Why Suffering is Hardwired into Human Biology

From a biological standpoint, humans are vulnerable creatures. We are fragile, we get sick and old. Our bodies are affected by nearly everything, cold or heat, stress or loss of loved ones, physical injury, loneliness. It seems like suffering isn't just part of life - it's part of us. But why would we be made this way? Who designed such a mechanism? And can this be understood not only through neurobiology, but also through philosophy?

In order to comprehend this, we need to look at three levels: scientific, philosophical, and metaphysical.

Pain as a Biological Signal

On the simplest level, pain is a warning system. It says:

Stop. Danger. Do something, or you will die.

Without pain, we would:

• damage and burn our own tissues without even realizing it
• walk around with broken bones
• push our joints to the point of complete destruction
• die from infections without noticing a single symptom

This is a disease known as congenital insensitivity to pain. These individuals do not live a long life: their bodies don't record any pointers. No pain means no protection. In this light, biology is vicious, yet practical: misery is the coin of life.

And here, however, the principal question comes up:

Why is it that pain exists not only in body but also in the feelings, psychology, even the thinking? Evolution might have constrained its scope to the physical signals. But it made suffering an essential element of the psyche. Why?

This was developed by philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche in the following radical form:

What does not kill me, makes me stronger.

In his case, he viewed suffering as not merely as evil, but as a necessary condition for growth, overcoming and "self-overcoming" of man. Evolution has nothing whatever against it: a system without pain is doomed to decay and extinction.

Negativity Bias: Why Suffering Is a default Setting of the Psyche

Our psyche is not objective. It has a fundamental feature called negativity bias. It's a mental trait that causes us to respond more to bad news, painful memories and threats, as compared to positive stimuli.

Neuroscience: The negative stimuli are much quicker and more intense activators of the amygdala, our threat detector, than positive ones are. To a brain, loss of 100 dollars is more important than finding the same amount.

Evolutionary meaning: To our savannah forerunners, a lack of cue (rustle in the grass that may be a predator) was fatal. A lack of a signal of reward (a ripe fruit) was simply inconvenient. Individuals who had switched to negativity made it and inherited their genes.

The studies conducted by psychologist Roy Baumeister revealed that:

Bad is Stronger than Good

A single negative comment can negate a dozen positives and a psychological trauma takes longer to heal than a physical one. The survival tool of a dangerous world is our psyche, and the set up side of it all is we are automatically in a state of increased vigilance and can more easily deviate into the abyss of suffering.

What If pain isn't a mistake, but a function?

Here we approach the edge of scientific knowledge and enter the realm of metaphysics. The question "how?" is answered by all of the explanations that have been provided above, but not "why?". Why should the universe, nature, or the Creator need such a system where progress and survival are inseparably interconnected with pain and death?

It's just at this moment that we come to a disturbing and interesting hypothesis the concept of Loosh by Robert Monroe.

Monroe, a well-known researcher out-of-body experiences, in his book "Far Journeys" gives an account of a message which was received from a non-human consciousness. As per this message, we live in a sort of a garden, or a farm, which is our reality.

• Energy of Suffering: The entities of higher evolutionary stage, or other dimension, do not eat physical body, but eat energy which is produced by living organisms. The most mouth-watering and most sustaining form of this energy is that which is discharged in the time of most dramatic emotion, chiefly in suffering, struggle, fear, grief, and sacrifice. According to Monroe, this energy was called Loosh.
• Biology as a Factory: The best generators of this resource are the mechanisms that are inherent in our biology physical pain, negativity bias of the psyche, fear and aggression instincts. This whole process of food chain in which life must eat life is a brilliant system of making Loosh all the way along.
• A Spot-On Quote: Monroe instructs that he had heard that:

Struggle... producing strong emotion... is succulent food. Especially in combination with the emotion you call Love, when it is connected with loss, separation, self-sacrifice... This is the best.

This chilling notion is a resemblance to traditions. According to Hindu writings, the universe exists because of sacrifice. The Eagle eats the consciousness of the dead creatures in works of Carlos Castaneda. The blood sacrifice is also a first-rate feature of redemption even in Christianity.

A singer of world pessimism, philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer asserted his view that the world is essentially Will a blind, insatiable striving that will forever remain in pain, as the fulfilment of a need soothes only momentarily, and never removes pain. Is this not the Will which is the mechanism of producing Loosh?

Conclusion: So What Do We Do With this Knowledge?

In the correctness of Loosh hypothesis, suffering is not an accident, but rather an institutionalized, systemic, inbuilt operation of our reality. We are biological reactors generating some energy on behalf of another person.

However, here is the secret of potential liberation as well. The realisation itself of this system is the initial step towards getting out of this system.

• Awakening from Hypnosis: Recognizing that our negative responses are not personal drama of our own, but a well-tuned mechanism, we will be able to begin monitoring them as an outsider, not as a full participant.
• Conscious Reprogramming: We are aware of developing states that, on the theory, are not tasty, or not under the system control: unconditional love, unconditioned joy, deep serenity, non-dramatic compassion, creativity.
• Going Beyond Biology: Meditation, mindfulness, energy work may be directed towards disconnection with the grid and training to feed on other source, inner source- on the infinite field of consciousness, and not the field of struggle and suffering.

During history, misery has been incorporated into our DNA, built into the very design of the human being as a mechanism of survival. But on a metaphysical level, this same mechanism can become the fuel for the system we are trapped in - until we recognize it, stop being an unconscious part of a machine moving toward the abyss, and take the first step toward freedom. Pain is absent only in theory; in practice, it rules over us.