The Last Post

Humanity is a melting pot of so many ideals, opinions, actions, creations. We as humans have created many things on this earth, literature, art, music, architecture. We have created and destroyed, we are both good people and bad. But there has always been one question that we have never been able to truly and fully answer; what does it mean to be human? Through this class, we have been studying humans, their behaviours, how we think and we act, what we feel, what we like and dislike, and even how our brains work. Now as the year comes to a close, we have to look back at all we have learned and analyze and answer the question of what we are as humans, why we act the way we do and why we are the way we are. We have read many books and plays, watched many films that explore the infinite possibilities of humans.

 

While the introductory unit was short, and there was really no end as it meshed with the Humans Nature and Sacred Space Unit, we touched upon some things that bring about the question of humanity. Our powerful minds have brought amazing and unbelievable things into this world, some new, some old, something creative, or something of literature. Our minds have infinite possibilities (or so we believe), because our mind is split into two hemispheres, right and left. As described by Leonard Shlain in his writings on Right Brain/Left Brain, the right side of the brain is concerned with being, and the left side, doing. The left and right sides of the brain are polar opposites, like many things in the world. The left side of the brain is much more literal and concerned with linguistics and speech while the right side of the brain is the more creative and artistic side that concerns itself with emotion, intuition, and the appreciation of music. But, the two sides of the brain have to work together to make a functional brain and create great works of literary masterpieces such as Genesis, which can be considered one of the greatest and most well known texts in the world. Without our complex brains, we would not be able to accomplish anything that we ever had. Myths would be nonexistent, along with symbols, metaphors, art, music or even a written language. These are all important and essential creations of the human mind. Karen Armstrong wrote in her A Short History of Myth that humans have been and always will be mythmakers. It combines the abilities of the left and right sides of our brains. The creation of myths have allowed us to connect ourselves to religion and to rituals within that religion. Religion is intertwined with humans and their history  and many great religious works have been published, that use both the left and the right sides of the brain. Our brains are unique, there is no other animal on the planet that has a brain as superior as ours, and that is a part of what makes us special.

 

As humans, we have a lot of appreciation for the things around us, and even ourselves. We have a deep appreciation for nature, and we have a desire to protect it, especially with pollution and deforestation in today’s world. We spent a lot of time in class discussing the importance of nature, and watched a documentary, Australia’s Aborigines which exemplified that importance though the rituals of a dying race of Australian Aborigines. Nature can be what connects us to the higher power, or in the Australian’s minds, to the Dreamtime. Nature can be our sacred space, the place we feel most comfortable and connected to ourselves and the world around us. Nature is sacred and very interwoven into the history of humankind. We read a rather long packet How Art Made the World: Second Nature by Nigel Spivey which described how nature is important to different people, and how we view nature in our art. Which, even in our art, nature is seen as sacred, as a place we can escape to, to bring peace to our minds.  Constable’s Study of the Trunk of an Elm Tree is the perfect example of this desire, because he so perfectly depicts the elm tree that it almost looks like a photograph. Constable must have spent more than a few hours studying that same trunk, but it brought him much delight to do so. We study and depict nature in art because it something that we are connected to on a deeper level than, sometimes, we are connected to each other. From the early days, we have been dependent on nature to bring us nourishment and keep us alive. And while we are not so dependent on nature in today’s world, that deep bond still exists.

 

We as humans have always been concerned with our outward appearance, to make sure we are aesthetically pleasing to the world. It is still a large issue that is covered in the media today, but it is also a topic that was explored by Oscar Wilde in his novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. Dorian Gray is a beautiful young man who is willing to sell his soul to attain everlasting youth and beauty. This speaks loudly to the idea that we as humans are very concerned with our looks, that we are willing to give up anything, even our souls, to be eternally young and beautiful. Humans will always look for something that brings us pleasure or happiness. Love is something that, along with attaining beauty, humans constantly seek out. The movie The Shape of Things actually combines these two concepts quite nicely. The film follows Adam as he falls in loves with an art graduate student, Evelyn, who is working on her art thesis during their relationship. Adam seeks her love and attention, as all humans do, and falls in love with her, only to be heartbroken and deeply betrayed by Evelyn when she finally presents Adam as her human sculpture for her thesis. Throughout their entire relationship, Evelyn only sought to change Adam’s appearance, to make him more aesthetically pleasing to the world, through only the power of suggestion. But Adam is completely oblivious to this because his only concern is his love for Evelyn; he is even willing to put her above his friends. Love makes us do crazy things, but Evelyn put her art above love. There have been some interesting philosophies on art, and how it affects us as humans. Friedrich Nietzche, a German philosopher, had, at least in my opinion, the most interesting view of art and humans. He viewed art in two ways: rigid and structured Apollonian and creative Dionysian; two opposites that balance the world. Good art is a perfect balance of these two, just as is the world, and are humans; just as we are not just left or right brained, but a balance of the two.

 

Laws and regulations are something that have been created by humans to help keep humans in line and to create a surface in which society can grow and develop from. We have created laws to prevent other humans from doing something that we deem unacceptable. One of the most well known set of laws in the world is the 10 commandments. In the 10 commandments, it outlines what we as humans should or should not do to live a good life free of sin. However, humans are not made to be bound by rules, and that is evident in the novel, The Stranger, by Albert Camus. Mersault murdered a man in cold blood, even though that is clearly illegal. It may be argued that he was not in his right mind when he pulled the trigger, nevertheless, he broke a rule that was placed in order to prevent humans ending another human’s life. This can also be a question of ethics, and what Mersault’s ethical values compared to ours. The idea of our ethical values are then put to test while watching Crimes and Misdemeanors. Men cheat on their wives, and there’s a murder. These are all issues that bring on awareness of our ethical values, what we believe is right and wrong. This is apart of what makes us human and what separates us from any other living being on the planet. We are unique in that we have the ability to reason with ourselves, our minds, our conscience. Even when that ability is taken away, due to mental illness or injury, we might consider that person to be lesser than the rest of us, less than human. Ethical values are huge factor to through into the pot of what makes us human. Without them, what would we possibly be, how could we have ever risen to be the dominant species? Ethics help to bring law, and help to distinguish us from the world.

 

The idea of an inner journey is something that is an uniquely human experience. The inner journey, as we have discussed in class, is something that completely individual. The search for our inner self is explored through Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, where the main character, Siddhartha, searches for enlightenment through the teachings of many teachers. Siddhartha’s inner journey is to discover himself and make peace in the world. And while Govinda was searching for the same thing, they reached that personal enlightenment in very different ways. But the inner journey can take many different shapes and forms and different paths can be followed. In the except of The Book of Job, Job’s journey is to live a blameless life, free of sin. He reaches his enlightenment, if that it is, through staying faithful to God. He is rewarded for not going against God with unimaginable riches and a family. The movie we watched for this unit, explores two very different philosophies of human reality, existentialism and nihilism. The existential detectives believe that the world is connected; everything is connected, and that humans are able to act on free will. On the opposite end, nihilism believes that there is no true meaning to life and are skeptical about most everything. Both sides battle for Albert’s attention, but in the end he learns that both are essential to reality, we cannot have one without the other. There is a perfect balance between existentialism and nihilism; there cannot be good without bad, optimism without pessimism; there are both ups and downs in life.

 

Looking back, we have made great discoveries about humanity in our class, we discussed this question many times and in many different shapes in forms. But, as we come to the end, I think we have not only learned a lot about what it means to be human, but we also learned about how we, ourselves, are human. How each of us are unique, and have our own ideas about humanity. And now, to answer the question, I don’t think there is one real, true definition of what it means to be human. I think each of us, as individuals have our own ideas about what makes us human. So, there could be 7 billion answers to the question of what make us human. But, we can also learn from those who have contemplated the same ideas, learn their philosophies, but we also have the make our own judgments on the idea. A part of being human is the ability to decide for ourselves who we are and who we want to be.