Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Mind and Soul


MIND AND SOUL
by Antonio C. Antonio
January 8, 2014

QUESTION:  Cultural Adaptation… Are human beings really the most adaptive creatures on earth?

I agree that human beings are really the most adaptive creatures on earth.  Aside from not wanting to abdicate the superiority of my kind, it is unthinkable to imagine other animal species dominating man.  Man has managed to adapt to different environmental factors (good or bad) and still remain on top of the food chain for two compelling reasons:

First, he has a mind and a brain.  The brain is an organ of soft nervous tissue contained in the skull of vertebrates which functions as a coordinating center of sensations and intellectual and nervous activities.  The brain mass of man evolved to be more sizeable than other animals and, therefore, increased his capacity for adaptive behavior.  Rick Potts, the director of the Human Origins Program at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History, said: “The evolution of the brain is the most obvious example of how we evolve to adapt.  But in modern era, we know that in the human genome there are all kinds of interactions that allow human organisms to have plasticity --- the capacity to adjust is itself an evolved characteristic.  Man has two key advantages, our brains and our capacity for culture.”  But it does not end there.  More than man having material brain is his possession of a mind… the element of man that enables him to be aware of his environment.  Man’s mind gives him the capacity to think, feel and the faculty of consciousness and innovativeness.  Although other species in the animal kingdom also have brains, only man has a mind.

Second, he has a soul and a spirit.  The spirit is the immaterial part of a human being or animal which is regarded as immortal.  Pre-historic man considered biotic and even abiotic elements in the world as having spirits.  Upland dwellers consider the forests (flora and fauna) as possessing a spirit.  Developed countries of today have people who appropriate real property to establish pet cemeteries… why?; because they regard their pet animals as having spirits too.  If this is an accepted truth that the forest and domesticated animals have spirits, what would make man different then?  The difference lies in man’s possession of a soul.  In the context that a soul, like a spirit, is immortal, man now believes that his spiritual life transcends his physical life and that his spiritual life will account for his physical life… the strongest influence of religion on man.  It is for this reason that man now establishes his ethical standards and develops his code of conduct to be both ideal while still in his physical life...  this is often formally called religion.  Man’s ethics and (behavioural) code enable him to discern right from wrong, good from bad that guides him to make ideal decisions and, therefore, develop and progress.  Man’s soul, therefore, no matter how immaterial, plays a significant role in his adaptation.

 Just my little thoughts…

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