"Is Man Just Another Animal?" Professor Steve Jones says...
- Thread starter gorski
- Start date
bubblesmcgrath
Well-Known Member
Just watched a documentary on Terry Pratchett's life and death....gone way too soon..
"Imagination, not intelligence, made us human"....
Goraki, have you read any of his books?
"Imagination, not intelligence, made us human"....
Goraki, have you read any of his books?
Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
(Phew...)
A question, and not meant in a disparaging way. You've made a study of philosophy. Seems to me, that looking into the deeper truth behind things, the long view, etc, tends to promote what one might call a 'philosophical' outlook. An outlook that does in fact take the long view, that doesn't sweat the small things. An outlook that's maybe a little bit more chill than the outlook of someone tossed on the seas of an unreflective life.
On this thread, your demeanour appears to be something other than that. Combative, condescending at times, etc.
So the question is this: to the extent that you [or anyone] reacts with hostility, aggression, etc, in a situation where a different approach might be more productive - do you think those mannerisms arise from your 'exceptional', human intellect/creativity etc; or from some animal substrate, that responds to perceived threats with hostility and suspicion?
Keep in mind that I'm not talking about the presentation of information per se; but about the mannerisms employed during communication.
danny la rouge
I have a cheese grater in the dishwasher.
bubblesmcgrath I caught the end of that. I've never read any of his books though.
NoXion
his soul is marching on
Random observation related to the subject, although I suspect someone else may have made the point already:
It is not any particular trait or behaviour that makes humans unique. Rather it is how far humans have developed certain traits and behaviours during their evolutionary history.
Humans are not the only animals to use tools, but no other animal has created tools as diverse and developed as humans have. From flint knives to the Saturn V rocket which put humans on another world.
Humans are not the only animals to change the nature of this planet, but no other animal has affected this planet in as many ways as we have. The land, the sea, even the atmosphere...
Humans are not the only animals to develop culture, but no other animal devotes so much mental and physical energy to producing cultural artefacts. We even have whole groups within society - actors, writers, painters - whose entire livelihoods are centred around producing culture.
So the difference between humans and the other animals is one of simple degree... but it is such a large degree that it is worth taking notice.
It is not any particular trait or behaviour that makes humans unique. Rather it is how far humans have developed certain traits and behaviours during their evolutionary history.
Humans are not the only animals to use tools, but no other animal has created tools as diverse and developed as humans have. From flint knives to the Saturn V rocket which put humans on another world.
Humans are not the only animals to change the nature of this planet, but no other animal has affected this planet in as many ways as we have. The land, the sea, even the atmosphere...
Humans are not the only animals to develop culture, but no other animal devotes so much mental and physical energy to producing cultural artefacts. We even have whole groups within society - actors, writers, painters - whose entire livelihoods are centred around producing culture.
So the difference between humans and the other animals is one of simple degree... but it is such a large degree that it is worth taking notice.
Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
The question is, what does a difference of degree prove.
Looking at animals, one attribute is size. A minnow is small, and a blue whale is very big. We could say, 'the difference of that attribute is so great, that it must prove they are different things'.
And yes, they are different things. But they are still both members of the Kingdom Animalia.
Humans think way more than other animals. It's a difference of degree. It doesn't prove that humans aren't members of the Kingdom Animalia.
NoXion
his soul is marching on
Good thing I never said that then, isn't it? "Humans are not the only animals..." - that phrasing explicitly accepts that humans are animals.
As I attempted to convey with my use of multiple examples, it's not just exaggeration in one particular trait, like size, which makes humans noteworthy. Humans are weirdly min-maxed in all sorts of ways that make us stand out from the rest of the animal kingdom, even if our fundamental nature is the same.
Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
I agree. Lots of other animals stand out within the animal kingdom as well. It's just that we humans are particularly mesmerized by our own attributes.
NoXion
his soul is marching on
Comes naturally with the facility of self-reflection that all humans share. I don't know why you seem to make it out to be a negative thing, though.
Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
I don't agree that self reflection must lead to a narcissistic obsession with our own apparent specialness.
bubblesmcgrath
Well-Known Member
Terry Pratchett in interview...
"I don't have much truck with the "religion is the cause of most of our wars" school of thought because that is manifestly done by mad, manipulative and power-hungry men who cloak their ambition in God.
- I number believers of all sorts among my friends. Some of them are praying for me. I'm happy they wish to do this, I really am, but I think science may be a better bet.
- So what shall I make of the voice that spoke to me recently as I was scuttling around getting ready for yet another spell on a chat-show sofa?
More accurately, it was a memory of a voice in my head, and it told me that everything was OK and things were happening as they should. For a moment, the world had felt at peace. Where did it come from?
Me, actually — the part of all of us that, in my case, caused me to stand in awe the first time I heard Thomas Tallis's Spem in alium, and the elation I felt on a walk one day last February, when the light of the setting sun turned a ploughed field into shocking pink; I believe it's what Abraham felt on the mountain and Einstein did when it turned out that E=mc2.
It's that moment, that brief epiphany when the universe opens up and shows us something, and in that instant we get just a sense of an order greater than Heaven and, as yet at least, beyond the grasp of Stephen Hawking. It doesn't require worship, but, I think, rewards intelligence, observation and enquiring minds.
I don't think I've found God, but I may have seen where gods come from."
His books are brilliantly human and yet full of animals...he creates cultures, philosophies ...planets and universes on the pages.
Worth reading danny la rouge
NoXion
his soul is marching on
There's nothing apparent about it.
bubblesmcgrath
Well-Known Member
Small Gods might be one for you gorski...
A couple of quotes
"His philosophy was a mixture of three famous schools -- the Cynics, the Stoics and the Epicureans -- and summed up all three of them in his famous phrase, 'You can't trust any bugger further than you can throw him, and there's nothing you can do about it, so let's have a drink.
Terry Pratchett, Small Gods (Discworld, #13)
"What's a philosopher?", said Brutha. "Someone who's bright enough to find a job with no heavy lifting", said a voice in his head...."
A few more quotes from Small Gods
Small Gods Quotes by Terry Pratchett
A couple of quotes
"His philosophy was a mixture of three famous schools -- the Cynics, the Stoics and the Epicureans -- and summed up all three of them in his famous phrase, 'You can't trust any bugger further than you can throw him, and there's nothing you can do about it, so let's have a drink.
Terry Pratchett, Small Gods (Discworld, #13)
"What's a philosopher?", said Brutha. "Someone who's bright enough to find a job with no heavy lifting", said a voice in his head...."
A few more quotes from Small Gods
Small Gods Quotes by Terry Pratchett
danny la rouge
I have a cheese grater in the dishwasher.
He seemed an interesting character. I only really became aware of him after his diagnosis of Alzheimer's became news. Then I kept seeing articles and interviews, and I watched a programme about Alzheimer's that he was in. I liked the cut of his jib.
However, I don't think I'd like his books. It's a genre I've never enjoyed. I dislike Tolkien and found him unreadable, I find CS Lewis insufferable, I couldn't finish the first of Philip Pullman's trilogy (although I liked his views in interview, too), I once picked up Gormenghast, then put it back down again sharply. It's just not my thing.
bubblesmcgrath
Well-Known Member
danny la rouge
I have a cheese grater in the dishwasher.
Everybody's Tolkien at me, but I don't hear a word they're saying.
There's an interesting book review in the latest edition of the lrb - Wohlleben, a forester, argues that a forest has consciousness:
Certainly, the kind of consciousness Wohlleben proposes is so different from ours as to be utterly alien: it is a diffuse, blind intelligence located in the sensitive, questing filaments of thousands of root-tips, or a networked language of chemical messages, fanning out through the forest floor via a ‘wood wide web’ of symbiotic fungal mycelium. It is a sensory alertness present in every leaf. Wohlleben gives the example of a tree attacked by caterpillars: as the larvae bite into a leaf, the tree can ‘taste’ the species of pest that has attacked it. The ‘leaf tissue sends out electrical signals, just as human tissue does when it is hurt’, and these signals prompt the release of ‘defensive compounds’ which spoil the leaves (oak trees, for instance, release tannins). Trees also warn their neighbours of attack, broadcasting chemical and electrical ‘news bulletins’ to other trees, which then pre-empt a similar attack, again by releasing chemical compounds. When umbrella thorn acacias are nibbled by giraffes they release ethylene, which deters them; but the chemical also drifts to nearby acacias, and ‘all the forewarned trees also [pump] toxins into their leaves to prepare themselves.
Certainly, the kind of consciousness Wohlleben proposes is so different from ours as to be utterly alien: it is a diffuse, blind intelligence located in the sensitive, questing filaments of thousands of root-tips, or a networked language of chemical messages, fanning out through the forest floor via a ‘wood wide web’ of symbiotic fungal mycelium. It is a sensory alertness present in every leaf. Wohlleben gives the example of a tree attacked by caterpillars: as the larvae bite into a leaf, the tree can ‘taste’ the species of pest that has attacked it. The ‘leaf tissue sends out electrical signals, just as human tissue does when it is hurt’, and these signals prompt the release of ‘defensive compounds’ which spoil the leaves (oak trees, for instance, release tannins). Trees also warn their neighbours of attack, broadcasting chemical and electrical ‘news bulletins’ to other trees, which then pre-empt a similar attack, again by releasing chemical compounds. When umbrella thorn acacias are nibbled by giraffes they release ethylene, which deters them; but the chemical also drifts to nearby acacias, and ‘all the forewarned trees also [pump] toxins into their leaves to prepare themselves.
gorski
customised free radical
OK, just woke up and these two messages were left on my screen, so I am going to start with them, early in the morning...
No, I haven't. Have you? If it is really good, critically minded, or at least humorous, I would, of course, be interested, thanx!
EDIT: just read your other posts with excerpts from his interviews/books and I must say I would consider it light-hearted entertainment, maybe...
You are now going to get mad but I must speak the truth, as I am, after all, a philosopher - and truth is my "business", sorry...
I learnt this on this forum, in this country. You see, unlike the Scandinavians who really "dislike" conflict - in this country (and its satellites, in both hemispheres) it's the be all and end all! Social democracy versus Social Darwinism. When I talk about ideology in this thread, I refer to this. Co-operative versus adversarial attitude to life and then all our institutions, processes, customs, mores etc. etc.
When I came to this forum I was appalled by a good number of people and how freely they exhibit these traits (to them, this is the norm, the "natural" way to behave) - and get away with it, time after time, after time... And they seem not to suffer any consequences of such behaviour. In fact, it's as if they are "good entertainment" to those who decide whom to remove and who is a "good contributor" on the forum.
There is also a prevailing anti-intellectual spirit - in a really ghastly measure, much more than in many other "civilised" places, UK and its satellites are well known for it! "My country" [of birth] was similar after WWII but that changed, thankfully. Even from those who are reading a lot - but have a real problem with people like me, also reading a lot. But I dare differ from them and their "outlook on life", so - in their insecurity and dominance seeking BS "blessed" Social Darwinist minds - I am attacked at every turn, whatever I contribute, no matter how right I am or turn out to be. And they never apologise, such is their "arrogance". Very nasty, disruptive, almost from GCHQ cookbook...
In effect, on top of the usual anonymity shit on the internet (and quite a few of such "contributors" are actually purring pussies in real life, I am told), this "bravado" is socially generated to a huge extent.
As far as I am concerned, I am not a Christian. I do not turn the other cheek when attacked. And I will not stop, if I didn't start it! Moreover, as I mentioned, I am a philosopher, a thinking person and giving in to such arseholes would be to betray everything I believe in. Intellectually and morally! I did not cow-tow to a seriously mean Stalinist regime in former YU, where I was a pro-democracy activist (as a Social Democratic 'lefty', against the hard Left), so why on Earth would I be expected to do the opposite here, in an allegedly democratic country, whose people are allegedly democratically "cultured"?!? Well, from my experience, many here take the good sides of UK etc. for granted or even denigrate them wholesale - they have very little of "democratic culture" to boast about!
Now, I have a question - not to be rude but to get some facts: do you poke, say, Butchers and co. the same way? If you do not - why not? He and his ilk are the culprits on this forum of most of such behaviour!
Also, check this and other thread: I ask to stay on the topic and not to get personal. Politely. And I do not start deviating from it!
But oh, no - before you could say "Darwin" - wallop!!!
One liners, Selbstverständlich, uncritical, commonsensical attitude, "how dare you even ask the question" BS and so on... Unworthy of a reflective, decent, critically minded, inquisitive, cultured Human Being. But this immature, herd/horde BS is prevalent, sadly. And as long as I live I shall never surrender to it. That would be the death of me. And it is not just a philosopher in me, it is also who I am (in effect, Fichte's dictum, as mentioned earlier by you, unknowingly).
Does this answer your Q? And could you answer my Q - but fully and honestly, please?
Just watched a documentary on Terry Pratchett's life and death....gone way too soon..
"Imagination, not intelligence, made us human"....
Goraki, have you read any of his books?
No, I haven't. Have you? If it is really good, critically minded, or at least humorous, I would, of course, be interested, thanx!
EDIT: just read your other posts with excerpts from his interviews/books and I must say I would consider it light-hearted entertainment, maybe...
You are now going to get mad but I must speak the truth, as I am, after all, a philosopher - and truth is my "business", sorry...
I learnt this on this forum, in this country. You see, unlike the Scandinavians who really "dislike" conflict - in this country (and its satellites, in both hemispheres) it's the be all and end all! Social democracy versus Social Darwinism. When I talk about ideology in this thread, I refer to this. Co-operative versus adversarial attitude to life and then all our institutions, processes, customs, mores etc. etc.
When I came to this forum I was appalled by a good number of people and how freely they exhibit these traits (to them, this is the norm, the "natural" way to behave) - and get away with it, time after time, after time... And they seem not to suffer any consequences of such behaviour. In fact, it's as if they are "good entertainment" to those who decide whom to remove and who is a "good contributor" on the forum.
There is also a prevailing anti-intellectual spirit - in a really ghastly measure, much more than in many other "civilised" places, UK and its satellites are well known for it! "My country" [of birth] was similar after WWII but that changed, thankfully. Even from those who are reading a lot - but have a real problem with people like me, also reading a lot. But I dare differ from them and their "outlook on life", so - in their insecurity and dominance seeking BS "blessed" Social Darwinist minds - I am attacked at every turn, whatever I contribute, no matter how right I am or turn out to be. And they never apologise, such is their "arrogance". Very nasty, disruptive, almost from GCHQ cookbook...
In effect, on top of the usual anonymity shit on the internet (and quite a few of such "contributors" are actually purring pussies in real life, I am told), this "bravado" is socially generated to a huge extent.
As far as I am concerned, I am not a Christian. I do not turn the other cheek when attacked. And I will not stop, if I didn't start it! Moreover, as I mentioned, I am a philosopher, a thinking person and giving in to such arseholes would be to betray everything I believe in. Intellectually and morally! I did not cow-tow to a seriously mean Stalinist regime in former YU, where I was a pro-democracy activist (as a Social Democratic 'lefty', against the hard Left), so why on Earth would I be expected to do the opposite here, in an allegedly democratic country, whose people are allegedly democratically "cultured"?!? Well, from my experience, many here take the good sides of UK etc. for granted or even denigrate them wholesale - they have very little of "democratic culture" to boast about!
Now, I have a question - not to be rude but to get some facts: do you poke, say, Butchers and co. the same way? If you do not - why not? He and his ilk are the culprits on this forum of most of such behaviour!
Also, check this and other thread: I ask to stay on the topic and not to get personal. Politely. And I do not start deviating from it!
But oh, no - before you could say "Darwin" - wallop!!!
One liners, Selbstverständlich, uncritical, commonsensical attitude, "how dare you even ask the question" BS and so on... Unworthy of a reflective, decent, critically minded, inquisitive, cultured Human Being. But this immature, herd/horde BS is prevalent, sadly. And as long as I live I shall never surrender to it. That would be the death of me. And it is not just a philosopher in me, it is also who I am (in effect, Fichte's dictum, as mentioned earlier by you, unknowingly).
Does this answer your Q? And could you answer my Q - but fully and honestly, please?
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Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
.
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bubblesmcgrath
Well-Known Member
Gorski...but ... you say that Scandinavians are non confrontational ..?
Scandinavian ancestry was extremely aggressive, warlike and confrontational...The mark of the Vikings was made on most of Britain and Ireland. So much so that people still talk about it in whispered tones.....
I think the Scottish mainland was the only neighbour left relatively unaffected....
People argue...and even you do. It's human nature or maybe it's animal nature. You come across as wanting to win an argument.....whether you mean to or not.... Isn't that on the same page or perhaps in the same chapter as "confrontation"?
As for Terry Pratchett, I think you would really enjoy his books.
Scandinavian ancestry was extremely aggressive, warlike and confrontational...The mark of the Vikings was made on most of Britain and Ireland. So much so that people still talk about it in whispered tones.....
I think the Scottish mainland was the only neighbour left relatively unaffected....
People argue...and even you do. It's human nature or maybe it's animal nature. You come across as wanting to win an argument.....whether you mean to or not.... Isn't that on the same page or perhaps in the same chapter as "confrontation"?
As for Terry Pratchett, I think you would really enjoy his books.
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danny la rouge
I have a cheese grater in the dishwasher.
Was just going to ask about this.
gorski - who are these social Darwinists to whom you refer? Books you've read, articles you've come across? Because you surely can't mean people on here.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Why are you lot bothering with this fella?
He's selectively answering the posts that suit his agenda and studiously avoiding the tricky ones from DLR and one or two others. It's so obviously a troll and you're taking it hook line and sinker!
Stick him on ignore and have the debate between each other!!!
He's selectively answering the posts that suit his agenda and studiously avoiding the tricky ones from DLR and one or two others. It's so obviously a troll and you're taking it hook line and sinker!
Stick him on ignore and have the debate between each other!!!
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
I also don't think he's trolling. But he does very badly misunderstand the positions many others are taking, mine for instance.
As danny says, the idea that a single one of us on this thread or the last one is a social Darwinist is so far wide of the mark that I have to doubt whether gorski knows what a social Darwinist is. If anything, he's the one who's been treading a fine line in that regard with his talk of human potential and some not reaching it.
As danny says, the idea that a single one of us on this thread or the last one is a social Darwinist is so far wide of the mark that I have to doubt whether gorski knows what a social Darwinist is. If anything, he's the one who's been treading a fine line in that regard with his talk of human potential and some not reaching it.
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