A Better Model of Homo sapiens

If you believe that God created mankind, I'd like you to consider this: I don't think He did a very good job. (This might appear blasphemous to some people, but the spirit in which this is intended is more one of whimsy. Or, it's what the physical scientists would call a "thought experiment.")

Here are some ways in which I think a new, improved model could be better than the existing model; or--pretty much the same thing, I guess--how I would design Man if I were doing it.

First, how about a human being who is incapable of lying? We would not have to worry about being cheated, conned, etc. Think how that might revolutionize politics! We would not vote for candidates only to find out, once they were in office, that they were not going to keep their promises to us.

Or, a model of human who was less fond of killing his own kind.

How about a human being who was incapable of believing incorrect things? We would not have superstition (like albinos in Africa being killed because their bones are thought to have magical or medicinal value, or rhinoceroses being killed to extinction because the Chinese believe their horns have aphrodisiac properties).

Of course there's a difficulty here: If human beings were fashioned such that they only believed that which is true, we might have the problem, in designing our new, improved model of human, that there might just be some uncertainty as to what is true. Even in Science, that which is true today can be shown to be false tomorrow.

So, this is just an exercise in fanciful thinking. But you have to admit, the prospect of a race of beings who could not lie is intriguing. (Any writer of science fiction: Feel free to use this idea in a story of yours.)

On a more serious note, for anyone who would like to indulge in further contemplation of the Nature of Man, I recommend the (long) poem by the 18th-century English poet Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man.