The Universe

In chapter 5 the origin of the universe is widely discussed by Savater. And while I think that everything discussed throughout the chapter is worthy of discussion, what caught my attention the most was the origin of the uvinerse as seen from the religious point of view (with God being the creator) and from the scientific point of view (with the Big Bang theory).

First of all, he gives the metaphor of the clock on the street. This metaphor is based on the fact that if you see a clock in the middle of the street, you know that someone made it, you don't think that it just appeared in the street, you are certain that somebody must have made it. The same happens with the universe, it's foolish to believe that it is just there, somebody or something must be responsible for it, be it God, a big explosion or whatever other theorys there may be.

In my particular point of view, I think that once you see the immensity of the world, the perfection of the universe and the greatness of its components, it sounds almost arrogant to believe that it all resulted from an explotion, specially because nobody has been able to say what caused it.

I say arrogant because to me, the universe is amazing, this planet is amazing, the human body and its anatomy is amazing, and to deny that only a superior being could be responsible for all these things sounds arrogant to me.

I mean, if you think about it, our body functions in an amazing way. The way it defends itself against viruses, the way it recovers from illnesses, its just amazing. The nature and its diversity is amazing too, all the ecosistems, the animals and their cycle of life, it's all jus awesome. And the universe, the enormous universe and the way every part of it is arranged, it's almost incredible.

So, in conclusion, for me, from my point of view, it sounds way more reasonable to believe that a supreme and superior being is responsible for the universe and its greatness, rather than to belive that an explotion came out of nowhere and created every single thing that the universe is made of.

Chapter 5 the universe.

This chapter is divided in three mayor levels for a human that are, first my world, that is refers to my family, my friends, my culture and its keep going. They are almost the thing that belong to you, that the first. The second one is ower planet, that refers to the people that is around us and thing that we don’t put attention in normal life but they are there. For last there is the universe. The universe is something that has not really a meaning, the universe it is deferent for every body even for the philosopher, there are a lot of meanings for it.

Some people said that the universe have some kind of order. That depends on how you interpret the meaning of the word, because for normal people the universe is a mess the planets are all over, things flying across every were… but for the scientist the planets are alien, all the comics have a specific routine that they are always following.

Other thing that scientists say is that the universe doesn’t have a limit. I think that the universe it need to stop or finish in a certain place, yes its to big but it need to have a ending point. Every beginning have a end.

Happy Animals

The book The Questions of Life by Fernando Savater, cites a play written hundreds of years ago. This play Antigone, which we have read before in literature class, has many controversial points of view. Sophocles brings up certainly an interesting theme, stating that the fate of humans is to wonder. I want to zoom in some of the aspects this observation means.

At least I, wonder numerous times. I believe I exist among wonders, creating them and also being part of them. Day by day I live thinking with curiosity, and I'm constantly admired by how the world is. I become aware of all that surrounds me and see the way all those things affect me. I believe humanity has evolved not only in a biological way, but in another level, like spiritually, destroying barriers which block the entrance to other realities.

I was amazed when I read in the book that we are like free animals, because many times before I thought like that. No other animal limit our mental capacities from the inside, and we almost all the times create our context for livehood. It is us who dare to control other beings, and that I presume is a result of our own freedom. I consent that some people look like they do not wonder at all, but deeply and in their own way, they are wondering about things we don't even imagine.
I consider that Sophocles was right to say we wonder, and that yes we are happy animals, because wondering allow us to be marveled, even for one single moment, to feel admiration for something, to feel amazed and to be happy. I consider the world to be as complex as it is wonderful.

what are we?? Animals or humans??

First of all, whan I heard the tittle of this chaper, I only thought on the difference between animals and humans, in the aspect of what do we do and what do we think on, but after reading this chapter I realized that we have some kind of differences between us that I didn't even think about.
One of the major differences that I thought it was special, was that Fernando Savater states that Animal conduct is different from human behaviour. And what i understand on this statement, is that animals are born with an instinct that makes the knowledge for them and they have prepared or done what they're going to do. And humans are born in the way that we have to learn everything from the knowledge and experience of our parents from the beggining of our lives, untill the end of them, and if you think on this, as a human, you never stop learning new things and that is completely reasonable because everyday a human is supposed to learn at least one thing each day.

Well as a conclusion I think we are similar to animals, absolutely in NOTHING but reproduction, which goes to the same end, that is to create and educate a new life, and better yet complete a kind of children however you want them to be

Symbolic Animals?

Why are we sometimes considered as animal? Why are we always compared to them? If we are dirty we are called pigs, if we aren't intelligent we called donkeys, etc. After reading Chapter 4 of Fernando Savater´s book, "The Questions of Life", we analyze some of Savater´s ideas and of other philosophers that he mentions.

Fernando Savater has a lot of ideas about the relation between animals and humans. He brings up differences and similarities between both of them. One of his ideas in his book "The Questions of Life" is that animals use their intelligence to get and achieve what they need and want, the have something in mind, a goal. On the other side, humans use their intelligence to get what they need and want, but they are not always satisfied, they continue searching for more.

Another difference that Fernando Savater states in his book is that animal "conduct" is different to human "behaviour". Animals are born knowing almost everything and they have a predetermined conduct, for example all wolves have the same conduct; they are aggressive, they attack, etc. Humans learn everything through life, starting from our parents raising us and continue learning in school, and they have a behaviour; every single person have a different behaviour, even though some of us are raised together, we behave in a different way.

According to Ernst Cassirer, we are symbolic animals. He states this because he says that we express ourselves with symbols, signs that represent ideas, emotions, etc. I agree with Ernst Cassirer because it is true that we express everything through signs, and everything means something to us, for example a dove or an olive represents peace. He is absolutely correct in his idea.

Humans vs. Animals

When i heard we were going to read a chapter about the difference between men and animals, I immediatly thought that all the arguments that Savater or any of the philosophers quoted in his book were going to be negative, denying the existance of God or simply saying that we are mere animals. That's why it was such a nice surprise for me to see Giovanni Pico della Mirandola quoted.

It's not only that I was very glad to see someone sharing my point of view on man's superiority over animals, but it is also that his point of view is exactly the same as mine.

Everything he says about man being more than animals because of our free will and God granting us the opporunity to create things, at least with regard of ourselves, is exactly the argument I use whenever someone asks me why we're more than just animals. That, and of course the fact that we were made similar to God.

So, in conclusion, this chapter totally changed my judgement of this book by surprising me with the diversity of its opinions and different points of view which is why from now on I'm going to try and be more open-minded whenever it comes to discussing this book's topics.

symbolic animals

What I think and what I have been growing with is that god creates us. I don’t think that we came from the animals, yes we have a lot in common but that doesn’t means that we come from them. Darwin evolution says that we where animals and we became humans, but why if we evolve why they don’t evolved the same time that us.

Another reason that I think that we don’t come from animals and the book say something about it is the language. The way we communicate with other is different from animal we have a language to speak and we think before doing something. To learn something we need to pass through something and that depends on the place and culture you where born.

Other thing that we where talking at class was what was easier to domesticate a person who always live in the jungle than a person so always live in the city move it to the jungle. I think it will be easier for a man to change their habits from a domestic to a wild, because the man al ready have some knowledge of how to survive in that kind of environment and the wild person doesn’t know noting about it.