(Untitled)

[ignifer_glacie]

D.H. Lawrence

Self-Pity

I never saw a wild thing
sorry for itself
A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough
without ever having felt sorry for itself

Comments

[chron_job]

Prove it.

I'll bet that bird was pissing and moaning every second. We just didn't know how to translate it.

[sugarspidersilk]

Actually, Nat, this is something you would probably be really interested in! Lucinda and dear old David are on to something & we can prove it. Most animals literally don't have an *emotional* reaction to pain, and that is what makes all the difference. In a manner of thinking about it, animals sorta don't suffer like we do, because it hasn't been conducive in natural selection.

You should pick up a book called "Decartes Error" by neuropsychologist Antonio Demasio, in which he explains that it is in fact "I feel, therefore I am" because all of our "rational" decision-making is in fact obliterated when there is damage to certain emotional areas of the brain. He explains his life's work in simple 'pop science' terms. (As cool as it is, his research isn't without flaws... I don't think it's going to like, change the face of science or anything but it's definitely interesting)

[ignifer_glacie]

hehe thats why i like you

[chron_job]

Well, I was being facetious, But If we want to get into it:

I'm not sure what's meant by "an emotional reaction to pain", but if what's meant by that is reacting to the pain in a context that relates the experience of pain to the self in a framework of time (being able to remember not-pain, and compare with pain) obviously this can't happen in a being that isn't self aware.

The fact that self pity as a response to pain, can only happen in a creature that's self aware, is a tautology.

Of course, this defeats the jist of the quoted poem even more thoroughly than my original comment... what's the use of alluding to wild creatures' supposedly laudable lack of self pity, when that's only because they don't have the capacity? Rather than (as I think the author is trying to imply) that wild creatures are somehow superior in character.

Also, I'm not sure where I draw the line on self awareness. I know that many apes, some dogs, and cetaceans react to the "mirror test" in ways that lead us to infer that they are self aware.

> animals

[sennawolf]

you have a pony sized saddle right? :)

[ignifer_glacie]

*blink* Kinda, it is small and if you have a small girth it could do on a pony I think. Why?

[trixiepixie7]

Until you have walked in someone else's pain...

But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world. --C.S. Lewis

[ignifer_glacie]

what does that have to do with wild creatures

[trixiepixie7]

Are you a wild creature? I think that all "creatures" have pain, emotions, silf-pity and a general sense of what feels good and right...and what does not. Pain is not to be ignored. Animals from all walk's of life limp.. if kicked.

"...whispers to us in our pleasures, ......but shouts in our pains..."

[ignifer_glacie]

I never said that.
According to the bible, god does not hold animals to the same standards as humans. They do not go to heaven or hell therefore he would have no reason to whisper or shout at them.

And pain is not the same as self pity.

By the way, if you are merely responding to this because you think this is about you, sorry to disappoint you but its not. Chris and I we're watching GI Jane at a car shop and I liked the poem.

[ventrec]

Back to the subject: I've never seen a wild thing sorry for itself. I've seen self pity in pets, in cats and in dogs especially. I've seen self pity as universal in humans.

I've run many wild things to their death. I've never seen self-pity, only fear and the desire to escape.

Self-pity is reserved for slaves, the free have no comprehension of it.

I wish I had not been able to write this. To comprehend slavery is to embrace it.