putin speech on minorities in russia, page-216

Thanks for ignoring my question. You're just a tad self-obsessed a ren't you, and sadly not very eloquent. At least in words. But then eloquence in the written form tends to mirror eloquence in the spoken too.

To answer the rhetorical:

I pick up that salt shaker essentially because there is both selfishness and selflessness inherent in all human beings.

Much of what people call altruism isn't really, in fact. Any altruism you have heard of has most likely been publicised by the people doing it - and any altruism publicised by the people doing it is not purely selfless. There is an element of selfishness in the very act of self-publication in telling people about your selflessness. Even if it's an actor on Jay Leno who "doesn't really wanna talk about" his or her charity work, but then does anyway.

But in the allegory I outline above - there's no one around to see me pick up that salt shaker but I do it anyway to help out the guy cleaning up. Not even he will know about it. Nobody will. It is a purely selfless act. Small acts like this go unnoticed among human beings every single day across all of our planet.

Now ask yourself what you know about received wisdom on evolution. We exhibit traits which give us a reproductive advantage and self-select for those right? So if I'm strong or fast or intelligent or maybe even *perceived to be especially altruistic*, I have more of a chance to procreate and pass on those traits to the next generation.

But what about that purely selfless act that nobody sees or finds out about? Where's my reproductive advantage there? The fact is there is none, but we - ALL humans - are capable to differing degrees of such acts. Animals are not - only we human beings. It is hardwired into us somehow but people don't often stop and think and ponder why that is.

The next time someone who thinks they are cleverer than they really are is sounding off on evolution and puring scorn on religion - pose them that question - watch them squirm.

G'nite