That there is nothing markedly special about the human species is
practically dogma within naturalism. Though I consider myself a naturalist, I dislike dogma regardless of where I find it, so I challenge this
one.
From the point of view of biology, humans are just another
species. Biology, however, is a rather
limited point of view – it has little to say about the pre-biological
and less to say about the post-biological. Indeed, it refuses to recognize that such a
thing as the post-biological exists, even though the methods of biology
have proven largely useless for the study of human culture.
From the perspective of cosmology, one can argue that there
are three and only three large scale, self-organizing processes: 1) the physical processes that give rise to the organization of stars, galaxies,
solar systems, atoms, molecules, crystals, and planetary and earth geology; 2) the
biological processes which give rise to cells, organs, organisms, instinctive
behavior, and the workings of ecosystems; 3) human intentionality, which gives
rise to artifacts, architecture, machines, art works, languages, the sciences,
etc.
These three levels -- physics, biology, and the social
sciences -- form the levels of science we
find in academia. (The Chaisson
Complexity Metric demonstrates that these levels can be distinguished in a quantifiable manner based on energy flows.) Although there is a faith that all these
levels ultimately reduce to physics, for all practical purposes they do not,
and science is always about practical purposes.
So while humans may be just another species from the point
of view of biology, we are one of only three types from the point of view of the
self-organizing universe. And that is
rather special. Now someone will
undoubtedly point out that there are other animals that use tools, that have
language, etc. Yes, some ability of this
kind is strewn about the biosphere. But if
anything, these vestiges of intentionality merely highlight how different in complexity and novelty the process of human creation is.
I make no claim about a larger meaning of any of this other than
to say that the process of the self-organizing, emergent universe does not end
with biology. I have no interest in the
anthropic principle, and certainly none of the claims of theism. But I see what is in front of my eyes – the skyscrapers
of the modern city (as one example) belong to a different order of being than the trees of the
forest or the sand dunes of the desert. I have a hard time understanding
why my fellow naturalists are so intent on denying the obvious in regards to this.
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