# What if we flipped a switch and changed something major about how Humanity works? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 16, 2010, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672 "2010-03-16T17:52:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/21 "2010-03-17T00:12:56Z")
> [@PatriotGrrrl](#): > > What if we were nocturnal? I AM nocturnal. It sucks to be nocturnal in a diurnal society. Thank Og for 24 hour convenience stores. I imagine if the switch were flipped and I were diurnal in a nocturnal society, things would still suck. But, I’d have a tan and get to see the world under natural light. ---
**Author:** ![RalfCoder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@RalfCoder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RalfCoder)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/22 "2010-03-17T01:10:00Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > …and threw huge parties to celebrate their deaths? I **DO** have a short list of names… What??? You don’t?:dubious: ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/23 "2010-03-17T01:56:09Z")
> [@Zeldar](#): > > …Flip the switch and we suddenly go off and eat in private and don’t speak of it, while making elaborate plans and guest lists and all sorts of decorations and hoopla over the other function… Isn’t there a French play about that? 😕 I have vauge memories of my HS French teacher mentioning a play where a bunch of guests go to a “_fete du merde_” where everyone spends an evening sitting on a bunch of toilets in a big open room talking, but anytime somebody got hungry they’d excuse themselves (without actually saying why) and sneak off to a tiny cubicle and quikly snarf down a snack in private. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/24 "2010-03-17T03:44:23Z")
There’s one scene like that in a Buñuel film. Start at 2:06. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BPSc5m39EQ](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BPSc5m39EQ) ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/25 "2010-03-17T03:54:45Z")
All decisions are suddenly made only with reason and logic, not emotion ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/26 "2010-03-17T04:50:16Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > How about for sex to be incredibly unpleasant, but pregnancy and childbirth intensely pleasurable (bit of a bum deal for the men, that one) That would be disastrous, I think. Not only would men not enjoy sex, they probably couldn’t have sex; they’d be rendered impotent through the sheer unpleasantness. Which means that any society that can’t pull off artificial insemination on a large scale collapses due to a crashing population. Even they will have problems, since few men will donate sperm if masturbation is agonizing. Men will be constantly frustrated, with a sex drive they can’t indulge without hurting themselves so much it isn’t worth it. Relations between the genders nosedives, since men will come to regard women as a source of nothing but pain and frustration. For men, it would be like constantly being hungry, but not being allowed to eat without a beating. > [@YogSosoth](#): > > All decisions are suddenly made only with reason and logic, not emotion That too would be disastrous. There are people who are like that already due to brain damage; they are incompetent. They tend to get caught in loops - [unable to decide between two actions because they don’t get frustrated and just say “Oh, well, I’ll just go do X”.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buridan's_ass)They make decisions that will lead to disaster in the future, because they don’t care about the future. They can’t even play well at cards or other games; they tend to make moves randomly, since they don’t care about the results. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/27 "2010-03-17T05:18:20Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > That too would be disastrous. There are people who are like that already due to brain damage; they are incompetent. They tend to get caught in loops - [unable to decide between two actions because they don’t get frustrated and just say “Oh, well, I’ll just go do X”.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buridan's_ass)They make decisions that will lead to disaster in the future, because they don’t care about the future. They can’t even play well at cards or other games; they tend to make moves randomly, since they don’t care about the results. I figure we try one, then the other, then see how we like it. Emotion and ignorance has gotten us to this point and we’ve killed and hated so many of our fellow men over stupid shit. I’ll take a random chance that logic and reason will be slightly better ---
**Author:** ![Claude\_Remains](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@Claude\_Remains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claude_Remains)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/28 "2010-03-17T05:35:39Z")
> [@ragerdude](#): > > We could flip a switch to make all straight people gay and all gay people straight. > > I wonder how the straight minority would feel then. I just adore how you view sexuality as up/down, on/off, black/white, good/bad, etc. You could stand in the corner with your switch hooked up to The Clapper and millions would never notice.😉 ---
**Author:** ![Cyberhwk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7993a0/32.png) [@Cyberhwk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyberhwk)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/29 "2010-03-17T08:00:52Z")
> [@hotflungwok](#): > > I wouldn’t mind a switch that made us think that raw broccoli, tofu, and bean sprouts taste like candy, cake, & ice cream & vice versa. I think it would be fascinating to see if slim remained the desired physical shape in such a situation (especially if they completely switched places with fatty foods becoming distasteful). I understand we’re programmed to desire fertility cues which would include health, but I wouldn’t put it past society to desire things just because it’s hard to maintain. My switch would be the ability to simply turn on and off human fertility with 100% reliability. How would society change if unplanned pregnancies were no longer an issue? ---
**Author:** ![dragoncat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6a8cbe/32.png) [@dragoncat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dragoncat)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2010, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/30 "2010-03-17T14:10:22Z")
What if … women and men had equal standing in all known societies? Or if women had greater power and authority than men? ---
**Author:** ![arachnologus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dc4da7/32.png) [@arachnologus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/arachnologus)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/31 "2010-03-18T03:25:18Z")
> [@Zeldar](#): > > Take our obsession with eating and the festivity associated with it, as compared to our shame and secrecy about how we eliminate the waste from it. > > Flip the switch and we suddenly go off and eat in private and don’t speak of it, Little-known fact: the well-known American poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, wanted to write a satirical novel with precisely this theme. It was to be called _Hardigut_. The hero would be someone who boldly defied the social taboo about eating. She tried for a long time to make it work, but in the end couldn’t pull it off. One of those sad might-have-beens of literary history. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/32 "2010-03-18T03:59:53Z")
I once heard a comedian ask “Imagine if your knees bent in the opposite direction…what would a chair would look like?” ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/33 "2010-03-18T21:34:58Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > That too would be disastrous. There are people who are like that already due to brain damage; they are incompetent. They tend to get caught in loops - [unable to decide between two actions because they don’t get frustrated and just say “Oh, well, I’ll just go do X”.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buridan's_ass)They make decisions that will lead to disaster in the future, because they don’t care about the future. They can’t even play well at cards or other games; they tend to make moves randomly, since they don’t care about the results. That’s definitely dysfunctional, but I don’t think that making decisions based on logic and reason requires that sort of pathological result. In the first case, you can certainly decide between two equivalent options by realizing that there’s no good way to distinguish between them, and that it’s not worth spending more time not deciding. You can logically and rationally realize that the extra value from making the best possible choice is not worth the time required to make it, and that it’s better to simply make any choice at all. I imagine that in a purely rational world, people would regularly carry dice or coins around with them to act as a convenient randomizer for whenever their decisionmaking time exceeded whatever limit they previously decided on. In the second case, why wouldn’t people who act logically and rationally care about the future? Or is it just the games they don’t care about? If so, that’s easy: bet something on the game. Now they’ll play with strategy. It seems like your examples are really of people who are some sort of context-free rational beings. They are rational only in a given instant, but they don’t consider the past or the future. ---
**Author:** ![TPWombat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbce88/32.png) [@TPWombat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TPWombat)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/34 "2010-03-18T23:36:31Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > All decisions are suddenly made only with reason and logic, not emotion IIRC Theodore Sturgeon wrote a short story about an alien artifact that affected nearby humans thusly : The more fearful and stressed they were _the better their brains worked_. I think it started with a really messed up hating guy who wrote beautiful literature when he happened to be within its sphere of influence and finishes when the whole human race gets affected and the world immediately becomes a Good and Happy place, since any unhappiness causes increased ability to think your way out of your problems. It may have been **“The Travelling Crag”**. ---
**Author:** ![RalfCoder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@RalfCoder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RalfCoder)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2010, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/35 "2010-03-19T12:29:20Z")
> [@Claude\_Remains](#): > > I just adore how you view sexuality as up/down, on/off, black/white, good/bad, etc. You could stand in the corner with your switch hooked up to The Clapper and millions would never notice.😉 (Taking this idea and running with it) I have this image of someone doing this in a singles bar… {CLAP!} Half the room suddenly gets up and runs across the bar, sliding into booths and ordering drinks for someone they never knew 30 seconds ago… {CLAP!} _WHAP!!_ Most of those new-found friends wail on the intruders when their orientation again gets flip-flopped faster than a politician backpedalling on a promise. One word of warning: Don’t try this on a boat, please. [The sudden surge of people running from rail to rail might capsize it.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Eastland) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2010, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/36 "2010-03-19T16:06:12Z")
I once read a SF story about a race of aliens who had an adrenalin analog - a chemical that kicked in during times of stress and enhanced their functions. Only in their case instead of enhancing physical functions, it enhanced mental ones. Some emergency would make the chemical kick in and their intelligence would double so they could deal with the emergency. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2010, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/37 "2010-03-19T18:07:53Z")
How about a medical/science breakthrough that created a simple, easy, fast and effective method of setting a body’s weight? People could chose whatever weight they wanted, and the process would set their body to that weight, and that would be the end of it - eat, exercise, whatever, your body would maintain your set weight. I’m having a hard time figuring if that would make everything better or worse. ---
**Author:** ![Terra1041](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Terra1041](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terra1041)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2010, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/38 "2010-03-19T21:30:59Z")
I would flip a switch to drastically reduce the male sex drive. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2010, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/39 "2010-03-19T21:35:07Z")
> [@Terra1041](#): > > I would flip a switch to drastically reduce the male sex drive. Why? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2010, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672/40 "2010-03-19T23:45:58Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > In the second case, why wouldn’t people who act logically and rationally care about the future? Or is it just the games they don’t care about? If so, that’s easy: bet something on the game. Now they’ll play with strategy. No, they won’t; they show the same lack of concern with real money. I recall one example; an accountant who suffered brain damage, lost his emotions and spent everything he had on drugs and prostitutes and such despite knowing better than most how he was screwing himself. Why? Because he could still feel physical pleasure. But he couldn’t feel concern for the future. Caring about the future is an emotional response. Caring if you live or die, much less do well is an emotional response. Logic and reason are methods, not motives. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-we-flipped-a-switch-and-changed-something-major-about-how-humanity-works/532672.md?page=3)