Human Society, Human Culture, and Human Nature

2017 ◽  
pp. 205-235
Author(s):  
James F. Harris
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Human Culture

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Lewens
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Potential Functions ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
The Third ◽  
Current State ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
The Social ◽  
Compare And Contrast

Many evolutionary theorists have enthusiastically embraced human nature, but large numbers of evolutionists have also rejected it. It is also important to recognize the nuanced views on human nature that come from the side of the social sciences. This introduction provides an overview of the current state of the human nature debate, from the anti-essentialist consensus to the possibility of a Gray’s Anatomy of human psychology. Three potential functions for the notion of species nature are identified. The first is diagnostic, assigning an organism to the correct species. The second is species-comparative, allowing us to compare and contrast different species. The third function is contrastive, establishing human nature as a foil for human culture. The Introduction concludes with a brief synopsis of each chapter.

Hegel's Conception of the Study of Human Nature

1970 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 32-47
Author(s):  
H. B. Acton
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Dialectical Materialism ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Formal Logic ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Royal Family ◽  
Dialectical Method ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Creation

It is easy to understand why Hegel's philosophy should be little studied by English-speaking philosophers today. Those who at the beginning of the twentieth century initiated the movement we are now caught up in presented their earliest philosophical arguments as criticisms of the prevailing Anglo-Hegelian views. It may now be thought illiberal to take much interest in this perhaps excusably slaughtered royal family, and positively reactionary to hanker after the foreign dynasty from which it sometimes claimed descent. Hegel was a systematic philosopher with a scope hardly to be found today, and men who, as we say, wish to keep up with their subject may well be daunted at the idea of having to understand a way of looking at philosophy which they suspect would not repay them for their trouble anyway. Furthermore, since Hegel wrote, formal logic has advanced in ways he could not have foreseen, and has, it seems to many, destroyed the whole basis of his dialectical method. At the same time, the creation of a science of sociology, it is supposed, has rendered obsolete the philosophy of history for which Hegel was at one time admired. In countries where there are Marxist intellectuals, Hegel does get discussed as the inadvertent forerunner of historical and dialectical materialism. But in England, where there is no such need or presence, there do not seem to be any very strong ideological reasons for discussing him. In what follows I shall be asking you to direct your thoughts to certain forgotten far-off things which I hope you will find historically interesting even if you do not agree with me that they give important clues for an understanding of human nature and human society.

scholarly journals Other Ethics: Decentering the Human in Weird Horror

2017 ◽  
pp. 12-24
Author(s):  
Marianne Gunderson
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Experience ◽  
Transformative Power ◽  
Self And Other ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Human Subjectivity ◽  
Ethical Implications ◽  
Weird Fiction ◽  
The Absolute

Margrit Shildrick has argued that the monster’s ability to disturb and unsettle arises from its position as simultaneously same and different, both self and other at the same time. Through an analysis of Algernon Blackwood’s novella The Willows, this article discusses the challenge posed by the nonhuman Absolute other, the nebulous creatures whose whose difference is total, as they appear in weird fiction. Drawing on posthuman theory, it explores the ethical implications of imagining the crumbling horizons of human subjectivity in the meeting with the absolute and unknowable other. This article argues that by bringing concepts such as the horror of scale, ecophobia, the transformative power of awe, and the strangeness of matter into the monstrous figure, the weird undermines the structures that constructs human, culture, and mind as separate and different from the non-human, nature, and matter. By making us imagine a perspective from which humans are not just insignificant, but irrelevant, weird fiction not only challenges the anthropocentric worldview, but also makes us aware of the limitations and situatedness of human experience.

Hegel's Conception of the Study of Human Nature

1970 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 32-47
Author(s):  
H. B. Acton
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Dialectical Materialism ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Formal Logic ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Royal Family ◽  
Dialectical Method ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Creation

It is easy to understand why Hegel's philosophy should be little studied by English-speaking philosophers today. Those who at the beginning of the twentieth century initiated the movement we are now caught up in presented their earliest philosophical arguments as criticisms of the prevailing Anglo-Hegelian views. It may now be thought illiberal to take much interest in this perhaps excusably slaughtered royal family, and positively reactionary to hanker after the foreign dynasty from which it sometimes claimed descent. Hegel was a systematic philosopher with a scope hardly to be found today, and men who, as we say, wish to keep up with their subject may well be daunted at the idea of having to understand a way of looking at philosophy which they suspect would not repay them for their trouble anyway. Furthermore, since Hegel wrote, formal logic has advanced in ways he could not have foreseen, and has, it seems to many, destroyed the whole basis of his dialectical method. At the same time, the creation of a science of sociology, it is supposed, has rendered obsolete the philosophy of history for which Hegel was at one time admired. In countries where there are Marxist intellectuals, Hegel does get discussed as the inadvertent forerunner of historical and dialectical materialism. But in England, where there is no such need or presence, there do not seem to be any very strong ideological reasons for discussing him. In what follows I shall be asking you to direct your thoughts to certain forgotten far-off things which I hope you will find historically interesting even if you do not agree with me that they give important clues for an understanding of human nature and human society.

Human universals, human nature & human culture

Daedalus ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 133 (4) ◽  
pp. 47-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald E. Brown
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Human Universals

scholarly journals The River Exists, Therefore I Am: Ecocriticism, Nature and Human Nature in Willa Cather’s 'The Enchanted Bluff'

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 137-145
Author(s):  
Alireza Sardari
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Environmental Degradation ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Human Identity ◽  
Ecological Awareness ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Fresh Perspective ◽  
Representations Of Nature ◽  
Nature Preservation ◽  
The Relationship

Today, environmental degradation and nature preservation are among the most discussed topics in media, academia, and beyond. Adopting Glotfelty’s ecocritical approach, this article investigates the relationship between human culture and the natural world in Willa Cather’s The Enchanted Bluff (2009). The present study determines the different representations of nature along with the ecological issues to (a) heighten the ecological awareness and (b) to provide a fresh perspective to look at the natural world; therefore, this article shifted its focus from the anthropocentric attitude to the biocentric and focuses on nature and its correlation with humanity. This paper challenges the human/nature binary to help us look at the natural world stripped of established stereotypes. The results indicate that nature is an indivisible portion of human identity; furthermore, humankind and the natural world are codependent and interconnected; the results also emphasize that preserving the natural world is, indeed, the prerequisite for the protection of humanity.

The Use and Non-Use of the Human Nature Concept by Evolutionary Biologists

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter J. Richerson
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Early Development ◽  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Modern Synthesis ◽  
First Year ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Infancy And Childhood ◽  
First Year Of Life

A number of prominent modern evolutionists embraced ‘human nature’, signalling their commitment to the Modern Synthesis. Their claim is that for most of our evolutionary history, culture was of little importance, and that genes, not culture, controlled early development. More recently, cultural evolutionists have argued that culture and reason were present deep in the Homo lineage, and that the ability to learn socially develops in the first year of life. Thus, it is reasonable to think that genes and culture coevolved in the evolutionary past, and that they codevelop in infancy and childhood. Human nature theorists seek to deny this claim, while at the same time trying in various ways to make room for human culture and reason. I argue here that they are unsuccessful in their attempts.

Off Human Nature and On Human Culture:

2017 ◽  
pp. 58-70
Author(s):  
Robert Sussman ◽  
Linda Sussman
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Culture

Music and Rhythm

Mind Shift ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 303-319
Author(s):  
John Parrington
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Mental Illness ◽  
Classical Music ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Pop Music ◽  
Mental Processes ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Brain

This chapter evaluates how music has been an important part of human culture for a very long time. One explanation for the centrality of music in human society is that it plays a key role in coordinating activity. Rhythmic sound ‘not only coordinates the behaviour of people in a group, it also coordinates their thinking—the mental processes of individuals in the group become synchronized’. This may explain how drums unite tribes in ceremony, why armies used to march into battle accompanied by bugle and drum, religious ceremonies are infused by song, and speech is punctuated by rhythmic emphasis on particular syllables and words. The chapter then assesses what modern neuroscience can reveal about how music affects the brain, and considers the role that music plays in the creation of meaning. It illustrates these general arguments with reference to music ranging from the classical music of Mozart and Beethoven, to mid-twentieth century jazz, through to modern pop music. The chapter also looks at how music can help us cope with some of the alienation that many people feel in modern society, and ways in which music has addressed the issue of mental illness.

The reformation of worship

1954 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 393-407
Author(s):  
D. H. C. Read
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Scientific Culture ◽  
Christian Church ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
The Mind

There is probably no activity of man at once so congenial to his instincts and baffling to his intelligence as the worship of God. Worship may be described as congenial to man's instincts since it exists, and has existed, in some form or other in every human society, and is a recognisable impulse in even the most secularised product of a modern sceptical world. It may be described as baffling to his intelligence since it escapes the definitions of our scientific culture, and is, in fact, so unaccountable on any merely rational view of human nature that rationalism has handed the problem over to the psychologist to explain in terms of repressions, mother-fixations, infantile-regressions and the like. This modern rejection of worship with the surface of the mind, coupled with the persistence of the instinct in powerful and often perverted forms is worth examining in the light of the enduring summons of the Christian Church to the worship of Almighty God.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document