Bataille poetically defines
the identity of the animal as “like water in water.” In other words, an animal
does not distinguish himself from a fellow member of his species like you or I
would distinguish ourselves as individuals within a crowd of people. The animal
also does not perceive the contours of his own body, in terms of what he is not. Instead, an animal will behave according
to his surroundings, he will only change his behavior unless the environment
coerces him to do so, just as a wave does not form in the absence of wind. In essence, what defines us as humans
apart from animals is the localization of the mind within the body.
By localization of the mind
I do not mean cephalization or the presence of a fully formed brain, I mean a
mind that has a sense of the self. A mind that could reflect upon itself as a part of one body, as if it were an outsider looking in. A mind that could wonder how it came into being, or why it
was placed in this particular body. For instance, when looking in a mirror a
human might perceive themselves as attractive or unattractive based on their
own preconceptions of beauty whereas an animal looking in a mirror would
simply observe another animal staring back at it.
Because we have the characteristic
of internalization we are able to act freely from the environment, and we are
even able to manipulate it for our own benefit. Tools are made to specifically accommodate our own body shape
and lifestyle, and we call these objects into existence by making them from
organic material. However, this kind of mental ability and power does not come
without a price. We are burdened with guilt, shame, embarrassment, and other
mental consequences for our actions, that have the ability to guide how we perceive
ourselves as either "good" or "bad".
In addition, we consider our heightened mental awareness to be evolutionarily
more advanced than animals and yet we are of the same basic physiology and genetic makeup.
Moreover, even with these mental capabilities, humans still make
decisions that cripple the health of themselves and the environment
which in turn negatively effects our evolutionary fitness.
In contrast,
animals are able to work
around the problems that the environment presents without depleting its
resources. And since the earth is the only habitat that we know of which
can
accommodate human life, we are definitely shortening our lifespan as a
species
by destroying the limited amount of resources on this planet.
Furthermore, the
synchronization of the animal mind to their environment is a perspective
that we
will never be able to fathom. Because of our physiology we are
conditioned
to internalize and perceive ourselves as individuals whether we want to
or not. Thus, in order to fully understand our place among animals we
have to keep
in mind that consciousness was not chosen by humans but assigned to us
by random
evolutionary forces.
It is interesting to me what you said about the human ability to act freely in our own environment, to deliberately change and shape it to our advantage in a way that animals cannot. While the animal reacts to it's environment, both evolutionarily and in its actions, the human, as a self conscious actor, possesses the will and ability to create his/her own environment. We, being human and thus necessarily creators, judge animals to be beneath us because they do not create. This inability to shape the world around the self, or even to have a fully defined concept of self, is what separates the animal state from the human state. However this reality brings up the question of how our fundamental biological connection to the animal realm can be understood in the context of our obvious separation from it. Where is, as Tailhard would identify it, the breaking point, the point of transcendence? Moreover, with the advance of human technology causing a decline in the health of the environment, the question also occurs as to whether our traditional valuation of the human capacity to create is valid. If creation will inevitably lead to destruction, if our own freedom and ingenuity in shaping our environment will ultimately lead to the annihilation of that environment, what superiority can we claim over the sensible, sustainable balance of the natural world? In a sense, then, human beings are the least well adapted animal inasmuch as we cannot react to the realities of our environment, we cannot prevent our own self-destruction. What we value in ourselves, our will, our freedom, our creation, is ultimately what defines us as different from the animals, yet perhaps not inasmuch as we are superior, but inasmuch as we constitute an evolutionary blip, a point of transcendence that, once it has burnt itself out, may never be reached again.
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