Do the right thing

I remember Richard Dawkins talking about how humans generally want to do good, it is in our DNA, and there is a physiological reaction to a person in need not unlike sexual lust, a lust to do good. There is a perfectly serviceable evolutionary explanation which he tried not to go into, but after being pressed he had to explain. His point was it doesn't really matter what causes the lust-to-do-good feeling, we know the feeling exists regardless of our understanding. A lot of religious people would quickly tell you that God put that in us. Even though they don't have a biblical leg to stand on. They feel like it must be that way, so that solves it. (Dawkins explains that in our evolutionary history the human population was quite small, and seeing a fellow human in trouble or need was likely a relative and in helping them you help yourself by encouraging reciprocity, and keeping your family line alive and well. Fast forward 300k years and you still have the feeling but only for one person at a time...) I guess I have to get into this now.

There was an experiment and study mentioned in Sam Harris' and Richard Dawkins' Books. In the study they show people pictures of a single person in need. And you know the picture. These are the pictures used by christian charity organizations that say things like, "You can help this ONE person for 11 cents a day" or some such. They found 100% of responders in the study wanted to help the one person in need with 100% of their resources. The lust-to-do-good was strong, the strongest (100%). After that they showed the same people (and different ones for control group) pictures with the same little boy and his little sister. Now there were two kids in dire need of help. Amazingly they found 100% of the responders had a lack luster response, it was less than half the strength of the initial reaction (43%). The prediction for this part of the study was the same I would have predicted, that with two people in need the lust-to-do-good would feel twice as powerful, it seems to me that's how it should work out, but it was less than half. [side note: if more people in need increased the lust-to-do-good feeling it would disprove evolution and natural selection]

They keep going in this vein. Pictures of a family of kids, than an orphanage, than a village, each time the people in need increasing. They found the more people there were in need of help of any kind the more responders COULD NOT CARE. They could vocalize displeasure as in, "That's horrible," but when asked to donate money or help out in some way 100% of responders gave an unfavorable response hovering under 1%. These people were religious and not religious, men and women randomized. The study has been repeated to show this appears to be a universal human constant. All humans in all parts of the world care about one person a lot, even a stranger, especially a child, and their lust-to-do-good takes a steep nosedive with the inclusion of another person. I told you this for three reasons.

Firstly, Humans have a strong desire to be good, do the right thing and help out. The desire to help out and do the right thing alone ISN'T ENOUGH. You have to want to do the right thing, know what will help and than do that. Without understanding how to maximize well-being desire to do good can be very damaging or do nothing. What's that christian saying? "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Intentions alone aren't enough. I hope I don't have to give examples of this.

Ok I will, and I will pick on a seemingly innocuous non-religious entity. Breast cancer organizations, the pink ribbon, feel your boobies, etc champion a serious cause that kills a lot of women every year (though diarrhea, kills more women a year than breast cancer. It isn't as sexy though.) They take donations, give talks, go on walks, and 'raise awareness' which is where the majority of the donations go. It FEELS good to help. And lots of people do. But does it ACTUALLY help find a cure for breast cancer? Does it actually accomplish what it says it will?

No. In fact they are no closer to finding a cure now than they were before those non profit organization started popping up. If you read the fine print, about one cent per dollar actually goes to cancer research, (they don't say where, or who) which WILL find the cure for cancer. In other words walking around wont find it, talking in hotel lobbies and in parks wont find it, buying shirts, magnets and stickers wont cure it. Dedicated medical science and experimentation and study in a cancer lab is the most likely source of a cancer cure.

So here is a crazy idea: donate to that cancer research lab specifically. Than they get 100 cents of every dollar instead of one. Both the cancer lab and breast cancer awareness organizations have overheads most of the money they get goes there, followed by paying the staff. Than for the nonprofit orgs. comes raising awareness leaving a little bit for the cancer research center. Think about a hundred dollar donation to the Feel Your Boobies people. ONE whole dollar goes to a cancer researcher of their choice. Wahoo! [Side note: this means that a hundred dollar donation to feel your boobies and a one dollar donation to a cancer research center are the same to the cancer center. So a five dollar donation to the cancer research center directly is more money than they normally see. So YOU can help fight cancer for 11 cents a day! So why don't you?]

point 2: without understanding what actually helps humans, one feel-good reason is as good as any other. And this is where average religious person sits, you know, not the easily dismissible zealots we can all agree are bad like the, "Pope who’d tell Africans not to use condoms to protect themselves from AIDS, or a nun who would tell teenagers at a Catholic school that masturbation is evil, or a Mormon who would start a TV campaign in response to Prop 8 about how The Gays are out to corrupt our children. Or for that matter, a Muslim who would fly a plane into a building." No, the average christian, the one who wants to do the right thing (without knowing what that is) who hears an interpretation of a story, he is told, exemplifies how he should act, what he should do, how he should think. That guy, or girl IS A PROBLEM to the rest of us humans as a whole. Often if they do something right that helps people it is by accident. There is a right way to do this, to help people. Quick example: prayer.

Prayer has been tested and studied by science. In regards to people recovering from a common surgery. In every case it has done no better than chance/wishing/voodoo/sugar pills. And It actually harms people, believers most of all. It causes them to require more time to heal than people who were not prayed for, or people who were unaware they were being prayed for indicating it is in the mind of the believer. This means a lot of things, most importantly it means prayer is harmful to people in recovery. When my brother had chest surgery my religious uncle came to him and wanted to tell him that he and his church were praying for him. Kevin cut him off before he could say that and told him not to pray for him. And if he did to keep it to himself because he doesn't want to be recovering any longer than he needs. My uncle was hurt, but I am sure he prayed on his own.

thirdly: Sometimes doing the right thing is counter intuitive, or feels wrong. In some medical procedures causing pain helps people feel better sooner than letting them heal untouched. I suppose my overall point is sometimes wisdom from the superstitious people of bronze-age Palestine isn't wisdom. We can do better now and we should. Thank you.

**steps down from soap box**