I wonder, why the fuck do we do it?

Why do even the most intelligent of us cling to that which we suspect, even know to be false? I appreciate the great unwashed doing so, heck, it's what they do best - but it's a little unsettling to see someone of equal intelligence seemingly chained to a pattern of self-destructive behaviour.

My take on the whole matter is that we humans crave sensory stimulation of varying flavours. Some guys, addicted to violence, desperately seek the adrenaline rush that comes only from inflicting pain on another human. Mike Tyson once defied the Boxing rule not to have sex in the week before a fight, and indeed, the sheer exhilaration of being able to bed any woman he wanted swelled his confidence, no doubt as well as something else, to hitherto unseen proportions. Mike craved that rush before a fight, and it helped him.

What are our addictions, as men of intellect?

Jaybee

My addictions? Well, getting drunk and do pretty dangerous things (note, both are not necessarily connected), like climbing sheer cliffs without any ropes or protection, or just jumping down stairs with a bike or inline skates... and of course driving a car real fast. Such things, oh, and I am also addicted to listen to music. That´s it. :D

EDIT:
Oh, as an explanation, I do it for kicks and laughs. Damn, recently my back was bleeding because I made a pretty cool jump from 3 meters into a swimming pool (I only hit the water...) That hurt, but it was hilarious. :cool:

No matter how intelligent Homo sapiens sapiens becomes, we are still animals. We still have our basic instincts. One of those instincts is to do what feels good and is satisfying now.

Eating pizza for dinner more than anything else, for example. It tastes good. It satisfies our hunger. One knows it's laced with fat and cholesterol. If one goes on eating pizza like this, one will have a heart attack. But one doesn't care at the moment.

Another example: climbing a cliff without a harness. It creates an adrenaline rush. The rush feels good. It's fun. It satisfies one's need to have fun. One may someday fall off the cliff and die, but one doesn't care at the moment. It just feels too damn good (Did I hit the nail on the head, Dreamwalker?).

We as humans will always have our impulse to satisfy ourselves. The only difference between us and another, less intelligent animal, such as a turkey, is that we are smart enough to realize that that's what we are doing, and what will happen to us if we go on like this. Thus we have the capability of overcoming this impulse. But we all know it's easier to give in to our deep-rooted urges!

Yeah, that describes it pretty well. Of course, it is even more fun when the cliff rises from the sea, so you can jump down again. :D (Which is crazy, consider jumping from a 100 feet cliff...)