Talk:Human/Archive 8

message: I appreciate the hard work, but I very much prefer the current version of the intro. I am a theist, but anything suggestive of humans uniquely possessing a soul smacks of egocentrism, to me at least. I think thats a POV which doesn't need specific expression in the intro. The image needs swapped w the taxobox tho, of course ;) (Sam Spade | talk | contributions) 14:26, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I would never want wikipedia to endorse belief in a soul or spirit. I merely want wikipedia to report that to billions of people, that is part of the meaning of being human. --Goethean 14:15, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: Sam, I'm not sure what you're disagreeing with. Goethean said half of humanity believes (A) that possessing a soul is part of being human. You are asserting that only a minority believes (B) that only human beings have a soul. Is this correct? User:Ed Poor (sig added by (Sam Spade | talk | contributions) 15:39, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: I guess my main point is that I don't like the wikipedia defining humanity as simply being a bipedal primate, end of story, while the vast majority of people don't see it that way. Even adding on accomplishments such as the development of language and religion don't change the fact that we are disregarding these people's beliefs. --Goethean 16:17, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: And that's what I liked about the 1 March version. It began by pointing out that it's not as simple as: humans are bipedal primates. It began with various perspectives for looking at humanity. That's more inclusive, I feel. --Goethean 16:19, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Current

message: what's the cave-painting of the hand, btw? I like it, but just showing an image of a brownish smeared hand without saying where it is or how it is dated is completely unencyclopedic. provide a reference, or exchange. dab (ᛏ) 10:35, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: So far as I remember (I didn't upload it) it's Australian aboriginal cave-painting, from a famous site whose name has slipped my mind. Mel Etitis  (Μελ Ετητης) 10:37, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Cave Painting

message: the "bipedal" in the intro is silly. it harks back to Plato's non-feathered bipeds, and is not proper in classification attributed to "biologists". biologists classify us as mammals, primates, homines, without counting "feet". I know that "bipedal locomotion" is the subject of serious research, but it doesn't enter into taxonomy / phylogeny. dab (ᛏ) 15:20, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The story in Plato is somewhat amusing, and gives an idea about how long people have been trying, with varying degrees of success, to define humanity. We could consider including a reference to it. --Goethean 16:21, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The Encyclopaedia Britannica also begins its definition of "human being" with reference to bipedal primates, as follows: "a bipedal primate mammal that is anatomically related to the great apes but is distinguished by a more highly developed brain, with a resultant capacity for articulate speech and abstract reasoning ..." SlimVirgin 17:34, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)
All taxonomy above species level is essentially arbitrary; bipediality is more or less the defining characteristic of the phylogeny (not the same as taxonomy) of the many species involved in human evolution.  Bipedality came considerably before large brains.--Pharos 05:11, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: I am still not sure if this article is about more than one species. homo sapiens redirects here, not Homo (genus)! H. sapiens is a single species, and should be objectively defineable. Plato was, of course, in the article (but not in the intro!), before he was exported to Human_self-reflection#Classical_antiquity.  Correct me, but I thought zoological taxonomy was at least aiming at consistency with phylogeny? (otherwise, what would be the point? You could classify, for example, all blue animals into a family, etc.) It just irks me to have well defined, phylogenetic terms like primate and, redundantly, mammal, combined with bipedal that applies as much to as as to chickens. Of course, bipedal is an actual feature, while primate is simply pushing back the definition to another article. I'm just saying we should separate phylogenetic classification from descriptions of individual features, I guess. I'm not objecting to mentioning the widely  known fact that most people are walking on two legs. dab (ᛏ) 17:05, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: bipedal