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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 8:13:48 AM

juliaoceania

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Raechard

I said I don't think any animals are self aware in truth and I don't think there is any good test for self awareness. So put chimps in front of a mirror with labels on their heads if that’s what turns you on.

Seeing you do not know the difference between a monkey and a chimp or what a bonobo is, I will give your opinion about the self awareness of other creatures the weight it deserves

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 8:15:27 AM

Arpig

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The ability to engage in dumb arguements?

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 8:16:59 AM

Raechard

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I think I know the difference between a monkey and a chimp thanks although I might not have heard of a bonobo but then I hadn’t heard of you until today either.

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 8:17:38 AM

juliaoceania

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Arpig

The ability to engage in dumb arguements?

_____________________________

Once you label me, you negate me ~ Soren Kierkegaard

Reality has a well known Liberal Bias ~ Stephen Colbert

Great minds discuss ideas; Average minds discuss events; Small minds discuss people. Eleanor Roosevelt

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Post #: 24

RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 8:44:17 AM

GhitaAmati

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Arpig

The ability to engage in dumb arguements?

Oh darn, someone already posted it....this is exactly what I was thinking as I was readingthrough the first page of the thread!

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 9:41:08 AM

TheHeretic

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Vendaval

What is the essence of being human?

            I think it's been brushed past a few times already, even your reference to reading and writing in the OP, but I'd like to cast a different light on it.

         It's our ability to record information, and more importantly, the deep instinctual need we have to try and do that.  Not merely communication. Watch 3 (smart) dogs chase a cat across an acre of backyard sometime and you'll understand that humans are far from the top of the heap, when it comes to talking. Preserving what we learn, scratching it on rocks, depicting it with art, that is purely us. Consider the independent development of written language all over the world, and the way we scatch away on the electrons here today.

        Who am I to say that elephants do not sing songs of the dead, but we are the only ones that find a way to write it down.

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 9:42:06 AM

bipolarber

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Several things make up the essence of humanity:

1. We know about death.

2. We are tool makers/users.

3. We communicate with each other, and can even save our communication, our thoughts, our experiences for the future, via written language.

4. We have the ability to create. We know how to look into nature, understand its workings, and use it to better our lives. We also have the ability to use all of the above to make "art" which is a means of commenting on our unique place in existance.

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 9:48:27 AM

Raechard

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Knowledge of death isn’t something specific to humans and what do we really know about death anyway? I’d argue that a cat running from a dog knows about death too.

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 9:59:18 AM

juliaoceania

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quote:

2. We are tool makers/users.

There were hominids that made and used tools before human beings came along... and chimps will alter sticks to use them to fish for insects, and have made them experimentally

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:01:36 AM

Raechard

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This all reminds me of that recent study about lobsters feeling pain. With the common belief that invertebrates aren’t capable of feeling pain but responding only to stimuli. We are only told this so that we can all eat lobster and can ease our conscience about the fact it’s boiled alive.

I don’t know what it means if a lobster tries to rub acid off of itself the way that mammals do. You can be sure they’ll be one scientist trying to prove lobster boiling is perfectly ok and one that it’s cruel. It seems a bit silly to suggest the lobster would rub acid off of its body for any other reason than the realisation it was a harmful substance needing removal.

So everyone is dancing up and down trying to prove one scientific theory funded by the national lobster cooking society is superior to another study funded by the society against cruelty to lobsters and none of the rest of us are any the wiser. Whatever happened to impartial science?

< Message edited by Raechard -- 11/18/2007 10:02:38 AM >

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えへまにんへえや
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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:05:50 AM

samboct

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There's really not a lot that distinguishes us as human. If you try genetics- then you get into eugenics very quickly-and a chromosomal basis would deprive Mongoloids of their humanity.

Copulation for pleasure as opposed to recreation? Please, chimps, dolphins and dogs happily hump each other in male/male encounters, and they're all smart enough to know the diff.

Humor- dolphin trainers will certainly tell you that dolpins have a sense of humor, and some dog owners will say the same for their mutts. Cats however- have no sense of humor whatsoever.

Tool making? Right- chimps, beavers, and a number of other primates certainly use tools, both when taught by humans and on their own. Termite hives are also marvels of construction.

All of the above is why I have a lot of trouble with intelligent design arguments- seems to be ill educated- humans are clearly very similar to lots of species in the animal kingdom.

Language- now you're talking. I think what makes us human is our programming. It's not only the capacity to learn a human language (gorillas, chimps and even dogs can certainly pick up some human vocabulary) but it's the underlying programming that makes learning these languages easy for us that makes us human. Chinese is hard to learn? Why does a 5 year old Chinese kid make it look easy?

Taking it a step further- its the capacity to develop a human language that makes us human. In the 1900s there was a Cherokee chief(?) who was theoretically illiterate. He came up with his own alphabet that borrowed a lot of elements from English, but really had very different rules and syntax. See Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond.

To use a computer analogy, there's a lot of our operating system that we don't understand- the higher level languages are easier to figure out, but the underlying structures (there are some grammatical errors that a computer will make, but a 3 year old won't.) are really tough. Our moral codes are hardwired in as well.

Summary- what makes us human is the way we think- the underlying structure of our thought processes.

Sam

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:18:18 AM

kiaslyn

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Greetings, & What a profound question!

I would think the ability to learn, understand and then try not to do it again would separate us from the animal kingdom. Though for instance, those mice who are in the cage and have to push the button for food. If they choose the wrong one they will get a shock, eventually they will pick the right one. So putting that back into the realm of humans. If you give a beer to someone and they get sick from drinking too much. Will they if you give them another chance, a) not get sick again? or b) drink a little less? *laugh* Anyway, Just thought I would throw in my two cents.

But honestly, I think that the ability to learn, be teachable and then to apply that learning, be creative with it, break new boundaries of that learning makes us human.

Just a thought,
~kia

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:29:58 AM

FireWithin

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the answer is: essence of being human is within the conceptual understanding of whats good and what evil. so your all wrong

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:38:09 AM

Raechard

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Some people have a different idea of what good and evil is so that can't be right.

< Message edited by Raechard -- 11/18/2007 10:39:17 AM >

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:54:40 AM

velvetears

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Humans can cry other animals cannot.

But i think what really seperates us from other animals is our spiritual connection to something greater than ourselves (whatever form it takes) - and i don't necessarily mean organized religion.

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 10:58:42 AM

Raechard

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Yet another person that hasn't seen bambi!

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 11:08:06 AM

velvetears

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Actually i never have. At any rate, do you have anything positive to add to the thread or do you just enjoy heckling others?

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 11:11:04 AM

Raechard

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I thought that was positive

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Post #: 38

RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 11:16:14 AM

pinksugarsub

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Humans have souls, IMO. They are endowed with free will and hopefully a conscience, and will be dealt with in the afterlife in accordance with the manner in which they lived. They are made in the image of God.

JMO.

pinksugarsub

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RE: What is the essence of being human? - 11/18/2007 11:40:00 AM

angelikaJ

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Tool making...crows and other aforementioned animals.

learning.... and the ability to use the knowledge they have learned other animals do that as well...I think there was a study done on octupi

communication...and language... that is a close one I think...there are animals that learn AND teach sign
Some primates love to paint

humor...I've seen it in dogs

(and cats are definitly sarcastic)

I think it it that we have the ability to make concious choices....to be compassionate or cruel is what separates us...
but of course you have people who have varying degrees of brain damage and they may not be able to do that either...
at least to the best of our knowledge....

so to find one thing that identifies us all inately human....???

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