Absolutely. The choice mostly is conscious. Enlightenment, to my mind, is a belly laugh, a couple of pints, the outdooors, good company, or my team winning. Amongst many other things.
I can't choose whether my team wins, but I can choose my team. I can't open the pub when it's shut, but I...
In fairness, mine isn't an argument. It's an expression of relief that I don't share space with eejits that own machine guns. It's also expressing my fervent wish that said eejits stay where they are.
Might your op have it the wrong way around? The example has a directional flow from experience to knowledge. Could it be that our experiences are a function of what we think we know?
I'm inclined to thinks that when we (re)construct our experiences we are always trying to do something with...
Why a scientific standpoint?
To paraphrase Jaspers, I think we have a superstitious overconfidience in science. It leads us to apply it inappropriately. A bit like trying to fix a puncture with cement.
If I wanted to understand where a sense of humour comes from, I'd start with religion...
Yikes. The more nuts the US gets the happier I am that NRA types don't like to travel.
Why stop at guns - I think it's your right to have a missile, heck a nuclear missile. The governement have them and it's only logical that if you don't have one too there's nothing that will hold the mind...
I'd have freedom of movement - no more passports
I'd have equal access to education across the globe
I'd dismantle all armies
I'd ban guns
I'd make sure corporations pay a fair tax
I think evolutionary explanations like the one you cite are in the same neck of the woods as 'common sense'. Cover for people pushing some agenda.
Repression isn't a good idea - look how it's been working out for the Catholic Church over the last few decades
In a hypothetical scenario, if I were to argue that discourse analysis indicates that the way Mr X talks about gender equality is, although apparently egalitarian, based on taken for granted assumptions (e.g. women are more suited to child-rearing than men) I expect that you might agree with me...