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this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2024
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The best ones are thoughts that many people can relate to and they find something funny or interesting in regular stuff.
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I don't think it's weird - we're animals, mammals and hunters no less, and animals play. If we have unstimulated instincts and free time, we find ways to exercise them
It's kind of like the zoomies or play fighting, it's just built into our design, for one reason or another
Now, aliens might come here and be fascinated how Earth vertebrates can even function, assuming this isn't a common thing. But I'm guessing our social behaviors will be more mind boggling
"No, you don't understand... They're made of meat."
But specifically fear instincts seems strange. It makes sense to us because we're us, but look at it more clinically: we seek out to stimulate the instinct that keeps us safe. That means that it'd doing the exact opposite of its purpose. If we seek to stimulate our fear, that means we seek to put ourselves in situations where fear is a reasonable response, which is exactly what fear was evolved to prevent.
How did this behavior develop, and how did we survive once it did?
I think you're looking at it the wrong way - triggering the flight or fight response won't make you able to fight or flight by itself. You have to practice the responses or they're useless - detrimental even, like a deer in the headlights
Play is a way to exercise those instincts and practice responses, but in a safe way. We even creep into the danger zone a bit sometimes, but most people (and animals) keep the danger measured
Fear isn't pain - it's not meant to be an absolute deterrent. It makes us think twice and go into fight or flight mode to handle a challenge - it doesn't discourage behaviors, it moderates them. Sometimes you do have to face off a rival, or need to take a risk for a reward. It releases endorphins if we come out of it better off
So it's not weird that we are drawn to it - horror stories/movies/games trigger it artificially, but so does fighting each other or tests of courage
But in those cases, isn't fear supposed to be balanced by some reward? Competing instincts/motivations?
Before we figured out tools and became apex predators we were prey animals... we're SUPPOSED to be nervous and scared because that's what kept us alive. Some people have speculated that this is why in aggregate humans are prone to being spiteful, destructive, bored, and shitty