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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: xFrockx]
#7675650 - 11/24/07 07:11 PM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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Compassion is my standard upon which morality is based. Compassion is unmediated by social/cultural constraints, by ideological concerns, and it is the Heart of true religion IMO.
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xFrockx



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Ok then, what if someone goes insane and looses the ability to feel compassion. Are they amoral, or ahuman?
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: xFrockx]
#7677170 - 11/25/07 08:35 AM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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Depends on how you define humanity. Clearly, one does not lose one's obvious biological form, but the not so visible stuff, the brain chemistry, states of consciousness and perhaps even corresponding facial expressions and body language might morph into unusual if not unnatural configurations.
In Robert Louis Stephenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was made into several different films over the years. In the earlier ones, like with Spencer Tracer, Mr. Hyde didn't become all hairy and anthropoid like the later ones. As a kid, I was dissapointed by the lack of Hollywood monstronsity, but now as an adult I can appreciate the more subtle approach. The story line was actually about Stephenson's cocaine habit which made a monster of him and brought out his evil side (Note: The December 1, 2007 issue of Time Magazine. The cover story 'What Makes Us Good/Evil').
When one is said to 'lose his humanity,' we understand that it means to lose compassion, empathy, conscience, remorse, not that one has lost one's basic biological nature. Clearly, one's social, emotional, intellectual and sexual aspects are radically effected by a serial killer who kidnaps, rapes, murders and practices necrophilia and necrophagia. These are the ghouls of the world, yet they have not been able to escape punishment 'by reason of insanity' because they are methodical thinkers who do not wish to get caught and stopped. They are inhuman in this respect, and they are also immoral since they 'know' that it is wrong, yet, lacking remorse, they do not care. Lacking empathy, they cannot 'feel' why it is wrong, they simply 'know' how others would react to his treatment of victims and they do not want those reactive people to find him out and stop his fun.
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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Icelander
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When one is said to 'lose his humanity,' we understand that it means to lose compassion, empathy, conscience, remorse,
This is the point. Your defining of what is human is subjective. They haven't "lost" those qualities, they just don't use them. It's not like the fact that I have compassion and empathy means I can't act without them and often do.
To be human is to be a biological animal and that is the end of the story no matter how one wants to define the term within the emotional framework of their subjective desires.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: Icelander]
#7677328 - 11/25/07 09:57 AM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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"To be human is to be a biological animal and that is the end of the story no matter how one wants to define the term within the emotional framework of their subjective desires."
That's just ridiculous. You do not have a very fleshed-out sense of human identity if that is what you 'believe.'
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shakercee
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To quote Ken Wilber, "include and transcend."
-------------------- Pray, v.: To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy - Ambrose Bierce Medical science has confirmed what the male world has known intuitively for millenia: that scratching your ass is a great aid to complex thinking. Its God's responsibility to forgive the terrorist organizations such as Jaish, Lashkar etc. Its our responsibility to arrange the meeting between them and god." - Indian Armed Forces "Hey Monkey!! Get Funky" - Tarzan and Jane
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Icelander
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Sorry to step on your toes but saying That's just ridiculous. Is not an argument. (unless you are fundamentalist)
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: Icelander]
#7677382 - 11/25/07 10:15 AM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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Steel-toed boots, no problem. Hope you didn't hurt your sole. It was simply dismissive and doesn't even warrant an argument. I do not define my identity in purely biological terms because the only purely biological human being is a corpse, near as I can tell, and according to the Tibetans, I'm not even certain about that.
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Icelander
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why humans are not animals
Title of thread.
I don't care how you define your identify. Anyone can define themselves anyway they want and do but the defining factor is biology.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: Icelander]
#7677612 - 11/25/07 11:39 AM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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The defining factor is consciousness. I am not a materialist, although I have been a biologist, and then I realized I was a human being.
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Icelander
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A human bean? That doesn't sound right.
All animals are conscious.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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budmanman
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and a dog is a dog being. This is stupid.
-------------------- Everything I have ever said is total bogus bs I am full of crud therefore everything I say should never be taken literal. And I am mentally unstable.
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redgreenvines
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: budmanman]
#7678045 - 11/25/07 01:52 PM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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the distinction between human animals and all the other animals is that when they mate with eachother baby human animals will be the issue as opposed to other animals, and if they mate with other animals nothing will be the issue. we are species selective for conception. nothing remains closly related enough to even produce a mule- (i.e. donkey horse hybrids are sterile mules) (we wiped out the neanderthals etc. while competing for real estate and resources)
as for consciousness, all the animals have it, to greater and lesser degrees including memory, language, guile, humor and a sense of beauty and security. animals even have innate moral sense to some degree.
the human associative process is more highly developed than in other animals but it is a process that already exists in their minds. we (most of us) just have more brains per ounce of fat than the other animals.
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Icelander
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This is a good reply and I for one can make a pretty good guess at where our ideas of spirituality come from.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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MarkostheGnostic
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: Icelander]
#7678425 - 11/25/07 03:00 PM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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Reflective self-consciousness. Being conscious of consciousness, even Pure Consciousness. Perhaps they are aware of awareness, but as difficult as it is for humans to experience this rigpa consciousness (or whatever one wishes to call it), transcending the distractions of sensory inmput, emotions and thoughts, I suspect that animals other than Homo sapien sapien do not experience this. On the other hand, perhaps in the absence of linguistic thinking, they ARE more aware of simple Being than we are.
"A human bean? That doesn't sound right. "
Hey, "Soylent Green is people!"
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Icelander
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Reflective self-consciousness.
You mean like looking at ourselves in the mirror and thinking "there must be more to this"?
Thus was "God" discovered and made manifest. 
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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EternalCowabunga
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: Icelander]
#7678559 - 11/25/07 03:30 PM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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The point of the thread was not to point out that humans are not animals or biological in any way. The point was to discuss some unique characteristics of humans. Of course humans are animals, and we are even plants if you want to take the analogy farther (use the sun for sustenance?)
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Icelander
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Very misleading title.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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EternalCowabunga
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: Icelander]
#7678591 - 11/25/07 03:40 PM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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To err is human, to forgive divine.
Be a little bit more spiritual and get off my back
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BlueCoyote
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Re: why humans are not animals [Re: psyka]
#7678690 - 11/25/07 04:06 PM (16 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
psyka said: Define "far ahead," please?
Advanced.
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