this post was submitted on 16 Dec 2024
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[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 1 points 1 week ago

If they’re “intelligent” then I think yes. “God’s image” is a reference of conscious, loving, and powerful. They would have original sin if they evolved out of a biological gauntlet like we did and had to fear constantly because it was the only way for their species to survive amongst all the predatory life around them.

As a buddhist evolutionary psychologist might put it, they would have dukkha nature because a default state of dissatisfied craving would be the thing that drove them to keep worrying after their bellies were full.

Their civilization would have taken them to new environments beyond their Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness, requiring them to “work” instead of just following their instinctual programming.

So they would have had their own ejection from their own Eden, into the world of mortality.

They would have left the effortless Tao of their original nature. They would be like Amazonian tree frogs living in glass boxes solving simple puzzles to get food pellets. Capable, but horrified and missing something they never consciously knew.

We all must pass through this phase of awkward separation as we emerge from nature into civilization.