there are many particular are these two human values which whether they're good or evil depends on here on your perspective really say I I spent a lot of time in Ethiopia in Addis Ababa where we have one of our a eye development offices for my singularity net project and when I walked through the streets a novice you know there's so there's people lying by the side of the road like just living there by the side road dying probably of curable diseases without in the food and medicine and when I walked by them you know I feel terrible I give them money when I come back home to the developed world they're not on my mind that much I do donate some but I mean I also spent some unlimited money I have enjoying myself in frivolous ways rather than donating it to those people who are right now like starving dying and suffering on the roadside so does that make me evil I mean it makes me somewhat selfish and somewhat altruistic can we each we each balance that in our own way right so that's that whether that will be true of all possible Agis is it is it is a subtler question so you yeah that's how humans are so you have a sense you kind of mentioned that there's a selfish I'm not gonna bring up the whole iron Rand idea of selfishness being the core virtue that's an a whole interesting kind of tangent that I think will just distract ourselves well I have to make one amusing comment shirt or moment that has amused me anyway so the the yeah I I have extraordinary negative respect for 400 negative but when I work with a company called Jeunesse ins which was evolving flies to have extraordinary long lives in in in Southern California so we asked lies that were evolved by artificial selection to have five times the lifespan of normal fruit flies but the population of super long live flies was physically sinning in a spare room at an EIN rand elementary school in southern california so that was just like well if I saw this in the movie I wouldn't believe it well yeah the universe has a sense of humor in that kind of way that fits in the humor fits in somehow into this whole absurd existence but you mentioned the balance between selfishness and altruism is kind of being innate do you think it's possible that's kind of an emergent from a phenomena that those peculiarities of our value system how much of it is innate how much of it is something we collectively kind of like a dusty SP novel bring to life together as a civilization I mean the the answer to nature versus nurture is usually both and of course its nature versus nurture versus self-organization as you mentioned so clearly there are evolutionary roots to individual and groups action leading to a mix of selfishness and altruism on the other hand different cultures manifest that in different ways well we all have basically the same biology and if you look if you look at sort of pre civilized cultures you have tribes like the yanomamö in Venezuela which which they're their culture is focused on killing up killing other tribes and you have other Stone Age tribes that are mostly peaceable and have big taboos against violence so you you can certainly have a big difference in how culture manifests these innate biological characteristics but still you know there's probably limits because they're given by our our biology I used to argue this with my great grandparents who were Marxists actually because they they believed in the withering away of the state like that they believed that you know as you move from capitalism to socialism to communism people would just become more social minded so that a state would be unnecessary and people would just give you get everyone would give everyone else what what they needed no setting aside that that's not what the various Marxist experiments on the planet seemed to be heading toward in practice just as a theoretical point I was very dubious that human nature could go there I get at that time with my great-grandparents or I was just like you know I'm a cynical teenager I think humans are humans are just jerks the state is not gonna wither away if you don't have some structure keeping people from screwing each other over they're gonna do it so now I actually don't quite see things that way I mean I think the my feeling now subjectively is the culture aspect is more significant than I thought it was when I was a teenager and I think you could have a human society that was dialed dramatically further toward you know self-awareness other awareness compassion and sharing than our current society and of course greater material abundance helps but to some extent material abundance is a subjective perception also because many Stone Age cultures perceive themselves as living in great material abundance that they had all the food and water than while they lived in a beautiful place their sex lives that their children I mean the they they had abundance without any factories right so I I think humanity probably would be capable of fundamentally more positive and joy-filled mode of social existence than than what we have now clearly Marx didn't quite have the right idea about about how how to get there I mean he missed he missed a number of of key aspects of human society and and its evolution and if we look at where we are in society now how to get there is is a quite a quite different question because there are very powerful forces pushing people and in different directions than the positive joyous compassionate in existence right you