So I was originally going to write this blog on exhibitionism in America.
Then I scrapped that idea. It was none too gently chucked in the garbage bin alongside other varying junk posts such as: If I Were a Vegetable I'd Be...., Why I Should RULE THE WORLD (actually, that one is still pending dumpage), and Trump: The Most Powerful Combover in the Business World.
Oh, the sad depraved trails my mind wanders down.
Instead of focusing on an ultimately depressing subject, I think I'll save that one for later and just ponder a bit about why we do what we do.
I think that in order to figure out what makes one human, we need to take a look at personality. According to dictionary.com (the ultimate in citable material, I know), personality is defined as thus: "the quality of being a person; existence as a self-conscious human being; personal identity."
Ok. Well, I'm not really interested in the first part of that definition, because well...duh. "The quality of being a person" kind of speaks for itself, no?
The second part of the definition is quite intriguing if you think about it. "Existence as a self-conscious human being," which then leads into "personal identity."
Whoa. We be entering some deep territory with this here blog post. Let's break that down some more....
Existance. Yep, I know what that means. I'm guessing you do too, so I won't insult your intelligence by looking that word up.
Self-conscious human being. Well, that one's a bit more tricky. And decieving...very very decieving. It's deceptive in that one tends to oversimplify it.
Other animals have been documented as self-concious - most of whom belong to the ape family (although, my dog Rusty can be quite alarmingly intuitive sometimes). So what makes our consciousness any different? What makes us so special?
Many believe that it's our intelligence that makes us superior. I don't buy that line of reasoning. Too elitist for me, I guess. After all, intelligence could be considered as a relative thing - we're more intelligent than apes, who are more intelligent than monkeys. But what if we weren't in the equation? Then that just leaves us with apes being more intelligent than monkeys. Well, then apes would be the most intelligent beings on earth, which would mean that they too would share what we have. And what if we find some alien lifeform that happens to be smarter than we are? Would that discredit our uniqueness? Is intelligence imperative to a soul?
I don't know the answers to these questions, but I sure do ponder them and many others. Part of me thinks that personality is nothing more than a by-product of evolution. Same with love.
However, another part of me rebels violently against that theory. I strongly suspect that this particular part was the one that was the most influenced by years and years of good old Catholic education and sappy romance novels.
Either way, I doubt I'll ever get my answers. So I suppose I'll try my damndest to be content in my ignorance and live life as it comes.
Ha.
