Being Human - The Reason is "Reason"

jeffjagoe (72)in #writing • 5 years ago (edited)

Being Human

The Reason is "Reason"

The human-being (Homo sapien) is argued by some to be the most advanced species on Earth. Unfortunately, the only organisms able to judge such a thing are humans themselves. Like most land mammals, humans have eyes in order to see their environment, limbs to help them engage in action, ears and a vocal organ to help them communicate as well as sexual reproductive organs to allow them to create offspring to ensure the species lives on for future generations. However, the characteristic of humans that makes them more advanced than any other worldly life form is certainly not physical. Many of Earth’s creatures are much stronger and can withstand much more physical stress than humans, some even have a longer life span. What makes a human so special is its ability to have cognitive thought. This mental attribute enables humans to process vast amounts of information, store it with a long-term memory system, and produce a mental phenomenon called "reason".

Instead of acting on instinct like most animals, humans use their ability to reason to allow them to make decisions prior to taking action. Reason creates the numerous emotions humans can feel. Emotions are mental altercations developed within a human’s brain that are caused by some sort of antagonist in the human’s environment. They are essentially the prerequisite for developing ethics and morals. Ethics are the ideas that humans have created over time that govern their behavior and are handed down throughout generations. They serve to suppress the animalistic tendencies inherent in all animals on Earth by allowing them to think in broader terms than just survival. By engaging with the environment, the ability to reason allows humans to develop such notions of science, art, philosophy and mathematics. It is the primary function that is responsible for the advancement of human beings.