No.502[Reply]
What makes us so special? What makes us different? Humans are primates, when I look at other people I see, in every sense of the word, an ape. We are animals,we look like animals, we smell like animals. Thinking of what we really are makes my head spin.
What makes us special? What makes us different? What makes our lives meaningful? Are we even special? Are we even different? Are we meant to be in an unending war for dominance of nature that inevitably ends in our mutual destruction? Are we meant to become stewards of the Earth, the next stage in energy usage for Life, living in harmony with the Earth as its first sentient aspect? Why were there no others, why only us? In 500 million years of animal life, why only Man? Can more come after us, if we go extinct? Is our purpose merely to choose for ourselves why we exist? Are we free, or are we slaves? Why do we individually seem so limited, and yet together humanity seems to be without limits?
What is the dialectical explanation for Man? His consciousness? His relationship to Nature? His drive to spirituality? Is it a misunderstanding on Man's part? Does Man not see that those aspects he has are those he shares with Nature? Gained from Nature? Marx wrote that many species engage in labor; yet seemingly only man labors first in his mind, then with his body. Why are We in this regard?
Our notions of honor, of courage, of willpower, of morality; only we created cultures. And yet, other species experience these emotions from which such ideas rose. Other species experience love. They feel fear. They summon bravery to conquer that fear.
The materialist relation between Man and Nature, between Man and Himself; why is Man, why are We?
These questions, they haunt me frequently, I wish to understand, to Nature we seemingly stand above as gods, and yet we are of Nature, not apart from it; and to us aspects of Nature, like our Sun, like our Universe; they seem yet greater than we could ever hope to be. Help me to understand.
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No.1801
>>502My dear friend, the answer lies in material conditions and a philosophy. Please give it a read will ya'? I swear, I hate people who have existential crisis when they have learned that their higher being (or what many people call soul) is attached to material and will die once your body dies.
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No.1804
We labor, which then forms our inner monolog culminating in our consciousness. Animals don't labor.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1876/part-played-labour/index.htm>>
No.7413
Specieses are an abstracion to make biology easier to apply to things like medicine. Humans aren't real. You should focus on what you want to do next rather than trying to find some higher power to be a pawn for.
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No.7414
>>7413>Humans aren't realYou mean the category is not the same as the material thing it describes.
There are some attempts in biology to define life in terms of procedural matter pattern replicators, to escape the static categorization trap. These are not easy to grasp, it's unlikely it'll become the common descriptor.