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on human dignity George Kateb’s Human dignity (Harvard University Press, 2011) is not an easy treatise to read. Common feature of a philosopher’s writing but tiresome nevertheless. And the more arguable the statement, the longer the sentence. Now, wait, it’s not what I intend to comment on - I’m aiming on the point about Kateb using human/animal comparison to boost human stature. "Apparent similarities there do not establish that the word emotion can be used in exactly the same way about animals and human beings. ... Animals have no language and therefore no inwardness that makes a difference to what they do. ... Language is the key to human unique- ness. ... From language comes thinking, a trait that is essential to free agency and moral agency as well as to human stature in general ..." - Kateb bubbles. Wrong (mostly). Those are Kateb’s assumptions rather than established facts: his claims would be nonsense even if he were being honest about the current knowledge on the subject, which he isn’t. "Individual members of the human species matter existentially more than members of all other species; human beings have an incomparably higher dignity. They matter more because of what they are: members of the human species with the unique and incomparable traits and attributes of the species. In being partly and commen- dably nonnatural, a human beings has an incomparably higher status than any animal." - and so on by Kateb. What a textbook example of circular reasoning - with one very drastic exclusion: humans are nonnatural ! |
Golden lion tamarin at Apenheul, Apeldoorn, the Netherlands, making a well known gesture with it's middle finger when asked to comment on human dignity |
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One thing’s for sure: although Kateb brings the notion that "an infinitely greater mind created the human mind and the rest of nature" as another philosopher’s thought, he is there. Naturally, out of nonnatural species. "Unlike humanity, nature does not exist to itself; it is not self-conscious ... The human species is irreplaceable because ... the stewardship of nature is a contribution |
that only humanity can make" - Kateb writes and then, some dozen lines further, states "I do not rely on traditional answers that any religion gives to the question of humanity’s rank". Oh, really, how about "God Yahweh took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to serve and preserve it." in the second chapter of Genesis [WEEKLY]. It sounds just like Kateb’s stewardship. |
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