Anthropology: West and East (Orient) 27 8 2017
1. The man (human being) – from ancient times and now – is the main, principal problem. Andcontext of existence of human being is the entire Universe. The well-known attributes of Universe are matter, motion, energy, space, time and causality. The man (skt. manushya, purusha) is the synopsis of Universe. Microcosm. He is also zoon politikon (Aristotle), social animal. And the society in time process is the history of mankind…
2. The books on Philosophical Anthropology are very different in their structure. However, they have something the common. And this, the common, is comical, funny enough… Why? — The content of books on anthropology we can see in the introductions and it includes two main points:
(1)The first – The knowledge of the man is very, very important in all relations. But! —
(2)The second — What is the man – in his essence – we not know! :))
And this is not the joke or an anecdote! Really – Kant, Hegel etc. speak very solemn and even poetically about the importance of Self-Knowledge. “Know yourself” is absolute precept! …
3. But – which are the resultsof investigations of the “human nature”?
Karlos Valverde for instance writes in his Philosophical Anthropology: “The human person (personality) is paradox, multi-dimensional and marvel, and therefore a philosopher is normally very irresolute and had uncertain image of the man”.
Or Victor Ten: The further “goes” philosophical anthropology in investigation of the man, the less we recognize in the results of investigations the man himself! (Чем дальше уходит в свой предмет философская антропология, тем меньше узнается в этом предмете человек.)
4. The Christians speak about the man more resolutely: “Original Man was created by God himself!” But what can we think about this conception from contemporary point of view?
5. So, what is the human being (life, consciousness, religion, etc)? — It is the sphere of well-known “eternal questions”. It said very often, that these concepts are indefinable, and therefore it is useless to meditate (to reflect) about them. (Paradoxically, the definitions of them we can find in every dictionary!:))).
But – in spite of indefinableness – investigations in the biology, etc. lead to many new facts (on the empirical level) and conceptions.
6. The Problems of contemporary Anthropology
(1) Eurocentrism. It is nearly the last one hundred years in Russia and in the West (Occident) we see in the textbooks on history of philosophy only some pages about “Indian Philosophy”. In “Philosophical Anthropologies” we see nothing at all about oriental anthropology. It arises a strange impression: it seems, on the Planet Terra only the Europeans are inhabitants, it is not?
(2) All anthropologists give a great attention or interest for Max Scheler (Germany) with his “anthropological change or turn” in 20th years of 20th century. Meantime in Russia Anthropology of Konstantin Ushinsky was edited in 19th century!
We observe two extremes:
(3a) Substantionalism: very often, we meet the popular (but incorrect) idea about “the eternal nature of the man”. However, as matter of fact “the eternal nature” comprises only some thousands years!
(3b) Relativism. An adept of this conception writes: “What is the man? This question has no definite answer, since the human being is different in different ages of history”.
7. So, we must take the common in the human nature; the common in the last some thousands years.
But — Ab ovo. Stages of the analysis of item «Anthropology»:
Every living being (tib. sems.can) has two main needs: the need of cognition (information) and the need of motion, movement. It has jnana- and karma-indriyas (organs of cognition and of action).
8. The specific features of the Man; the difference between man and animal
Now we can observe a strange situation: the contemporary psychologists, it seems, have lost the knowledge (from 19th century) of difference between man and animals. They think difference in consciousness…
However, principal specific features of the human being are:
(1)self—consciousness
(2)language and
(3) abstract thinking
and as result, as consequence – the moral norms ( ahimsa etc — first of all), myths, art, religion; and then philosophy and science – the spiritual life.
The animal has body and psyche (sensations, emotions, and consciousness). The human being has body, psyche, and the spirit. The animal has consciousness but without of self-consciousness. The man has self-consciousness, the ability of introspection, of self-observance, of awareness. That is the main, radical difference.
While taking food, sleeping, fear, sex are common between men and animals only dharma is the extra quality in men, here dharma comprises all noble human values. — Prof Rao
So, the human being is:
A. The body
B. The psyche: (1) cognition (sense perception, attention, memory, imagination, thinking); (2) emotions and feelings; (3) the will (practical activity).
C. The spirit (see above), including the “I” and (potentially) super-consciousness.
The main need of human mind is the conscious mental activity.
9. The Contradiction is the essence of the Man
As everything in the Universe, the Man in his essence is contradiction; his being, his inner and outer life appears as a plenty of various contradictions.
10. Now we can observe a very strange thing: many thousands of psychologists and of anthropologists – they are all the profis! – had arrived in two last centuries not so much results in the man-knowledge (see above). And in contrary: not many non-professional personalities – Buddha Shakymuni, Nitzshe and others are well-known authors of the wisdom — of Dhammapada, etc. Why is it so?
The Conclusion and Definition of the Man:
11. As we all know, there are the four goals or values of human life, (skt. purusharthas – dharma, kama, artha and Moksha.) There are also the four states of the Atman: jagrat, svapna, sushupti and caturtha.
Moksha, caturtha are the ultimate reality (parama-artha), and the Man has the ability of realization of the Reality, of Super-Mind, of Super-consciousness.
DEFINITION. The essence of Man – in active consciousness, which transcends himself and goes to super-consciousness (skt. paramartha, ultimate reality), which in his nature indefinable, since it beyond (transcends) the words and thoughts (skt. avanmanasagocaram)…