We Hopeful Monsters

The phrase "hopeful monster" comes from debates about the processes of evolution where it is used (often with gentle ridicule) to refer to the idea that key changes in evolutionary history result from single large leaps, rare large mutations which bring some new characteristic into a population that turns out to be advantageous and thus spreads wide as the mutant has many offspring that share the characteristic. However, the phrase itself is one that's always been evocative to me.

I found myself thinking of the phrase last night, because of a discussion about environmentalism and population control. The common wisdom these days in progressive circles seems to take it as an assumption that humans are a problem. From this comes the suggestion that we need to have fewer people, so that we won't have such an impact upon the planet. Some even go so far as to describe humanity as a blight, destroying the planet. We are monsters, and for there to be less of us is seen as a good thing.

Another related line of thought, though clothed in a certain altruism, is that the problems of climate change and increased population are such that it may not be moral to introduce more children into such a world, due to the suffering they would no doubt encounter. (This strikes me as a rather historically oblivious argument, given that through most of history the likely level of deprivation and suffering for a child was much greater than now, and so the arguments suggests that humanity should have pessimistically snuffed itself out long ago as not worth the effort.)

Humans are one of the most successful species ever to arise on Earth, in terms of our spread from small bands in one area of the planet to a dominant, world-wide population which reforms ecosystems all over the planet by its very presence. Other dominant species also change ecosystems. Some grazers can help creates planes, by eating way the shoots of all larger plants before they can grow. Animals we think of as pests clearly can decimate other plant and animal populations by their plentitude. But it's hard to think of any creatures that have had such a huge impact on the planet as a whole.

Perhaps from an environmentalist point of view, or at least the view of a certain kind of environmentalist, we are thus monsters. But I'd argue that even thus, we are hopeful monsters. Unlike the non-rational animal populations, we are not unaware of our impact on the planet, and we change our behavior and learn new ways as we seek to live happily and productively on the world we find ourselves in. The technology, the ways of life that humans pursued, a mere three generations ago would not sustain the current population of the earth. We have changed our ways radically over the last hundred years, and those changes have been the result of inventions and improvements made by humans. Each and every person has the potential to contribute new breakthroughs, small and large, to the way we live on our planet. So while each person is another human individual drawing upon the resources of our planet, each person is also a source of new ideas of how we might life upon our planet better. To have fewer people is to have fewer ideas. We should see each person, not as another problem, but as another solution to the problems which face humanity.

Does this mean we have some sort of moral obligation to have the maximum number of children possible, an equal and opposite imperative to the claim that it is immoral to have more children? I Kant say that. (Get it? Get it?) No, but it does mean that we shouldn't start to see ourselves and humanity in general as an enemy. We should welcome the next generation as the hope that will continue to move humanity forward, which necessarily means finding ways to continue to live on our planet without making it uninhabitable to ourselves.