In broader evolutionary terms, I'm not sure whether our awareness of our mortality is necessary to distinguish us apart from other species. There seems to be an inherent, implicit, almost 'blueprint' for mortality in all species that tends to prompt survival, procreative, nurturing and protective behaviour. By that I mean, whether it's a Lion, Duck, May-fly or human, the 'instinct' to play out biological imperatives does not seem to differ all that much and 'awareness' of mortality or human conciousness, if you will, may simply be an artifact of our relative 'intelligence'.

To me it's like the phrase that 'the ultimate secret of life is the certain knowledge of death, for without this man would cease to make his mark on the earth' (a phrase from some film or other). At first, this seems to make sense, but I'm not sure it actually does because of the nature of all species to act and react to biological urges that all appear to coincide in terms of timing in the life cycle.

For an answer please watch

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJkWS4t4l0k

; )

Excellent. Good call, dude!

I really enjoyed your link. But still not convinced ;-)

Interesting idea!

@Bastien,

>>> Is our awareness of future death a critical characteristic that distinguishes human beings from other animal species?

I would also look into terror management theory (TMT). Very interesting view on death: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQb93wBF97c

@ Rachel

Yes, bees can communicate the place of a good flower patch. But ... that's it. Animals? Perhaps you think on the vervet monkeys: some young vervets deceive others by making make a warning cry for a non-existing danger.

The only point you can make with your remark is that our linguisticness has it roots in the animal world.

But what distinguishes our kind from all other species in nature is that we dispose of 'names for things'. We live in a words world, a world of named things. Something for which we have not a name (word), doesn't exist for us.

Disposing of 'names for things' made our species special:

- it created a feeling if distance between the 'namer '(subject) and the 'named thing' (object. Our species could 'objectivate' . While other animals remained unresisting and dependent part of their natural environment, humans could consciously influence their environment

- it enabled them to confer knowledge, purchased by one generation, to the next; knowledge could accumulate

- individual intelligences could be lumped; two know more than one, and a whole group can invent clever solutions; the power of democracy

- having a name for a thing confers a feeling of power over the thing; a name for a thing is a sort of gripe on the thing, with which you can 'grasp' the thing and hand it over to the other who can get it , capito?; it is this feeling of power that made our species so brutally that they began to use the fire instead of staying in panic for it ; using the fire made our early ancestors from australopiths to Homo habilis, to humans.

Capito?

@ Rachel,

As to 'intelligence': I doubt if our intelligence is higher than that of other animals. It is the achievement of 'names for things' that we can 'brainstorm' and consult, that we can perform so clever things. Intelligence is a personal characteristic

: just as there are stupid and clever dogs, there are stupid and clever people.

As to dolphins: I know they have means to communicate. Like all other group animals, they have such; and it depends on the extent of the intensity of group cooperation how sophisticated communication is. But I'm sure that they don't have 'names for things', because this achievement has a special effect on animals, like I summed up in my last post (three of it: I can enumerate more). With 'names for things', dolphins would be far more human-like animals.

Yes, clever dogs and chimpanzees and other group animals can understand 'names'. But this doesn't implicate that they get the achievement of linguality, such as thinking in 'names for things' en consulting each other and plotting.

Perhaps you could take a look on my website www.humanosophy.org !

I don't think we are any better at thinking about our own death than other species. We may think about dying and being dead but the loss of 'I' is not something we are capable of thinking about since death is not a thing. We should be reassured that there is no thing to worry about.

Frans, I fear your suggestion, that “something for which we have not a name (word), doesn't exist for us” might put things to simple. There might be a thing for which is no word known, but the concerning concept/idea still exists.

For example, the German word "Schadenfreude" has become a foreign word in the English vocabulary. Nevertheless, English-speaking people probably could experience the concerning emotion as well, before its concept was introduced into the English language. (However, I have to confess I am not an English native speaker.)

But that is only about this single issue. Still, I absolutely agree with you that our species is a rather special animal.