.josh Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 I'm not disagreeing with you guys; I'm sure that the "looking out for danger" does play a factor in there on some level. I'm willing to bet that % even goes up the closer to home the news is. I wonder if there's a study on that, or it would be interesting to run a study on that, if there's not. Anyways, I think Dan is closer to the truth on that count. One could indeed argue that we're interested in watching it happen to someone else, so as to better protect ourselves from such things in the future. We can better understand what we'd go through when it happens, so it won't seem as scary and mysterious, etc.. blahblahblah. But that doesn't really explain why we watch the same stuff over and over and over again. Also, the tendency of people having to 'learn the hard way' seems to negate Dan's theory. That is, people have a tendency to not truly take other people's advice, warnings, etc.. because they somehow don't think they will fall victim to the peril. This tendency contradicts the notion that people would watch that sort of thing in the interest of self-preservation. So why do we really like watching that sort of thing? My theory is that we're all a bunch of sadists. We like violence, competition, conflict, etc...be it games or solving problems, etc... humans seem to get off to it. We want to assert our dominion and influence over others. We want to command. Survival of the fittest. Your pain/bad luck == one less person for me to compete against. I'm running a race and the guy ahead of me and he trips and falls. Sure, I may feel sorry for the guy on some level, but it can't be on a higher level, because that kind of defeats the purpose of conflict/competition: to win. Sure, I might consider what he did wrong so I can avoid the same peril, but as mentioned, people tend not to think about that, because they tend to believe it won't happen to them. I believe that the highest thing on my mind is "Yes! one more person down, I'm that much closer to victory, RAH!" And I believe that the closer you are to victory, the less the chance of you feeling sorry for the guy who tripped and the less the chance of you considering it might happen to you, it will be. 100 yards to the finish line, down to me and one other dude. Forget anything else, just focus on moving those legs as fast as possible. He trips. "HELL YEAH I'M GOING TO WIN WOOT WOOT WOOT!!!" Yep, that's what's gonna go through my mind. And that makes me a sadist. His pain == my pleasure. Oh I'm sure that there are people out there that would stop and help the guy, even if it means they'd lose. But a) that just points out that you don't win by being the nice guy, and b) most people won't stop. Bottom line is, some of use are downright afraid and concerned and heed the folly of others. Most of us probably are the same on some smaller, unconscious level. But at the forefront, face it, most of us are sadists. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daniel0 Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 What I meant was simply that your brain prioritizes an event where you burnt your finger on something higher than when someone gave you a hug. Even though the latter is a nice thing and you'd rather remember that instead, the former one is more important to your survival/protection so the brain's primitive way of working gives it a higher priority in terms of remembering it. Therefore, something you perceive as a bad thing will be easier to remember that something you perceive as nice. That's not necessarily that you "like" to observe the bad things though. I'm not a psychologist (or whoever studies such things), but it's just something I once read somewhere. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
.josh Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 well yeah, but we're talking about what you're thinking about when you watch that sort of stuff happen to other people, not what's happening to you firsthand. I will certainly agree that most of us are not sadists when it comes to personally being in the bad situation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mchl Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 CV: Your text about running reminded me of flavor text on this Magic: The Gathering card . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stooney Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 While we're all completely off topic here, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waynewex Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 While we're all completely off topic here, To this day; I still laugh at that one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daniel0 Posted November 27, 2008 Share Posted November 27, 2008 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
corbin Posted November 28, 2008 Share Posted November 28, 2008 Oddly enough people like/pay attention to bad news more than good news. Oddly? Think about it a little. All animals are generally more concerned about signals of danger, than about 'good news' (whatever these might be) Funnily would've been a better choice than oddly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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