When we look for friends in other humans, we usually seek out common interests, or values that hold a shared meaning, rather. Today, there seems to be an underdevelopment of connections throughout society, such as; commonalities like culture, religion, common interests in art, music, etc. Not being able to form a society with shared values and commonalities seems to be a rising fundamental issue that humans face today. The diversity doesn't have to be an "issue," per say, but I do believe that cognitively us humans have that need, or desire to be in a place where they feel they uniquely belong.
Just the very title of this blog post is a philosophical issue. What exactly does it mean to be human? How are we supposed to come to a rationalized answer to this question when there is not one aspect of us humans, scientifically, that is unchanging? With advancements such as cloning, gene silencing, and just about all of the unforeseeable nature of other technological change in biology, scientifically thinking it is almost impossible to come to a general consensus as to what actually makes a human a human.
Today, science encompasses every piece of the world around us. In fact, "our insistence on cognitive knowing may have already robbed us of some of our capacity for being human." As humans, it has become almost natural to seek out reasoning for "why" or "how" using observation within the scientific attributes of the world around us. I don't believe science can simply justify what it means to be human. Being human does not strictly pertain to our biological makeup; especially with all of the manipulative advancements in today's world. Being human means expressing emotion, holding experiences unique to ourselves, and expressing these experiences through art, speech, literacy, and so much more. Being human means to understand and distinguish the difference between ugly and the beauty in pieces of art.
Conceptual expressionism is what it means to be human. Conceptual art allows us to confront our conflicting emotions. Being able to express our spirit, our freedom, our empathetic capacity by means of creativity through painting, drawing, etc. helps us form a proper understanding of the emotion we feel towards works of art and the reactions we have now. Humans hold their own beliefs and their own sentiments- it is how we express them that allows us to understand what it means to be human.
I like how you asked questions in your blog because while I was reading I also found myself wondering.. I mean how DO we define what it means to be human. There is so much changing and so many different forms of a human. I like how your paragraph about art expressed how art is a way of understanding our won emotions without words to understand more about ourselves. I think thats why psychologists have their patients paint or draw their feelings when they can't verbally express it. I agree with how you said that humans crave a "place"or a belonging in our society and I think that has a huge part in defining who we actually become in society. I liked how your blog was very abstract, it was interesting to read!
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