So human an animal by Dubos René J. (René Jules) 1901-1982

Author:Dubos, René J. (René Jules), 1901-1982
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Human ecology, Human beings, Technology and civilization, Écologie humaine, Homme, Technologie et civilisation, Adaptation, Physiological, Adaptation, Psychological, Environment
Publisher: New York, Scribner
Published: 1968-03-04T16:00:00+00:00

So Human an Animal

fact points to the conceptual difficulties presented by a narrow view of determinism. To consider man or anv living thing as a machine implies the assumption that it works to some designated end. Even a part of a machine serves its particular end. Man's body is a machinery of atoms in the sense that its structures and functions obey the laws of inanimate matter. But it is a machine also in the sense that man himself can control its operations toward certain goals—the life goals that he freely selects. Even among the most orthodox materialists there are few who would not agree with the religious philosopher Paul Tillich (1886-1965) that man becomes really human only at the time of decision, when he exercises free will. Man's most characteristic attribute, his conscious orientation toward the future, implies willingness to make the efforts required for shaping his personality and thereby his destiny. In the words of Jose Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955): "Living is precisely the inexorable necessity to make oneself determinate, to enter into an exclusive destiny, to accept it—that is, to resolve to be it. We have, whether we like it or not, to realize our 'personage/ our vocation, our vital program, our 'entelechy'—there is no lack of names for the terrible reality which is our authentic I (ego)." 34

In Notes From Underground, Feodor Dostoevski's sniveling hero could not find satisfaction in the order and comfort of the "Crystal Palace" world in which he lived; he chose an antisocial way of life because it was the one form of freedom of action still available to him. "I say, gentlemen, hadn't we

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