A little philosophical question:

What defines a human being, what makes me, you, the other 6 billion people on this planet unique??

what makes us unique is 0.5% of our genes.

You could well ask "what defines a cat?"

People may think we are the most complex being ruling over all other animals and creatures. But I find this is not the case.

Humans are the only animal that have grasped the concepts of grouping together and constructing things to make our lives easier -often at the expense othe other animals though.

Beliefs, weather, family, friends, thoughts, aims, achievents, love, suffering, wealth. These help define who we are, what makes us 'Human' perhaps. There are many arguments on what make us human. Some may say how we were created, some would say how we evolved, some would say how we live.

This should be an interesting topic ;)

People talk. Cats meow

Just because we don't understand how cats talk doesn't mean they don't - that's like saying French don't talk because I don't understand them

You didn´t quit get me 8people, so I reform the question:

What makes me, you, another person unique from the other 6 billion humans?

A soul.

/me runs for cover as the tomatoes and other rotten fruit are hurled at him.

I personally don't believe in the existence of a soul so I disagree with you, C'Jakob

What makes us unique is our mind and way of thinking/character as well as appearance that no other person can have. It consists of an extremely enourmous number of random (?) factors that make it impossible for two people to end up with the same combination.

That's what I think

I imagine if we studied two of any other species, we would find plenty of differences, despite the fact that they are of the same species. We could look for differences between any two members of any specides, and they would all be different. I think that it is only because we ourselves are human we notice all the difference between human and human.

So picture this, if we copied a human being, as in physical as in mind.

Would it then still be the same person?

If an extremely enormous number of random factors being coincident is impossible, then evolution by the same argument is impossible.

I agree with C'Jakob.

/me hurles tomatoes, rotten fruit, spoiled eggs and cowdy at anyone who disagrees :shake:

How is an extremely large number of random factors being coincident impossible? It is just as possible as any other set of extremely large number of random factors. Say I roll a die, d12 to be precise. There is only a 1 out of 12 chance that i could get a 3. Does that mean 3 is impossible? There is also only a 1 out of 12 chance i could get a 7. So if there is a 1 out of 99^(99^(99^99)) chance that any given random thing could happen, then each given random thing has the same chance of happening. It is only a matter of happenstance (coincidence) that thing #whatever happened.

As to the topic- what makes us individual is the fourth dimension. Even if we could plausibly clone the mind and body, two individuals could not occupy the exact same space at the same time, and therefore could not hear the same sounds, see the same sights, or at least not quite the same. From their inception, they would already differ if only on the basis of location. From here the number of divergences could only grow. I am an individual because of everything I've done. My genetics, my mind, all of those things can be plausibly copied, but no one has done has or can do the same things I do. Ever.

Amon-Ra

Memory makes us unique. Basically, I agree with Amon-Ra.

[ January 03, 2003, 04:55: Message edited by: TheBlackRose ]

Beer.

Beer makes us unique.

NO one else on the planet makes beer. Certainly not in kegs, and certainly not cold filtered.




Beer is the answer you're looking for.

Well, beer and cheap wine coolers. And feeling the need to add 'toys' to stimulate sex. How many squirrels are there that you know of that go up to the squirrly that they think is a hottie and say "Hey sweetcakes. How's about you plug that puppy in and we'll see what we can do with it?"

But, to get back on topic, I have to agree with the idea that each person's memory and life experience make them unique. No two people go through exactly the same experiences at exactly the same time for their entire lives, and that's what seperates one person from another. I also feel that's why people who tend to have similar life experiences and memories tend to feel connected to one another. And that's why many of the truly close and loving relationships that I have known of have two people that have gone through many of the same things. It's the closest you can get to being the same person.

Anyone read Boys from Brazil recently?

As to the topic- what makes us individual is the fourth dimension. Even if we could plausibly clone the mind and body, two individuals could not occupy the exact same space at the same time, and therefore could not hear the same sounds, see the
same sights, or at least not quite the same. Two cloned children, a nanosecond old, had no time to hear, see, feel, know. So basically their mind is the same in the first nanosecond. In that time, are they the same?
"No" you say, so their is one difference, maybe something the society refers to as "soul", or maybe the really are the same but your unconcious tells you different because your logic tells you otherwise

[ January 03, 2003, 13:01: Message edited by: Morgoth ]

genetical, social, cultural
the way we grow up
the way we are moulded by our parents, teachers, friend, idol, religion
everyone is a bit different right after birth, it is the what we experienced during lives made we unique...

We are featherless bipeds. ;)

Socrates refuted that definition of humanity by throwing a plucked chicken into the room of the "philosopher" promoting that idea.

Memory does make a person unique, but I think that a lot of people do underestimate the power of nature over nurture. Science has shown that genetics does contribute a huge part of our behavior and personality even with memories and experiences. Of course, time does change every person, but I don't think it can be taken to a universal extent.

Ambition helps to make someone unique - different people push themselves to excel in different things - they become interested in things and whether or not they push themselves to do the best they can.

I must agree that memory is important in making us "unique", but that cannot be all. Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that two people have had exactly the same experiences and the same memory. Then what happens if one is very intelligent and one is fairly slow, or one is a saddist one is very kind. Say one was made into a very mean person by these experiences while the other became softened and oversensitive.
What I meant by factors was actually genes. There is an enourmous number of possible combinations of genes that largely affects who we are. Each "factor", as I put it, describes a certain part of us or characteristic (allergy, liking, capability of some things, liking or disliking of some things). OK, so its possible that even though there is such an extremely large number of combinations, its still possible for two to get the same. By coincidence. Even if that does occur (it would be like 10000000d4 in which each dice would be the same - d#1 same in both people, d#2 same in both people, and so on - making it near impossible) then society, and memory would change the individuals enough for them to become unique.

So what is it?

no, its not beer,...

its
-Genetics (some people argue that this could be wrong, that scientists are wrong, don't believe everything the scientists say... well I believe that the scientists are closer to the truth than, say, the priest who is repeating the same bible over and over and who says that its all your soul...erm, right- I'd rather go with the scientist who are actually studying this.)
-Social background/how he was raised - society
-memory

All these things. Now why should why bother arguing which one is more important? They all have their role. And besides:

"It doesn't matter." I am quoting my friend. These are probably the smartest words I have ever heard.

-What would you do if you were in a situation in which bla bla bla?
-It doesn't matter. I'll know what my reaction will be when I am in such a situation.

[ January 04, 2003, 12:26: Message edited by: Matthew G. ]

Math: I thought for sure you would jump on 'the soul' bandwagon!

Now for my two cents:
we are not as unique as we all think we are.
(that's one cent)
genes + experience = individual
(there's the other cent)

I would have to agree with 8people. No other creature makes any attempt to improve itself, whereas we are defined by that aspect of ourselves.

Being human is also defined by our willingness to sacrifice our own lives for another.

"It is arrogant to assume that humans are the only intelligant organisms on the planet." Spock from Star Trek IV. ( may not have used his exact words) Humans are the only animal that have grasped the concepts of grouping together and constructing things to make our lives easier -often at the expense othe other animals though.
What about all the other animals who live in complex social groups?
What about chimpanzees who use simple tools? Chimpanzees have also been shown to be able to grasp basic concepts of language, combining words to make simple sentances and problem solving.
Beliefs, weather, family, friends, thoughts, aims, achievents, love, suffering, wealth. These help define who we are
Elephants show suffering. When a member of the herd dies, elephants have been known to inspect the body and stay by it for days. When they come across a skeleton, they inspect, feel, smell the skeleton.
Memory makes us uniqueThere are two elephants at the San Diego Wild Animal Park who are "good friends" One was a real problem animal. They brought in another elephant to be with it. Long story short, the two had been in the same family group when they were very, very young. They recognized eachother some 30 years later.
No other creature makes any attempt to improve itselfDecorator crabs will take shells, rocks and other objects from the ocean floor and place them on their shells to make themselves look different and to camoflauge themselves. They also do it to make themselves look better to potential mates. Some animals have been shown to be self aware, a trait thought to be unigue to only humans. Dolphins and chimps are two that come to mind. Being self aware would cause an animal to want to improve itself.
And 8people, it is actually only about 1% of our DNA that makes the human species unigue. That's how much genetic difference there is between us and chimps. As for anything else that makes us unigue, is a written language. And scientists are not 100% positive on this. For the longest time, we thought that humans were the only species that had a speken language, but that it not true anymore. Lots of animals have specific sounds for specific things, experiences, etc. That's all our language is, specific sounds for specific things.
Kinda really puts that quote from Spock in perspective, doesn't it?
Ok, I actually thought of one more thing that makes us unigue. We are the only species on earth that is capable of wiping out every other species, including our own.

[ January 07, 2003, 07:11: Message edited by: Elios ]

Fingerprints :D

Seriously, I think experience is the word here.

umm, a few of you are getting memory confused with self-awareness and/or consciousness.

all organisms have memory of some kind, be it neuronal or simply molecular. :square:

God, there are other animals who are self-aware as well. like I said above.

Dolphins!!

But what is memory exactly?? It´s just a tape

I wouldn't argue the existence of a memory, but its contents.

Think fourth dimensionally- in order for someone or something to be EXACTLY like me, and not simply very similar, it would have to have been conceived and born precisely when I was, with all of the same characteristics, down to room temperature, time of day, and most implausibly, location. Even if only a nanosecond passed, before time even became a factor, the third dimension shows contradiction. It would have to occupy the same space-time for the duration of my existence, and therefore would be indistinguishable from me. Any deviation, anything it did differently, any misstep or word spoken that wasn't mine would immediately negate any claim that it was the SAME as me. I don't see how this idea necessitates the existence of a soul. Logic dictates that a person and their clone, no matter how precise the clone is, cannot occupy the same space. Already they differ. Not greatly, I admit, but they differ.

For scientific evidence, I conducted an experiment. I threw a ball at itself and failed. Anyone who doesn't follow that, I'm truly sorry. The ball is unique.

I never meant to imply we have some great distinction that can seperate us from the animal kingdom, and in fact, i have a serious problem with people who say that the things humans do are unnatural. Detrimental to nature? Sure. But to say that humans aren't just as much a part of nature as everything else is ludicrous, and as Spock said, arrogant.

Amon-Ra

Hmm, what makes us unique, you ask? Well, it's psychologically proven that our environment makes us unique. The way we were raised, the circumstances and whatnot. No one in the world will ever experience all the things that I've experienced, and vice versa.

While I do believe that we humans have souls, it's not exactly in the same context. I believe that we are the souls, you know, one and the same. Like, a person and a soul aren't two separate entities. But that's just me.

Anyways, I think I've said my two cents now.