We explain what man is and its meaning throughout history. In addition, its definitions according to philosophy, anthropology and biology.
What is man?
Thehuman being, formerly referred to in a general way as man (discarded as referring only to human beings of the male sex), is the only animal aware and capable of language that exists in the Earth. Its existence on the planet comes from 315,000 years ago, when it arose among others species of hominids today extinct and spread throughout the continents.
The distinctive range of our species is the development of a complex consciousness, capable of generating an articulate language and at the same time a reasoning intelligent, which has allowed us to understand and shape the world around us in the way that is most convenient for us. For this we have developed tools, devices and even chemical elements previously non-existent.
However, the human being is alone on his planet and lacks an answer to his most transcendental questions about the existence, the life and the death, for which it has developed over the centuries of human civilization different philosophies and systems of beliefs, which among other things have allowed him to define himself.
In this sense, human beings share essential mental and cognitive traits, such as awareness of ourselves and our certain death, the ability to remember our past and foresee the future, as well as to symbolically link ourselves with it. universe (through art, or the religions, for example).
However, it is always a challenge to define what is human, and in this regard, many perspectives have been woven over time.
The man in philosophy
The branch of the philosophy that deals with thinking the essential sense of the human, encompassing it, contemplating it totally, is the anthropology philosophical. His essential question, in that sense, is "what is man?" And since ancient times he has offered numerous possible answers.
Thus, for the French philosopher René Descartes (1596-1650), father of rationalist thought, the human being should be defined as a thinking being; while for Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), the first philosopher of criticism and forerunner of German idealism, the distinctive feature of human being it must be his ability to self-determine morally.
On the other hand, the German poet, playwright and philosopher Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805), a central figure in the classicism of Weimar, proposed that man was "a being who can love", a definition closely linked to the Romanticism, who valued human emotions and subjectivity above any other trait of his person.
Other definitions of the human link it with its ability to build tools (Benjamin Franklin), to symbolize (Ernst Cassirer) or to elaborate its own articulated language (Ferdinand de Saussure). For its part, the Marxist concept (in the doctrine of the dialectical materialism of Karl Marx), proposes him as the protagonist of the story: being able to create, produce and transform reality within his grasp.
Man in Anthropology
The human being is a gregarious being, who prefers the company of his fellows to solitude, and that is why since ancient times he grouped himself into tribes, communities Y structures increasingly large and organized social networks.
Thanks to his ability to speak and communication complex, he was able to conceive and transmit to his descendants a set of beliefs, laws and vital perspectives, which today we know as culture.
In its various cultural branches, the human being has always mythologized its own origin, through fables and founding stories that generally have a magical or religious character. The belief in a creator god (or several) is widely spread in human civilization, and hence also an idea of himself as the summit of creation, the owner of the world.
Man in biology
The human being is a Living being of the animal kingdom, belonging to the order of the primates and to the family of the hominids. The scientific name of the species isHomo sapiens (which translates "wise man"), and it originated during the Middle Pleistocene, between 0.781 and 0.126 million years ago.
It is a bipedal species, with notorious sexual dimorphism (physical differentiation between the sexes) and sexual reproduction it takes about 9 months to spawn a new individual.
It is also one of the few species on Earth that has sex independently of the reproductive cycle.
His nutrition It is omnivorous and its life expectancy is around 80 years, although genetic and environmental conditions affect it.