Stepping onto the Moon in Libya

First Man on the Moon, Wikipedia

The last blog may not have seemed like it, but it was a feeble attempt to suggest that we need to look and think differently if we are to get different results.   The problems that always arise between us as individuals or nations are due to our nature, encoded in our DNA.   Yet we continue to blame circumstances and our opponents, that is anyone that does not agree with us and belong to our tribe.  Our traditional solution to every disagreement is to fight.  However, the solution to war is not going to be found in blame (nor to domestic disagreements one might add)- not in Syria or Vietnam.  There may not be solution, but if there is a solution it will be found in the way we frame the problem; in Vietnam for example we blamed the communists and they of course blamed us.  Neither side was willing to admit it was a war of self-interests, we were fighting to protect what we perceived as our interests and they to further their interests.  Human beings have always fought over territory, it is part of our DNA, just as it is with many other animals species.   Human beings have always killed each other to protect their family and home, it is in our nature. Mainly, however we fight for control, control of the territory ,control of the tribe or control of the relationship.

Human beings have always fought to control their world, it is our nature.  However, in this case we have have rethought the issue and created another way to establish control, to determine who is the dominate male of the tribe.  We have codified systems that protect us from that part of our nature – we created political systems.  Candidates who wish to be the dominate one, instead of fighting to death or until the weakest one is driven away, the way many species do, stand for office at the polls.  We have elections and choose the dominate person or party based on the size of the constituencies instead of the size of muscles or armies as previous societies did.  And as flawed as the process may be a times it is far better than the fight to death system.

They are voting today in Libya, the polite way to choose the dominate male of the tribe and Libya still is very much a tribal state.  Part of voting has been polite, but some, who apparently distrust the process, have tried to steal ballot boxes or intimidate the voters with their guns; they have tried to force their preferred choice on their fellow citizens.   But for the most part the voting seems to be going well; it is being reported that people seem to be thrilled to be voting for a leader – instead of having a leader who chose himself through the power of his army – as Muammar Gaddafi did.  The last election in Libya was in 1964, so the majority of Libyans have never voted before.  For many it is very exciting and filled with hope; one young man said he felt like an astronaut, stepping onto the surface of the moon – a small step for him, but a giant step for Libya.

Sometimes the solution to a problem is outside of our world.  To solve it, we may have to rocket ourselves away from this world; and then we can look down on it from a distance and rethink the whole problem.  And in the process it is necessary to remember our nature – it provides us with unlimited possibilities, but it also holds us down.