Who are we? Existential questions

General Philosophy
1

Homo sapiens. Thoughts. Bodies. Drives. Souls. These are various attempts of philosophers, psychologists, and scientists to explain the human phenomena.

I personally like Heidegger’s and Sarte’s views, and to a lesser degree Max Stirner. We are beings with our essences undefined and we owe ourselves authenticity.

This then begs psychology. Drives. Passions, in older terms.

What should rule our mind? And is that even “us”? What really defines us?

These are broad statements that can be taken many different ways. I would like to hear your opinions. I would like to hear the words of the wise.

Are we just a sum of parts, as science suggests? Or are we something different, perhaps even transcending to metaphysics? I would like to hear various arguments.

2

To answer this question, you first need to understand the structure of Reality itself. Reality is made of three distinct categories of beings:

  • Material: like a pebble, a galaxy, or the universe.
  • Living: like a bacterium, a bird, or a monkey.
  • Thought: like a shamanic theory of spirits, or the theory of quantum mechanics.

Crucially, each category n is carried by a special, singular being from the previous category (n-1):

  • The material universe is carried by an unknown quantum object (the one that will finally unify quantum mechanics and relativity).
  • Life is carried by DNA, which is a molecule—a purely material object, not a living organism itself.
  • Thought is carried by the human biological organism. That is exactly what we are: the carrier of the category of Thought.

If you are interested, I can go much further and explain exactly what thought actually is, and why it has seemed completely mysterious to you and every thinker before you (even Hegel, who called man ‘this night’)."

3

Last surviving members of the genus Homo. We existed for around 300,000 years without leaving much behind. We had the genetic makeup to allow speech, but we don’t know if we did speak, or if we did, what we might have been saying. Something changed around 60,000 years ago. We started maintaining skills and building on them, but it wasn’t until about 4000 years ago that we started writing down what we believed. We believed the sun was divine and that a fertility goddess made plants grow in the spring.

The universe woke up and started telling stories about itself. That’s what we are.

4

@MCogito To answer this question, you first need to understand the structure of Reality itself.

I would argue the true nature of reality is ill-defined since there are strong counter-arguments as to what it is. Both in terms of rationality (principle of sufficient reason, as elaborated by Leibniz) and seemingly anti-rationalist thinking (Kant). If you take the principle of sufficient reason to be true i.e. rationality can explain all existing things, I would say that you would have to elaborate further on what you mean. And tie it to the principle of sufficient reason, as did Leibniz. Even Schopenhauer does such. It makes for a very convincing arguments. Is it true though? Who knows.

What I find curious in explanations of the universe is that there appears to be different modes of thought for thinking about different things. You see this in Kant, with analytic versus synthetical. Schopenhauer argues about the Principle of Sufficient reason as four parts. And finally Hegel with his dialectical. If different things require different reasons, how would it be possible to synthesize them all? Maybe this is more rhetorical than actual, but some authors make this case. In such case, you cannot say what reality really is.

I find this problem of trying to describe “what” is the primary problem of both epistemology and morality. Because without true accounts of what things are, how can you make true accounts of what ought to be?

@Frank I appreciate your historical view. Thanks for sharing. I value the poetic power of your last paragraph as well.

5

@Bizet : I 0% agree : “principe of sufficient reason” is an abstract, language focused, idealistic object belonging to foggy epistemological discussions between institutional bureaucrats of thought and it say nothing about the “we” reality your question was about.

“We” are real thing, a species. I upgraded this biological fact to the metaphysical level and could answer a precise answer : “we” are the metaphysical carrier or the category of Thought, as DNA is the carrier of Life etc. I also said I could go much further in the evidence.

You are not interested by this precise answer because you are not interested by the question : you are interested by the sensation that “we” is a mystery, the infamous Hegel’s night : you want mystery, you want transcendance, that’s why a precise answer does nothing to you.

Sorry but I am a metaphysician, I answer questions (I think I could provide deep mystery if explicitly asked for btw…)

This desire of mystery is the typical idealistic thinking abdication coming from the faulty [nature-human] bi-categorical immanent framework of Philosophy, as explained in my first post in this beautiful TPS forum : Breaking the [Nature-Human] bi-categorical framework of Philosophy

6

I appreciate your take @MCogito. But I would say I am interested in all that we can take to be. Even your arguments in the other thread, that we may be emergence of DNA, is still at play.

I take not necessarily the sensation of “we” as that can be an arguably psychological. At least you are using psychological terminology, perhaps you mean different. No offense but I find Hegel to be a poor explainer, hence his mystery.

I don’t want transcendence. I just want explanation.

I would say that all thought is somewhat idealistic (though the bounds are unclear). Thus I would argue that the principle of sufficient reason may apply. Or else what are we talking about? Then you would have to explain what is inexplicable, which Kant attempts to elaborate on. So there are bounds, but then Hegel argues that this is a useless abstraction. So there are counterarguments to that.

You argue against the PSR (principle of sufficient reason) yet argue on grounds of reason, biological fact, thereby being self-defeating. What else is there to argue but upon reasonable grounds? That is what brings us to idealism in it’s modern form. For we cannot argue otherwise.

Perhaps there is some thinking things that is not Categorical in nature that knows more than we will inevitably know. It is possible, thereby a possible truth (to use Leibniz’s terms). But to use logic, such would be unnecessary, thus the necessity of our existence. Perhaps we are bound by necessity, per Spinoza. Or perhaps not. It really is a metaphysical argument. You see why these questions are so difficult?

7

Our body are made of particles of the Universe but I believe our consciousness which is what allow us to think and have memories, don’t just come from our brain but something deeper. Our brain seems to be the computer for us to be able to smell, see, touch and manipulate our body but I believe we have unlimited memory capacity which cannot be confined to our small brain. Memories is experiences of your entire life, you don’t remember everything but for each moment of your life you are able to resurface part of your memory based on what you are experiencing in the present moment. Now with this in mind, what should rule our mind? What is “us”? You are your own experiences and memory. As life goes on and you questions things, you gain answers and evolve your thinking capacity and accumulate more memories. I believe we aren’t just our body but what define us is your consciousness - the very thing that make who you are. The capacity to be creative, able to learn, experience emotions and attachment. Without a body and a universe, we would not be able to evolve our consciousness at all. I believe our bodies are a sum of parts but you that control this body transcend to metaphysics. We have infinite way to think and behave from our consciousness but are confined to a body on Earth. You can choose to wander in your thought or decide to discipline your consciousness into learning new things but note that there is no limit to where you can go in your own consciousness. This is where I say to you: Do something constructive in your life as you are much more than a sum of part but something much greater and I believe your consciousness and memories will persist in the afterlife because you are something that transcend to metaphysics.

8

I think there’s a lot of interesting ideas to be had here, and I’ve read some of the replies however I still new to this and don’t know the philosophers by name like others and tend to get lost when conversations extend to that level. However I think I could present something meaningful here as a potential answer, emerging from my own framework. First the question is not super specific: “who are we” in linguistic use could mean a million things because who is identity, therefore subjective and fluid. If we try to answer “what are we” we dive into definitions, material existence, relations and potentially metaphysics, depending on what your criteria for something to count as metaphysics is. Give then context of the question, it sounds like Bizet is asking “what is the substance of existence, present in an individual of the human species, and what does that mean”

So a few things here, I think there multiple definitions, and I think a fundamental substance of a human is incoherent with known reality. Reality by nature is experiential, formed by the human perspective, and all knowledge is filtered through that perspective. Biology shows us there is a essentially infinite (infinite just used to describe a very large number in this context) amount of parts and interactions between those parts, that when combined something called a human emerges, however the definition of human has changes throughout history the parts and interactions remain largely the same. I would say the foundational substance of a human is not a substance at all, but rather it is the emergent system of numerous substances interacting in relation to one another. However this definition is not specific to humanity, so that begs the question, whats different about humans if something is different. To answer this imagine for a moment, a very large mathematical formula full of values and functions. the values can either be constants or variables, and the functions are constant. birds eye view of this, you have a formula comprised of parts, the rules the dictate how those parts interact, and the result of that formula. I’d say a human is that result of that very large formula, that due to the sheer size produces something so incredibly specific that it feels unique to others. so when you ask if we are just the sum of parts, I think yes, however the word “sum” is very important here and often overlooked. If all the parts existed without functions causing interaction, a human would not emerge, and vice versa. humans are a structure comprised of components that operate inside of a system. Then as we see in reality, that structure then interacts with other structures, becoming components to a system, which then create a new structure. thing society as a result of humans interacting with on another. Or a mountain as soil/sediment interacting with each other. is a mountain just the sum of its parts? does that reduce its meaning?

then to go on the question of what should rule our mind. thats an interesting one, i think implies a ruling agent with requiring one, its also implies that the agent is seperate from the mind. I don’t think that the mind being ruled by something is a premise with evidential backing. then to say that they ruling agent could potentially be us is also strange to me. then finally, what really defines us. We do, we chose our definition as a collective, just like bears probably define use differently in their framework then we do them. definition is subjective, not intrinsic to being, because to define requires an agent doing the defining.

Souls are an interesting concept, without evidential back in the empirical sense. If you define soul as the culmination of the entirety of ones being you could get something interesting. Or perhaps the soul discussion would head down a nature versus nurture route. If souls are real, are the static or dynamic?

9

The definition of reality here is an unsupported claim so the conclusion is speculation. That doesn’t appear to be a common definition of reality or the functional definition. The category of material includes pebble, galaxy, and universe; these entities do not reliably show the same properties, a pebble is an object of matter, a galaxy is a grouping of objects. are the objects in the group material, or is the group as idea material? is the universe even material? depends on how you define universe which I get a sense you’d say its spacetime and matter.
Secondly, why is living separate from material, is just because living things are contingent on material? a pebble is contingent on atoms, why is it in a separate category? Additionally “living” is not clearly defined, its a category that can be useful but is not perfect, consider viruses for example. They are contingent on hosts to replicate, and possess RNA not DNA, are they alive or not?
thought as a category of reality is interesting, and also not clearly defined. are the imagined spirits the thought, or the act of imagining them? why are spirits and hypothesis on how matter interact in the same grouping.

the material universe is carried by an unknown quantum object. this is a claim without support. and also once again requires definition of universe. This statement implies a non-contingent terminus which is incoherent with known reality or at least unable to be supported as a claim with any positive descriptions, and there’s other possibilities present. the idea “a quantum object” also implies a single point terminus, which is difficult to support.
Thought is not only carried by the human biological organism as currently defined. Are orcas humans? they have thought, language, differentiation, planning and so on. If the definition of a human is the carrier of the category of thought, how do we differentiate humans from orcas. that definition loses functional utility as we cant meaningfully differentiate. I’m curious to see what else you have to say, but please, avoid philosopher name drops as I dont know their works, I’m new to all of this.

10

Would animals fall into this definition as well?

11

Absolutely

Also, my own explanation on what differentiate a human from the rest is our capacity to think and talk about philosophy. Any other living things can’t do that.

12

@SupremeMarshall
You seem to hint at the Descartesian model. I am glad you espouse that the mind is modelled after our faculty and senses. I would say that is very appropriate. I am glad you recognize the metaphysical accounts, as we all have to have acting assumptions. It is a bit a strange account that “but note that there is no limit to where you can go in your own consciousness.” I feel this a bit as well, intuitively speaking. I am not sure where to draw the bounds, hence the question. I suppose consciousness encompasses the idea being discussed, and I suppose what I am looking at is an account of consciousness, in clearer terms now that discussion has budded. But consciousness is a notoriously difficult proposition.

I would argue that the ability to talk about what is necessary, and beyond survival, is what separates humans from animals. That we can do whatever and define whatever within our sphere of knowledge, limited only by faculty. This is not given by other animals; they are limited to mere survival. Though we have evolved from such, survival-oriented behavior, we can grasp much more, hence our exclusion from rules of evolutionary biology (at times).

@VicePresBobinski
I would say that an emergent account is apt. I appreciate your abstract account of functions, abstracting it from its mathematical account. I would argue though that “sum of its parts” is a bit reductionist, since a mountain can re-compose the parts. This then becomes a permutations problem. I suppose what is necessary is a dynamic account of what humans are, which is experience. I suppose that is true, as to the best possible explanation (abduction). In that regard, perhaps we are meant to be experiential, again an abductive principle.
I would be careful with saying “definition is subjective” as certainly some definitions are necessary, such a person needing a body.

Souls are an abstract, metaphysical account and honestly I cannot seem to grasp it. Hence why I appeal to this forum.

13

@VicePresBobinski my post here is a condensed version of two subjects (see the link) that will clear-out your objections.

14

@MCogito I appreciate the attempt to construct a broader metaphysical framework. However, after reading the thread you linked, many of the objections I raised in the other discussion still seem unresolved. Most of them stem from issues of definition and explanatory scope.

The first concern is the definition of thought. In the model presented, thought appears as a category emerging from life. But the term itself is not clearly defined. Does “thought” refer to consciousness, reasoning, information processing, or something else? Without a clear definition, it becomes difficult to evaluate the category. For example, if thought is defined as information processing, then many non-biological systems could qualify. Artificial intelligence, computational systems, and even simple feedback systems would blur the boundary between life and thought. In that case, thought would not be contingent on life in the way the model proposes.

This leads to a second issue: the relationship between cognition and biological life. If AI systems were eventually capable of genuine reasoning or decision-making, the proposed hierarchy (matter → life → thought) would no longer hold as a strict sequence. Thought could emerge from non-living systems. This possibility suggests that the categories may not be as structurally necessary as the framework implies.

Another difficulty arises with borderline biological cases. The category of “life” itself is notoriously difficult to define. Viruses, prions, and other replicating systems sit at the boundary between chemistry and biology. If life is one of the core ontological layers in the model, the theory should account for these ambiguous cases. Otherwise the boundary between matter and life remains unclear.

There is also a problem regarding mental phenomena such as hallucinations or imagined objects. A hallucinated object clearly has some form of existence as a neural event in the brain, even if the represented object does not exist externally. The model does not appear to distinguish clearly between the existence of a mental representation and the existence of the thing being represented. Without that distinction, the category of thought becomes difficult to apply consistently.

More broadly, the framework assumes that these three categories (matter, life, thought) exhaust the relevant structure of reality. But the justification for these particular divisions is not fully demonstrated. One could just as easily construct alternative sequences such as matter → chemistry → biology → cognition → culture. Without a clear argument for why these specific categories are fundamental, the structure risks appearing somewhat arbitrary.

For these reasons, the model still seems incomplete as a comprehensive ontology. It raises interesting ideas about emergence and levels of organization, but several key concept, particularly thought, life, and their boundaries, require clearer definitions before the framework can be evaluated as a fully explanatory system.

15

@VicePresBobinski reread the “metaphysical reasonning” paragraph (20x times : ) because you think too much and in a mono-categorical way. All your objections are mono-categorical, exists only in the vicinity of one specific category.

My model explain only the obvious difference between a pebble, a bird, 2+2=4 : that’s it. Anything beyond that is not metaphysical, meaning : not multi-categorical.

You also draw objections relative to the transition between categories : this will be solved starting in two weeks with a series of post about the self-construction of Reality in categories of beings, wich involves exactly the same mecanism (yes : the thought->data transition is the same dynamic that the matter->life transition or the quanta->matter transition).

you can also read my second post on the [non-being [being]] Totality : it may help a lot to understand the specificity of the multi-categorical reasoning.

16

We are the universe. We are mind interconnected. We are various organs working together to make the world run.

17

Your reply still doesn’t address the criticisms of the framework itself. You originally presented this as a metaphysical structure of reality in which humans are the carriers of thought, but when the framework is questioned the claim shifts into simply pointing out obvious differences between things. Those are very different positions. If it’s a metaphysical model, then the categories and their boundaries need to be justified and defended. If it’s just a descriptive classification, then it doesn’t actually support the stronger claim you made about what humans are. Telling someone to “reread it 20 times” or that they “think too much” isn’t an argument, and “mono-categorical thinking” hasn’t even been defined, so it doesn’t explain why the criticisms are mistaken. So rather than deflecting, could you clarify whether you’re proposing a genuine ontology of reality or simply a way of grouping phenomena? Because the strength of your original claim depends entirely on that distinction.

18

I would encourage defining all those terms. Universe and mind specifically.

19

@VicePresBobinski OK :

  1. first you have to intuitively feel that a pebble, a bird, 2+2=4 are things that exist and that they intuitively have a “metaphysical” or “ontological”, meaning a non-reductionist identity : you can’t reduce these identities, they stand for themselves “as is”. If you don’t access or agree with this obvious metaphysical difference I really can’t do anything for you relative to this model.

  2. you have to recognise that every thing you can think of belong to one of these three categories i.e. that there exists no other categories. For example a chair is the implementation of the idea of chair : it belong to the 2+2=4 category, not to the bird category, not the pebble category.

  3. a pebble is externally controlled (defined) by physical law, as a galaxy is, as the univers is. Externally is “topological” meaning logic with a spatial taste. A bird is internally defined by it’s DNA code, as a virus is, as a monkey is, as every living thing is. 2+2=4 is “betweenally” controlled : this one is a little more tricky and for more evidence on this one you have to wait for the forthcoming posts.

What I tried to communicate is that these concepts have zero deepness : thought mean 2+2=4 as a different thing than a bird : that’s it. I mean thought exactly the same way a 2-7 years old boy understand it. That was I was saying by “thinking too much”. Think with a 5 years old intuition, that’s all I’m saying.

about your boundary, relationship, AI, brain vs mental etc. objection : this is fully articulated in the forthcoming posts on the self-construction and categories transitions logic.

at this stage the only valid objection is : "I have a better metaphysical, non-reductionist, multi-categorical, definition of the difference between a pebble, a bird, 2+2=4 as “things that exists”. FYI : the top-achievement in Philosophy, Hegel’s dialectic, is unable do define this (obvious) difference and can only talk about different levels of the self-achievement of the “concept” etc. Try to do it and see by yourself that it’s extremely difficult to precisely define this difference.

20

For the universe, it’s the whole thing. Like in the sky.

For the mind, it’s what a human is. Or its head. Being aware and thinking.