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Can Humans Be Animals?
Apr. 7th, 2010 01:06 pmI'm reading this (quite long) article in the NYT titled: "Can Animals Be Gay?.
What an absurd thing to ask.
That question simply reflects science's own human biases.
Who said the life sciences were objective?
Nothing can be spoken about without subjecting it to human categories. We're so used to everything being about us, that we've forgotten that we're a part of it.
Evolution is a tricky beast. It's the reason why it's so interesting, fascinating and ultimately, the only way you can explain the diversity found within animals (human included).
The biggest misconception regarding Evolution is that we're going somewhere with it. That the changes that have gone on for billions, millions and other large sums of years, are progressive. There is no proof, nor is there any way to prove, that our gradual changes, that the fact that we have retained an appendix and Wisdom teeth - commonly known as vestigial organs, as far as this lay person is aware - are positive changes. That is, we have no way of knowing whether we are actually better equipped for "survival" than we used to be.
"Survival of the Fittest", "Natural Selection" - possibly the two most disastrous terms to ever be written and adopted into human functionalism.
I'm digressing.
Are humans animals? ( Come on in and find out )
What an absurd thing to ask.
That question simply reflects science's own human biases.
Who said the life sciences were objective?
Nothing can be spoken about without subjecting it to human categories. We're so used to everything being about us, that we've forgotten that we're a part of it.
Evolution is a tricky beast. It's the reason why it's so interesting, fascinating and ultimately, the only way you can explain the diversity found within animals (human included).
The biggest misconception regarding Evolution is that we're going somewhere with it. That the changes that have gone on for billions, millions and other large sums of years, are progressive. There is no proof, nor is there any way to prove, that our gradual changes, that the fact that we have retained an appendix and Wisdom teeth - commonly known as vestigial organs, as far as this lay person is aware - are positive changes. That is, we have no way of knowing whether we are actually better equipped for "survival" than we used to be.
"Survival of the Fittest", "Natural Selection" - possibly the two most disastrous terms to ever be written and adopted into human functionalism.
I'm digressing.
Are humans animals? ( Come on in and find out )
