Tuesday, April 13, 2010
What makes us human?
I had never seen Star Trek before today, but I sincerely enjoyed the story-line and the questions it proposed: What makes us human? I think a more interesting question is when do we stop becoming human? During wars in the past, soldiers have called the enemy nicknames which degrade them to a sub-human level. Franz Kafka's "The Metamorphosis" calls into question the way we treat the sick or the old once they "stop contributing" (monetarily or otherwise). Can you guys think of other ways that we sub-humanize people?
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The blog gets posted to "google buzz" through my gmail account and my friend, Cindy, responded to it:
ReplyDelete"What sets us apart is our intelligence and resourcefulness, as well as our penchant for more. This article is also some food for thought:
'The questioning of animal suicide is essentially people looking at what it means to be human,' says Duncan Wilson
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1973486,00.html#ixzz0kxS764IA
I thought this was a very striking question posed towards humans."
"If we just treated pigs like pigs and cows like cows, that would be sufficient."
ReplyDeleteI really like this sentence. Everything that human beings believe are depending on human logical and knowledge system. however, we do not understand pigs or cows at all, and what we did will not change the fact that we will still eat cows and pigs in future. Everything we did only proves that human beings can think.
It seems that we have a really strong self-esteem: We always think in a way of human logic, and believe that we are always right. Sub-humanization itself just displays this strong human self-esteem.
Genocide definitely qualifies as dehumanization. Much of the time it seems to be racially or politically motivated, where one group with the power classifies their enemies as less-than-human. Examples are everywhere; The Holocaust, Sudan/Darfur, Armenia, Rwanda...
ReplyDeleteHs far as what makes us human? This could be an endless debate. There are too many angles to approach from, biological or otherwise. I believe you stop being 'human' and just become another animal on this planet the second you abandon ethical/moral values that we as humans have placed into our society to prevent us from behaving poorly.
I'm no biologist (hate the subject even), but it seems like Humans are a species that would very easily self destruct compared to other species on this planet. We are very prone to kill one another over nothing. Most animals would kill another of their kind if their territory or offspring were threatened. We kill over what seems to be anything! Girls, cars, sports, political beliefs, religious beliefs, brushing up on one another accidentally, etc.
One wonders if all aforementioned values we placed upon ourselves actually helps or just makes things worse for us...
Humans and humanity are both so very interesting that it's very difficult to define either of them. But as others said, I think it comes down to the level of contribution that we're about to give, what we actually give, and how the level changes through out life and the things it throws at us. Being the egotistical species that we are, I think a main way that people become "de-humanized" is by having the ego scarred. Just like the example above of degrading nicknames that people never come back from, something that leaves a permanent mark, whether good or bad, can have a huge part in the level of "humaness" that a person holds and exhibits.
ReplyDeleteYea, if you think about it, throughout history there has been many examples where humans dehumanize other humans. Just as Basil said any genocide can be an example, but also slavery. Since the beginning there has always been "low level" humans that have been made into slaves. Be it the Egyptians with the Hebrews, The Romans with any other low level country they conquered, or America with African slavery. Additionally, there is always the fact that some of the more wealthy people tend to look down onto the lower class.
ReplyDeleteI feel like, however, that this is also seen in nature where there is the alpha male in a group or something along those lines. With this said, however, its never taken to the degree that humans take it to. This topic can be tied into so many things. The basic greed of humans, and how many people just look out for themselves and want whats only good for them. They feel superior or something to the rest of the world or as if everyone owes them. This is seen everywhere, it is just human nature I guess.