Can we deal with a problem by killing it?

Where does this impulse come from? That to kill is to solve? 

If I were in the moment of the sabre tooth tiger eating me, unless I kill the tiger, I would solve the problem of being eaten.

But to punish someone by killing, what exactly does this solve? 

It might appease my need for vengeance. Make me feel somewhat righteous. Even heroic.

Yet these impulses for vengeance are our reptilian impulses, those created and honed by sabre-tooth tiger experiences.

Is it possible for us to collectively grow up? Yes, yes it is. That is the uniqueness of our human mind. To apply our capacity to temper our base impulses.

What is it to punish? And how might we do that with wisdom and the ability to look to the whole that created the aberrant behaviour in the first instance.

In the world of the microbe if we choose to live in an extremely sterilised world do we prevent bacteria and virus’s? Or do we create a culture where the super bug becomes supreme.

Do we kill the virus? Or do we look to the ecology that made the virus possible?

Complex issues are not solved by sabre-tooth tiger-killing instincts.

Photo taken July 2nd, 2020