Sometimes life seems to follow a theme of sorts. A conversation that Robyn and I had a few nights ago along with raising two kids and then listening to a couple of recent Podcasts and watching episode 2 of [url=http://www.sho.com/site/thisamericanlife/]This American Life on Showtime[/url] got me thinking and asking myself how much of what we do and feel is “hard-wired” and just how much is learned or comes about through life’s little twists and turns?

One of the features on [url=http://www.sho.com/site/thisamericanlife/]This American Life[/url] was about a 12 year old boy who claims that he doesn’t believe in love. When asked if he loves his parents, he responded that he liked them and thinks they are nice people, but he doesn’t “love” them. Although he is growing up in a loving household with intelligent, caring parents and siblings, he believes that love really doesn’t exist and that all the rest of us are experiencing some kind of delusion. Of course, the average person’s response to this kid would be “you just haven’t experienced enough in your young lifetime to understand love”. But what if he’s right and he’s seeing through this delusion by which the rest of us are blinded?

While laying in bed the other night, Robyn and I were talking about the kids (as we do pretty much each night before falling asleep) and how we love them so much that it hurts. It [i]literally hurts[/i]. The thought of anything happening to them or of them being in any pain is simply unbearable. I mentioned that I thought this is a consequence of any loving relationship. Along with the good feelings that love brings us, it has a sort of “dark side” I guess. I’ve read that the feelings that we call “love” and attachment are considered by some scientists to be a biological function that keeps the family unit together long enough to ensure the survival of the young. I guess over the millenia, we humans have added a little bit to this with our sentimental feelings and whacky marriage customs. Maybe that 12 year old was right?

Earlier in the week, I saw this article on the [url=http://www.cnn.com]CNN[/url] headlines: [url=http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/04/04/neurotheology/index.html]Are humans hard-wired for faith?[/url] In addition, [url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=13]Fresh Air[/url] featured interviews with [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dawkins]Richard Dawkins[/url] and [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Collins]Francis Collins[/url] who presented their extremely polar views on God, religion and science. I pretty much consider myself to be [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism]Agnostic[/url] in my “beliefs” – do I even have any beliefs then?