Talk:Human/Archive 21

message: I removed the self-definition part again (as previously discussed at Talk:Human/Archive 19#Intro comments). I feel it to be awkward and out of place—when reading an article, I don’t think how a group defines themselves is relevant in the introduction. Their self-beliefs are certainly important and should be discussed, but to me it doesn’t seem to belong in the introduction. Do others disagree? — Knowledge Seeker দ 03:33, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Support this, "define themselves" is absurd as I have stated previously. KillerChihuahua?!? 07:24, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I also support this removal.  I am not sure about the following sentence either: "They are the dominant sentient species on planet Earth". When did this one appear?  Can we honestly write this in an objective way? David D. (Talk) 16:07, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would not object in the least if that sentence were removed entirely. KillerChihuahua?!? 16:30, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Certainly this approach is better than self definition. David D. (Talk) 19:52, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: ...he asserted, vacantly. — goethean ॐ 20:49, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The puppy objects. Strongly. KillerChihuahua?!? 21:04, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: "Human" in what dictionary has a spiritual meaning? Sure, there is a spiritual aspect, and a social aspect, to what we may regard as the essence of being human, which is explored thoroughly in the article. This does not belong in the opening. Take a look at Frog: "Frog is the common name for amphibians in the order Anura." Elephant starts "Elephantidae (the elephants) is a family of animals, and the only remaining family in the order Proboscidea." Details of how they live and interact is later in the article, where it belongs. One puppy's opinion. KillerChihuahua?!? 21:11, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I guess that I think that human beings are different from frogs. — goethean ॐ 21:19, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Which is why this is the Human article and not the frog article. Are you deliberately misunderstanding me (in other words, was that intended to be humor or a point?) or am I being unclear in some way? KillerChihuahua?!? 21:29, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You seemed to be implying that the first sentence of this article should be modelled on that of the frog article. I was pointing out that that's absurd. — goethean ॐ 21:36, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Why is that absurd? It's about as NPOV as you can get. David D. (Talk) 22:51, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: (ri) No, an animal is an animal is an animal.  Humans and frogs are animals.  Period. Jim62sch 21:42, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Ditto -- well said!  Jim62sch 22:21, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Yes, calling your opponents or their views "insane" definitely helps to prove your point. However, you should have said "Period." at the end. That would have really hammered them. — goethean ॐ 22:26, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hyperbole is one of my favorite tools (that, or just one of my bad habits). However, I meant no offense; if I seemed a bit too zealous or critical in my above paragraph, it was meant to emphasize, not to insult. So, I apologize if my delivery was a bit too brash or my word choice excessive—and I don't, and will never, apologize for the message, which is perfectly valid. This is an article about human beings, not about "how humans define themselves" (which could make a good article topic in its own right) and not about the word "human" (which is more of a dictionary than an encyclopedic topic). The sole reason anyone has for such a ridiculous beginning to an article as "Humans define themselves in..." is, apparently, to namedrop spirituality in an attempt to further an agenda and propagate the mistaken notion that science, spirituality, and sociology are somehow at odds, incompatable, or distinct (clearly nonsense when it comes to "sociology", which is as scientifically-based as history, psychology and anthropology). You yourself have demonstrated this bizarre and inexplicable anti-scientific bias in the past, goethean, and are no doubt one of the main forces keeping this article's intro a religious sermon and stopping it from becoming an encyclopedia article. Religion is one of my favorite encyclopedia topics of all, and I spend almost all my time on Wikipedia editing and researching articles on religious issues, but there's a time and place for everything; starting the article on "humans" by namedropping the "spiritual perspective" is deeply, fundamentally biased and meaningless. It would be like starting it by saying that humans "define themselves in mathematical, scientific, and geographical ways"; it's patent nonsense. So maybe "insane" was too strong a word, but it got the point across: there's literally no reason to word the beginning of this article so awkwardly and misleadingly. -Silence 22:41, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Agree again.  Jim62sch 23:03, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Absolutely concur, Jossi, and btw good catch on the "language" addition to the introduction, (as well as your other tweaks and edits today.) thanks. KillerChihuahua?!? 22:36, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I feel no animosity whatsoever for any of the people involved in this discussion. I can stronly, strongly disagree with someone without feeling any ill-will towards that person. I'll try to tone it down a bit, if you promise to think about the fact that "Is Wikipedia only a scientific encyclopedia?" is like asking "Is Wikipedia only an encyclopedic encyclopedia?" Being encyclopedic requires a working acceptance of scientific methodology; such a requirement is implicit and universal, to the extent that even saying it is unnecessary. If not for this basic and fundamental aspect of encyclopedicness, the sun (as opposed to solar deity) and heart (as opposed to heart (symbol) articles would not start with the current widely-accepted, experimentally-proven facts and theories on these topics, but with random, arbitrary, untested beliefs about them like "The sun revolves around the earth" or "The heart is the seat of thought and emotion". Of course Wikipedia is scientific; this doesn't mean that it can't contain unscientific information. On the contrary, it must contain all noteworthy views per its POV policy (and per common sense, why hide information just because it's false?), properly referenced and in their correct context (for example, compare eschatology, a sociological article, and end of the universe, a cosmological one). Encyclopedias, like all modern reference tools (i.e. a mathematics textbook, as opposed to a book of holy scripture), assume a secular, scientific methodology, simply because there's no other consistent, unbiased, reliable way to analyze and present knowledge. It's no more biased or POVed to utilize science (rather than religious dogma) in an encyclopedia article than it is to utilize air (rather than water or sand) for breathing. -Silence 23:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Here's my take on it: I think it does sound quite out of place for a reference work to discuss how a group defines itself over what it is (whatever that means) and it does seem quite unusual to describe humans in this way. I don't mean to imply the biological aspect is more important than the spiritual aspect, but it is more obvious. Keeping in line with my comment above, I think we should attempt to write this article as if from a disinterested viewpoint, perhaps as if we were aliens observing Earth and humans. We start out with the most obvious: humans are animals, bipedal primates. Next we observe the social behavior, civilizations, technology. Next we learn about their remarkable culture. Finally we begin to understand their religious beliefs; that many believe they possess far deeper levels and so on. Does this make sense? It's kind of a hierarchy, from the most readily apparent to some of the deeper characteristics. — Knowledge Seeker দ 22:42, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It does make sense. Whichever way we slice it, we have to include all these aspects. If only we could become a bit dispassionated (would that be ever possible?) and think of the reader for a while, rather than to think with our POVs, we could make some progress. ≈ jossi  ≈ t • @ 22:53, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree strongly with both of the above comments. The reason to start this article with a simple and straightforward explanation of "human" is not just an empty gesture to make a point; it serves a deeply and absolutely practical purpose, to make the article more accessible and meaningful to readers and to provide first the most fundamental and simple information (i.e. the definition of "human being" as a reasoning, bipedal primate in the genus Homo), then to grow to increasingly specific and field-focused information that would require the initial context to make sense. At this point, even "Humans are featherless bipeds" would be a better start than "Humans define themselves as...." How can someone understand the human soul before they know what human itself is? Y'gotta know that we have four limbs and a head before you can start worrying about divine spiritual ascension or the vicious karmic cycle of samsara, sorry. -Silence 23:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Wow, déjà vu all over again.  No offense, Seeker, you are correct.  I'm merely noting that we've stated all of this previously (including the bit about aliens -- well, assuming that they are friendly aliens) Jim62sch 23:06, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Not friendly aliens, Jim62sch—neutral (but interested) aliens. If they were friendly, that'd miss the point entirely. :) -Silence 23:14, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Good point, Slience.  As long as they are not bearing a book entitled, "To Serve Man".  ;) Jim62sch 00:53, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Define themselves..." 

message: I would like to add a section on the etymology of "human". There are some very interesting perspectives, for example the notion of "earthly beings," as opposed to "gods". In Hebrew adam means "man" and adamah "earth". Then we have the Sanskrit Manu, the Proto-Germanic Mannaz that is, the word is connected with the root "men" ("to think"), or the Finnish  "ihminen", which means one that is "wondering". Fascinating stuff. ≈ jossi  ≈ t • @ 23:12, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The link between man and to think is highly hypothetical, and is only given as "akin to", not as "men" being a root...that's not to say it's wrong, there just isn't enough evidence to support it given the development of PIE. My guess would be that "man" preceded, rather than was derived from "men", concepts tending to come after the tangibles.  Jim62sch 00:59, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I am only proposing that it will be very interesting to describe the different etymologies, based on verifiable information from scholars that study languages. It says a lot about how we as a species describe ourselves, through the use of language. Would you agree that this is a good idea or not? I see this as very fascinating material for our readers.≈ jossi  ≈ t • @ 16:14, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It may be, but be careful with the etymology -- in my spare time (as if I had any) I'm a linguist, and a pretty good one.  For example, the word we're discussing, human, comes from homo, which is probably from PIE root *ghthem meaning ground, earth, which in English became guma as in bridegroom.  On the other hand, the Greek anthropos comes from PIE *andher meaning spout, and Gk ops meaning eye.  There's no real meaning to the word in and of itself -- in all languages it goes back to the time when naming objects was important, and concepts had yet to be thought of.  Jim62sch 00:59, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

text: It's a good idea. It will be difficult to do neutrally, however, given the number of languages that there are in the world. — goethean ॐ 16:32, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: We'd probably better stick to english for the most part, this being the english wiki. Sam Spade 17:01, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Eh, I agree with goethean. We're the English Wikipedia because we're in English, not because the topics we cover are only about English. This sounds like an interesting topic, though if there are large plans for it, you might consider merging etymology with "terminology" and creating a daughter article for more in-depth analysis, since the human article is already quite large. Also be careful not to just make it a list of different languages' words for "human"; that's what Wiktionary is for. -Silence 17:21, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the feedback. I will attempt to add a sentence or two about these aspects to the "terminology" section, in the next day or so. ≈ jossi  ≈ t • @ 17:38, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Etymology

message: I'm sorry some people are so worked up, but I think its time we got back to work. I for one am not here for drama. Step one appears to be NPOVing the intro. Shall we start listing our options? Sam Spade 15:17, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Now that was one of the funniest comedy routines I've ever seen.  Well done.  Jim62sch 23:11, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Curse talk page ranting 

message: The paragraphs are here arranged side-by-side to make comparing them easier. To assist further in comparison, they are also divided into three parts based on their general topic:
#the first part (encompassing the first paragraph of Version 1, the first paragraph of Version 2, and the first two paragraphs of Version 3) seeks to give a basic definition of human and humanity's most noteworthy/unusual biological characteristics;
#the second part (encompassing the third paragraph of Version 1, the second paragraph of Version 2, and the fourth paragraph of Version 3) seeks to explain human society, culture and the arts (though Version 1 also touches on science, technology, self-awareness, and personality, which is covered third part for the other two versions);
# and the third part (encompassing the second paragraph of Version 1, the third paragraph of Version 2, and the third paragraph of Version 3), which is the part with the most dramatic differences between each version, either discusses spirituality and religion (Version 1), discusses the general human desire to understand and influence the world with religion, science, philosophy, etc., as well as human self-awareness and personality (Version 2), or touches on a variety of loosely-connected and somewhat disorganized topics, including the mind, soul, arts, feelings, self-definitions, language, curiosity, psychology, philosophy, and religion (Version 3). -Silence 17:06, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed lead sections

message: Please note that :Image:Homoerectusface.jpg is a copyvio, tagged for IfD and will be deleted from WP. ≈ jossi  ≈ t • @ 23:28, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image removal