Nature with Human Nature

He published with Friedrich Engels Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei , commonly known as The Communist Manifesto , the most celebrated pamphlet in the history of…. Humans have free will and determine their own destinies….

Humaneness and human beings Iranian religions In ancient Iranian religion: Human nature irrationalism In irrationalism major references In ethics: Aristotle opportunism In opportunism realism theory in international relations studies In international relations: The postwar ascendancy of realism Smith In Adam Smith: The Theory of Moral Sentiments.

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Human nature

A strange thing is happening in modern philosophy: What makes this strange is that, not only does the new attitude run counter to much of the history of philosophy, but — despite loud claims to the contrary — it also goes against the findings of modern science. This has serious consequences, ranging from the way in which we see ourselves and our place in the cosmos to what sort of philosophy of life we might adopt. Our aim here is to discuss the issue of human nature in light of contemporary biology, and then explore how the concept might impact everyday living.

The existence of something like a human nature that separates us from the rest of the animal world has often been implied, and sometimes explicitly stated, throughout the history of philosophy. The Epicureans argued that it is a quintessential aspect of human nature that we are happier when we experience pleasure, and especially when we do not experience pain.

Human nature matters

In contrast, many contemporary philosophers, both of the so-called analytic and continental traditions, seem largely to have rejected the very idea of human nature. We beg to differ.

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What exactly does science tell us about the idea of a human nature? From Charles Darwin onward, the scientific consensus has been pretty clear: Our particular lineage gave origin to the species Homo sapiens at least , years ago, resulting from a long evolutionary period, which unfolded over millions of years from the point of divergence from our most recent common ancestor with the chimpanzees, our closest phylogenetic cousins.

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Put that way, it would seem that biology does indeed do away with any idea of human nature: How Culture Made the Human Mind , that small percentage translates into thousands of structural changes at the genetic level, which in turn can be combined to yield millions of ways in which humans are distinct from chimpanzees. In light of this, we think that the picture emerging from evolutionary and developmental biology is — contrary to the widespread opinion among contemporary philosophers — one that very much supports the notion of human nature, just not an essentialist one. Human nature is best conceived of as a cluster of homeostatic properties, ie of traits that are dynamically changing and yet sufficiently stable over evolutionary time to be statistically clearly recognisable.

These properties include characteristics that are either unique to the human species, or so quantitatively distinct from anything similar found in other animals that our version is unquestionably and solely human. Take language, for instance. But no other living species has anything even remotely like human language, with its complex grammar and high levels of recursion where a linguistic rule can be applied to the results of the application of the very same rule, and so on.

Other animals, such as octopuses, have large, complex brains and nervous systems, but no other animal has both the size relative to the body and especially the structural asymmetry and layering of the human brain; for instance, its enormously developed frontal cortex, which is in charge of reward, attention, short-term memory tasks, planning and motivation.

The list could go on and on, but the basic point is that it is fallacious to state that there are no fundamental differences between humans and other animals just because the boundaries are fuzzy and dynamic over evolutionary time. As Justice Potter Stewart said, in a case about pornography versus art in But I know it when I see it.

We all know it when we see it. Now, if human nature is real, what are the consequences from a philosophical perspective? Why should a philosopher, or anyone interested in using philosophy as a guide to life, care about this otherwise technical debate? T he temptation to link existentialism with the idea of a tabula rasa is understandable. Basically, once our self-adjusting intellect emerged it was capable of taking over the management of our lives from the instinctive orientations we had acquired through the natural selection of genetic traits that adapted us to our environment. HOWEVER , it was at this juncture, when our conscious intellect challenged our instincts for control, that a terrible battle broke out between our instincts and intellect, the effect of which was the extremely competitive, selfish and aggressive state that we call the human condition.

To elaborate, when our conscious intellect emerged it was neither suitable nor sustainable for it to be orientated by instincts — it had to find understanding to operate effectively and fulfil its great potential to manage life. However, when our intellect began to exert itself and experiment in the management of life from a basis of understanding, in effect challenging the role of the already established instinctual self, a battle unavoidably broke out between the instinctive self and the newer conscious self. To illustrate the situation, imagine what would happen if we put a fully conscious mind on the head of a migrating bird.

Obviously, the intellect could not afford to give in to the instincts, and unable to understand and thus explain why its experiments Page of PDF Version in self-adjustment were necessary, the conscious intellect had no way of refuting the implicit criticism from the instincts even though it knew it was unjust.

Until the conscious mind found the redeeming understanding of why it had to defy the instincts namely the scientific understanding of the difference in the way genes and nerves process information, that one is an orientating learning system while the other is an insightful learning system , the intellect was left having to endure a psychologically distressed, upset condition, with no choice but to defy that opposition from the instincts.

In short — and to return to our human situation because we were the species that acquired the fully conscious mind — the psychologically upset angry , alienated and egocentric human-condition-afflicted state appeared. We became ego-centric, self-centred or selfish, preoccupied with aggressively competing for opportunities to prove we are good and not bad — we unavoidably became selfish , aggressive and competitive.

What is so exonerating, rehabilitating and healing about this explanation of the human condition is that we can finally appreciate that there was a very good reason for our angry, alienated and egocentric behaviour — in fact, we can now see why we have not just been ego-centric, but ego- infuriated , even ego-gone-mad-with-murderous-anger for having to live with so much unjust criticism. From being competitive, selfish and aggressive, human nature returns to being cooperative, selfless and loving.

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Our round of departure has ended. As just demonstrated, with understanding of the human condition found ALL the great issues finally become explainable. Human condition — What is science?