The kids these days
One of the best things about our forays into creative microphilanthropy is that they so often involve the young and wise. Check out the latest post over at GOOD, paying tribute to all the little ones that have taught us something about generosity.
Though Darwin is most widely known for popularizing the “survival of the fittest,” that was actually only half of his view on human nature. Twelve years after publishing On the Origins of Species, he wrote Descent of Man, in which he argued that “our regard for the approbation and disapprobation of our fellows depends on sympathy, which, as we shall see, forms an essential part of the social instinct, and is indeed its foundation-stone.”
How about that? Even Darwin believed that human beings are instinctually social and sympathetic. Perhaps it’s society’s hardening effects that condition us to stop obeying our most basic instincts to empathize, share, and act on behalf of others. That's why kids are such great teachers and benefactors of creative microphilanthropy.