Have you ever wondered what the ratio of biological and social in a person is, how to find it? The article will be devoted specifically to this philosophical topic, which has been considered many times by many prominent figures. Why talk about it? This is necessary for those people who are interested in their psychology, who want to know themselves from different angles. In other cases, you will just be interested in learning something new about yourself. Forward!
What is a person?
In order to understand the biological and social in a person's personality, one must first understand what a person is. Philosophy and other sciences give very different definitions, which are basically the same, but their wording is very different. In order not to get confused in this, we give the most capacious and precise definition. Man is a complex concept that means belonging to the human race, which individually and to varying degrees combines the biological and social principles. In other words, it turns out that a person is a biosocial being.
What is modern man?
Every baby that is born is already a biosocial being. This is due to the fact that he is born in the circle of socialized beings, and not in the jungle, for example. Thus, it turns out that the baby from childhood gradually absorbs all social norms. He may not understand or be aware of them, but they will still influence his behavior to one degree or another. A person is born with underdeveloped qualities that develop in the process of life in society. Moreover, such a fact as heredity cannot be discarded. It gives the child not only a certain set of biological properties, but also endows him with human qualities, such as curiosity, feelings of joy and sadness, and imitation. For example, a person smiles because it is an innate quality, but he is consciously smiled by the surrounding social world in which he is located.
You should also pay attention to the human mind. It is known that it is not innate, but nature creates all the conditions for it to develop. Conscious reactions of a person can be formed only if he is brought up, trained, masters some skills and learns cultures. Only thanks to society, a person has the opportunity for spiritual development, communication through speech, etc.
Socialization in society
When a person "acquires" social qualities, this means that the process of socialization is taking place. It is important to understand that even those qualities that are inherent in one individual are the result of a rethinking of cultural values that already exist in a certain society. In other words, it is a double process that is both an expression and an embodiment of the inner qualities of a person.
Man, as a product of the biological and social components, is in some conflict with society, which imposes exclusively social norms. This conflict is natural, since a person can realize himself only in society, but, on the other hand, he is a product of the natural environment. At each stage of human development, balancing the biological and social in the life of man and society was a kind of ideal to which one should strive. Man and society cannot exist separately, as they are complementary parts of one whole. Society is an expression and consolidation of the essence of man, his ways of life. It will be such as the people who form it are. Yes, a person came out of nature, but the society in which he is formed and which he himself forms gives him the opportunity to become a cultured person.
Important issues in society
The biological and social nature of man should coexist, not fight. Society should pay attention not only to the development of the social qualities of a person, but also to his biological improvement. That is why one of the main issues in society is the health of all its members. Only biological health can allow a person to become an active member of society, create a strong family, fight for something, achieve heights, improve, improve the world around. If this basic factor does not exist, then social life will be indifferent to a person.
There is a very interesting relationship here. We found out that without health, a person does not need anything in life. The most interesting thing is that if an individual is completely healthy, but deprived of a social environment, then he not only loses his skills, but also degrades at the biological level. In other words, a person deprived of society not only morally decays, but also loses his physical advantages. In many cases, this serves to encourage people to exhibit antisocial behavior, aggression, and crime.
Thanks to society, a person can realize his natural nature, but he is also obliged to obey the laws of the society in which he lives. A person must understand that society is not something distant and incomprehensible, but it is the opinion of each individual who also wants to express himself. Speaking against society, the individual not only violates the overall harmony of relations, but also causes great damage to himself, because he forgets that he is also part of society.
Biological and social factors
The social and biological in man have an equally important force. In order to maximize all his beginnings, a person must strive to balance both of his parts. To do this, they must be clearly separated. Man was able to stand out from the animal world thanks to two groups of factors: biological and social. Biological features include the development of the skull, upright posture, the development of hands, the ability to speak articulately. Social factors are labor, thinking, collectivism, communication, language. Everyone knows that a large role belongs to labor, since it was he who served to the greatest extent in the process of becoming a person. In this example, one can disassemble the close relationship between social and biological: bipedalism freed the hands of man in order to be able to make tools. At the same time, a change in the structure of the hand allowed a person to use the tools he created. Moreover, joint work contributed to the development of social communication skills among members of the tribe. The advent of language helped people express complex things, think bigger, and plan at a more elementary level. A huge advantage of the emergence of the language is that it allowed the transfer of accumulated knowledge through generations, to preserve history and increase experience. Thus, it turns out that the social and biological in man has a very close relationship since the development of the human race, and it is impossible to separate these two principles.
Biological features
We briefly discussed both factors above, but each separately should also be given attention. Biological features are all that somehow brings the individual closer to the animal world. This includes the following: heredity, instincts (sexual, self-preservation, etc.), emotions, biological needs (breathing, sleep, food), similar physiological structure with many mammals (internal organs, hormones, constant body temperature), procreation, adaptability.
Social features
The social factors of human development include the following: awareness of one's needs, the ability to change the world, creative and mental activity, creation, spiritual development (morality, art), social needs (communication, love, friendship). Such features are unique to humans. Yes, in the animal world, too, you can often find something similar: for example, when animals save each other, raise other people's cubs. This is indeed inherent in the animal world, but this is only one aspect, because we cannot talk about creativity and morality. Again, we conclude that the social and biological in a person are one and inseparable, therefore a person from the moment of his birth in society becomes a biosocial being. It turns out that there is no difference in how to approach this question, because the answer is the same from all sides. But when were these thoughts formed?
The unity of biological and social in man
The idea that the two factors are a single whole did not immediately form: this was preceded by a long path of speculation and conjecture. Man as a product of the biological and social component began to form a very long time ago, but he himself began to think about it relatively recently. We will not delve into the most ancient times, but take the Enlightenment as an example. At that time, almost all thinkers shared the social and natural principles, but the first was considered not natural and necessary, but artificial and temporary. It was believed that morality, traditions, spiritual needs are just attributes that are not of particular importance. During the Enlightenment, such concepts as "natural morality" and "natural law" appeared.
What is meant by natural? It was a kind of foundation, which meant the correctness of the entire social order. Social norms were considered secondary and directly dependent on natural moments. Thinkers insisted that the ratio of the biological and the social in a person cannot be the same: the social (artificial) has always been less significant and more dependent. This statement was not even subject to dispute, because it was considered normal if a person acts on the basis of his selfish intentions, and only then “thinks” by the standards of society.
Darwinism
Biological and social in human development also worried scientists in the second half of the 19th century. It was then that one could hear more and more about social Darwinism. Man as a product of biological and social evolution was viewed very one-sidedly. Theories were that the ideas of natural selection in nature extended to the social life of people. These principles were formed by the English scientist Charles Darwin. The emergence of society and all stages of its development could only be considered within the clear boundaries of evolution. He believed that social inequality, rigidity and struggle are natural and necessary, just like in the animal world. He insisted that it is beneficial for each individual and for society as a whole.
In the last century, attempts to explain the nature of man only through biology continued. Worthy of attention are the views of the French thinker, naturalist and priest P. T. de Chardin. He argued that man represents the development of the whole world only on a tiny scale. It all boiled down to the fact that nature, developing, finds its final expression in man. In other words, it can be formulated as follows: "Man is the crown of nature." Human biological and social factors were considered complementary, but not equivalent. P. Teilhard de Chardin emphasized that nature reaches its highest point in man and after that, through man, begins the path of its conscious development.
present tense
Today, the biological and social evolution of man has ceased to be a topic of contention for the scientific community. It is generally accepted that man is a biosocial being. At the same time, the role of the social factor is by no means belittled. His role, on the contrary, is emphasized as the role of a decisive factor for society.
To date, hardly anyone will decide to reflect on the biological prerequisites for the emergence of man. For a long time it has been considered that a person is very dependent on many factors of nature (solar activity, natural disasters, magnetic storms), so it is not advisable to deny this relationship. It took many years for modern man to become what he is now. Neither biological nor social factors should be underestimated. Not a single group of factors by itself could bring a person to the stage of development at which he is now. The problem of the biological and social in a person should be individual, because each person is born with a certain set of biological characteristics and in a certain social system. It is these factors, with a deeper study of them, that explain the great differences in upbringing, life, and culture between different peoples. The ratio of biological and social in a person is determined in each case separately, depending on a huge variety of related factors (family, country, upbringing, cultural environment, nationality, etc.). All this must be taken into account in order to formulate judgments as accurately as possible.
Summing up the results of the article, I would like to say that the social and biological in a person is formed depending on many factors. The social part always prevails in an adult, conscious person, so he is able to change himself and the world around him.
BACKGROUND OF ANTHROPOGENESIS. Summarizing the observations of his predecessors and relying on the achievements of contemporary science, Vladimir Ivanovich Vernadsky (1863-1945) formulated the following theory of the functioning of life on Earth. The main generator and source of energy consumed by biological organisms on our planet is the Sun. Reaching the earth's surface, solar energy through photosynthesis is processed by plants into biological energy and in this form is accumulated by them. Plants serve as food for herbivores, herbivores for carnivores.
The reproduction of flora, i.e., the plant world, is possible provided that the biomass of plants is at least 10 times greater than the biomass of herbivores, and the reproduction of herbivores - if their biomass is at least 10 times greater than the biomass of predators. Fluctuations in solar activity result in a reduction or increase in plant biomass. Depending on this, the number of animals decreases or increases.
Initially, the reproduction of people (and we belong to omnivores) completely depended on the pattern described above. From the moment when it began to overcome it, we can date the birth of human society. This process was associated with the formation of modern man and his isolation from the animal world.
Turning to this problem, the problem of anthropogenesis, it is necessary to take into account those features of a person that not only distinguish him from other animals, but also bring him closer to them. First of all, it concerns the language. Language as a means of communication exists in many animals.
However, human language is the most perfect. Many animals with a central nervous system are primitively conscious. Human consciousness is characterized by a much higher level of development. Man is a social animal. At the same time, other animals also have elements of collectivism, although the degree of development of human social life cannot be compared with them. It is also known that a number of animals are engaged in labor activities. If we talk about its difference from human labor activity, we can only talk about the nature of its organization and effectiveness. Finally, it has been proven that even the use of tools is not a distinctive feature of man. They are used by some species of monkeys. But the use of tools among them is not of a regular nature. More importantly, they use only tools of natural origin.
Thus, a number of qualities that, it would seem, distinguish people from other animals exist in them in their infancy. With the development of these qualities, the formation of a person of the modern type was connected. Therefore, to solve the problem of anthropogenesis means to explain how human speech arose, how human consciousness was formed, how human society developed, why man embarked on the path of making tools.
In this regard, it is noteworthy that a person as a biological organism is a natural chemical laboratory. Chemical reactions require strictly defined temperature conditions. Depending on the mechanism of heat exchange, animals are divided into two groups: cold-blooded and warm-blooded. In animals of the first group, body temperature can fluctuate at considerable intervals. This allows them to function in different temperature conditions and does not require significant energy consumption for heat exchange.
The situation is different with warm-blooded animals, in which the body temperature is maintained at approximately the same level. So, in humans, it is 36.6 ° C. A deviation of literally 1-2 ° C can give rise to a painful condition, and a deviation of 5-6 ° C is fraught with death. In this regard, warm-blooded animals can exist only at a certain air temperature. For any person, this critical level is O ° C, the freezing point of water. For a primitive man who lived in natural conditions and did not know clothes, it should not fall below +10 ... +15 ° С.
Therefore, primitive man could only live in areas with a warm climate.
It is also significant that we are forced to spend more than 90% of the energy we consume on maintaining body temperature. Moreover, per unit of live weight, we spend more heat than other animals with a central nervous system. This means that the biological characteristics of a person require him to display greater vital activity, i.e., greater activity in obtaining food.
And since a person is an omnivore, getting meat food in ancient times depended largely on his physical data. Meanwhile, he was not able to keep up with many animals, had neither sharp claws nor powerful fangs that allowed him to fight with other animals, and then tear his prey apart. For this reason, primitive man had to either be content with carrion, or hunt only small animals. Under such conditions, the need for food of animal origin could first stimulate the primitive man to turn to tools of labor of natural origin, and then prompt him to think about the possibility of making them.
This was facilitated by the fact that our behavior is regulated by two types of reflexes: innate and acquired. The action of congenital reflexes is mainly associated with the functioning of internal organs. Labor activity is based on conditioned or acquired reflexes. And although conditioned reflexes are not inherited, a person’s knowledge of the world around them and his work experience can be transferred from one individual to another in the order of personal communication (upbringing and education), which allows a person to accumulate knowledge about the world around him and improve his experience. .
How did this process develop at the stage of anthropogenesis? There are two completely different approaches to solving this problem. One of them is associated with the name of the French scientist Georges Cuvier (1769-1832), the other with the name of the English scientist Charles Darwin (1809-1882).
According to Charles Darwin, the evolution of the animal world is based on the struggle for existence, which leads to natural selection, and natural selection - to the transformation of individual animal species. So, Ch. Darwin believed, the monkey evolved and turned into a man. However, as genetic studies have shown, the transformation of one animal species into another through natural selection is impossible. Such a transformation, which is based on a sharp change (mutation) of hereditary traits, suggests a different mechanism.
Unlike C. Darwin, J. Cuvier believed that all major changes in the animal world are the result of global changes that took place on our planet and were catastrophic for the plant and animal world. These could be climate changes, including temperature, the Earth's magnetic field, radiation and some other changes, about which we don't even know yet.
In this regard, the so-called “glacial theory” is of particular interest, according to which, under the influence of changes in solar activity, our planet has experienced a number of major climate changes, as a result of which the ice sheet that exists in the regions of the North and South Poles has repeatedly expanded and led to reduction of the territory with a climate favorable for the habitation of primitive man.
Climate change on the planet is associated not only with solar activity. Here is the opinion of experts on this matter: “The globe, during its rotation around the Sun, makes oscillatory movements, and the poles move slowly; thanks to such fluctuations, the imaginary earthly axis, passing through the poles, annually turns somewhat to the side, towards new regions of celestial space. Due to this constant change in the direction of the earth's axis, there is a change in the position of the earth's equator relative to the Sun, so that every year the March equinox begins 16 minutes earlier than in the previous year. As the earth's axis turns invariably over a long series of centuries, after a period of one hundred and five centuries the conditions of the seasons in both hemispheres will be completely changed. The hemisphere that previously received the greatest amount of heat will receive less, and the hemisphere that had more winter days will receive more light and heat, and in this hemisphere summer will be longer than winter. As established, “9252 BC was the coldest year for the entire northern hemisphere; then the temperature of the northern hemisphere gradually increased, in order to begin its movement in the opposite direction again in 1248, which in 11747 will reach its climax.
The climate changes that took place on the planet resulted in the death of some individuals of primitive man and the painful adaptation to new conditions of others.
SOLIDATION OF MAN FROM THE ANIMAL WORLD. The question of the beginning and main stages of anthropogenesis still remains clearly insufficiently developed. All researchers agree that our ancestor could be driopithecus (literally, a tree monkey), which lived in the tropics and subtropics several million years ago. Dryopithecus lived in trees and ate plant food. Later (according to some data - 5 million, according to others - 1 million years ago), a type of primitive man was formed, called Australopithecus (which means southern man). He differed from his predecessor in that he moved on two limbs, ate meat and was familiar with stone tools.
Some researchers believe that these tools were artificial. According to others, they were of natural origin. The question of how regularly Australopithecus used them also remains unclear. In any case, from this moment on, stone tools enter the life of primitive man. The time of their use was called the "Stone Age". The Stone Age is divided into three periods: the Paleolithic (Old Stone Age), the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age) and the Neolithic (New Stone Age). In turn, the Paleolithic is divided into three periods: early (lower), middle and late (upper). There is still no unity among researchers in determining their chronological framework. Apparently, the closest to the truth is the point of view of Valery Pavlovich Alekseev and Abram Isaakovich Pershits, who write: “For most of the ecumene, the Lower Paleolithic ended approximately 100 thousand years ago, the Middle Paleolithic - 45-40 thousand years, the Upper Paleolithic - 12-10 thousand, the Mesolithic - not earlier than 8 thousand and the Neolithic - not earlier than 5 thousand years ago.
Of particular importance for primitive man was the mastery of fire. Throughout their existence, animals have repeatedly become both witnesses and victims of fires. The latter circumstance, apparently, led to the fact that the fear of fire acquired an almost innate character in animals. But something made the primitive man overcome this feeling in himself and approach the fire. As a result, from an enemy, fire turned into a helper of man and opened up opportunities for him that no other animal has.
Firstly, a person received a new, additional type of energy at his disposal, therefore, from that moment on, the growth of his energy supply began. Secondly, the fire in the hands of man turned into a weapon with which he became stronger than any predatory beast. Thirdly, if before that a person could only use the mechanical processing of stone, now the possibility of heat treatment has appeared, which meant a significant increase in productivity in the manufacture of tools. Fourthly, fire has made it possible to use for food a number of plants, the consumption of which in the raw form is impossible or possible in very limited quantities. Fifth, cooking over fire increased the digestibility of food and thereby reduced the amount of food required to get the amount of calories a person needs. Sixth, from that moment on, new opportunities opened up in the processing of animal skins, as well as other materials that could be used to make clothes, shoes, and some household items. Seventh, mastery of fire leads not only to the development of natural shelters (for example, caves), but also to the construction of buildings. This, as well as the appearance of clothing, allowed man to go beyond the tropics and subtropics and begin settling the planet. This circumstance should be emphasized, since animals are characterized by the fact that they can live only in certain natural and climatic conditions. Eighth, overcoming the fear of fire was the first step towards the suppression of animal instincts by man and the formation of a new type of behavior, completely uncharacteristic of other animals.
All this, taken together, gives reason to consider the mastery of fire as a revolutionary upheaval in the life of primitive man. It is significant that in many nations this fact formed the basis of legends. Recall at least the ancient Greek myth of Prometheus. The question of when exactly man managed to master fire remains open. According to some sources, this happened about 700, according to others - 400 thousand years ago.
But it took a long time before the use of fire became commonplace. The fact is that initially only fire of natural origin, which arose as a result of a thunderstorm, volcanic eruptions, and spontaneous combustion of some mineral and organic substances, was available to man. Unable to artificially obtain and renew fire, those few primitive people who managed to master it had to maintain it continuously. The loss of fire, and it happened repeatedly, threw back the emerging human society. This continued until attention was paid to the heat generated by friction and the sparks struck by flint. There was a technology of artificial production of fire. From that moment on, the use of fire began to spread throughout the planet, and the changes that began under its influence in the life of primitive man became irreversible.
It is quite possible that they were reflected in its biological evolution. Australopithecus, who lived before man mastered fire, had a brain of up to 600 cm 3 and in this respect did not differ much from some species of monkeys. Not later than 700 thousand years ago, a Pithecanthropus (monkey-man) was formed, whose brain was about 900 cm 3. The brain of a Neanderthal man who lived between 250-40 thousand years ago reached 1400 cm 3 . Approximately 40-30 thousand years ago, a modern type of man was formed, called Home sapiens, or "reasonable man." The volume of his brain was already equal to 1500 cm 3, which corresponds to the volume of the brain of a modern person.
The formation of "reasonable man" was associated with the appearance of his speech and a completely different level of consciousness. This was reflected in the birth of art (rock art) and ideology (religion). At the heart of the emergence of religious ideas lay, on the one hand, the desire of primitive man to understand the world that surrounded him, and on the other hand, the desire to influence him. This is how the first magical rites were born, with the help of which a person tried to protect himself from the elemental forces of nature and ensure a more successful extraction of food. One of the first religious cults was the cult of the hunting animal. The emergence of religion was an important event in the birth of spiritual culture.
The mastery of fire and the formation of a man of the modern type contributed to the improvement of his productive activity. Australopithecus and Pithecanthropus, who lived in the early Paleolithic period, had at their disposal about 20 types of stone tools, which were different types of axes. The Neanderthal was already aware of 60 types of tools. Moreover, side-scrapers, pointed points, bone needles and awls appeared along with hand axes. It was at this time that man began to produce the first composite tools (knives) and tools for making tools. Homo sapiens in the late Paleolithic period (40-12 thousand years ago) used more than 90 types of tools. Compound tools began to occupy a special place among them. There is an improvement of knives, stone axes and spears with stone tips appear. A man comes out of the caves and starts building wooden buildings.
If it is purely theoretically assumed that all types of tools known to us were created in a certain sequence, i.e. one after the other, it turns out that in the first case it took at least 30 thousand years, in the second - 1 thousand years, in the third is about 300 years old. On the one hand, we have a picture of accelerating technological progress. On the other hand, it must be admitted that for a long time this progress was almost identical to stagnation.
More rapid changes occur in the Mesolithic (10-6 thousand BC). At this time, a bow with arrows, a club, a boomerang, a harpoon, a fishing hook, a fishing line, pottery, a chisel, a dugout boat appeared, weaving was born.
PRIMITIVE SOCIETY. Initially, man led a lifestyle that did not fundamentally differ from the lifestyle of other animals. In particular, he ate at the expense of what nature gave him: he was engaged in gathering, hunting and fishing.
The imperfection of people as predators did not always allow them to hunt and fish alone. Moreover, since the forests were once teeming with predatory animals, even gathering alone was not safe. This forced primitive people to live in groups and jointly obtain food. This also determined the relationship that developed between them.
The earliest form of their association, apparently, was a primitive herd, which was later replaced by a tribal community. The clan united several dozen people. Its gradual expansion led to the branching off of other tribal groups from it. As a result, a union of several clans arose - a tribe. The composition of the tribe fluctuated within a few hundred people. The growth of a tribe made it inevitable that other tribes would separate from it, which, as a rule, resulted not only in the isolation, but also in the isolation of new collectives.
The reason for this was as follows. The appropriating economy could exist without disturbing the reproduction process in the animal and plant world, depending on natural and climatic conditions, with a population density most often not higher than 0.3-0.5 people / km 2, or at a ratio of 2-3 km 2 / person The economic territory of the genus within 50 people. should have been at least 100 km 2, and a tribe of 500 people - at least 1000 thousand km 2. In the first case, the radius of activity exceeded 5, in the second - 18 km. Obviously, already within the tribe, as it grew, the ties between clans began to weaken. Regular contacts between individual tribes, and even more so their joint activities, were impossible.
The evolution of the primitive collective was accompanied by the transformation of the relationship between its individual members, associated with obtaining and distributing food, as well as with the organization and management of the collective itself. Since labor at that time had a collective character, there was no individual ownership of its results. The right of ownership means the right to own, use and dispose of material values. What even a single person managed to get belonged to the whole team.
The oldest way to distribute food was to eat it together. In one case, a piece of meat was passed around in a circle, and each cut off as much as he considered acceptable. In the other, vegetable food went in a circle, in the third - a vessel with a drink. Some experts call this form of distribution collapsible-communalist. At this stage, the food was in the full ownership of the collective, and everyone had more or less equal rights to it.
Over time, the analysis begins to be preceded by a section. In some communities, food was originally shared between men and women. The isolation of the genus and the emergence of families within it entailed the preliminary division of food between families.
It is widely believed that the appropriating economy could give a person only the necessary minimum means of subsistence. In fact, it was also able to provide an excess of food. But the complete dependence of its receipt on natural and climatic conditions led to the fact that periods of abundance of food alternated with periods when a person was on the verge of starvation. In such conditions, cannibalism or cannibalism was not uncommon.
More important is something else. Initially, human food consisted of perishable products (meat, fish, vegetables, fruits). Therefore, the main problem was not the impossibility of obtaining, but the impossibility of preserving excess food. This circumstance contributed to the emergence and spread of such a phenomenon as gift exchange. If the primitive collective could not consume all the products prepared by it, it shared them with others. This is how one of the oldest forms of realization of the surplus product arose.
Gradually, gift exchange, sharing, and sharing of food begin to be regulated. In the family, these functions were performed by the head of the family, in the tribal community - by the clan master, or elder, in the tribe - by the leader. .
In ancient times, social needs were mainly determined by personal needs. Their growth was mainly due to population growth. With this in mind, two stages can be distinguished in the development of the appropriating economy. In the first of them, the rate of population growth approximately corresponded to the rate of development of new lands. At the second stage, as the reserve of free and convenient lands for the appropriating economy is exhausted, the rate of their development begins to lag behind the rate of population growth (Table 1). And as a result of this, a crisis of the appropriating economy develops.
Table 1
Land endowment dynamics
Those tribes that previously faced the crisis of the appropriating economy became generators of mass migrations or aggression. The exhaustion of this possibility opened before them three prospects - extinction, subjugation or extermination by other tribes, transition to a productive economy. Not all peoples who found themselves in such a position could make this transition. Such a possibility existed only where there were wild animals and plants that were suitable for consumption and could be domesticated.
The total population density of the planet, at which an appropriating economy is impossible, was reached by the 3rd millennium BC. e. Meanwhile, for a long time the territory inhabited by primitive man (his remains were found in the eastern part of Africa, in the south of Asia and in Europe) did not exceed 40 thousand km 2, i.e. 30% of the planet. With this in mind, the exhaustion of the possibilities of the appropriating economy in the zone inhabited by primitive man could have occurred by the 5th millennium BC. e. And if we take into account the uneven distribution of primitive people in their habitat, in some places the crisis of the appropriating economy could begin in the Mesolithic and even in the Late Paleolithic. It was then, between 50 and 10 thousand years BC. e., man appeared in Australia and America.
Initially, people settled along the banks of rivers and lakes. This was due to several reasons. First, man needed fresh water. Secondly, here he had one of the sources of food (fishing). Thirdly, the banks of rivers and lakes served as a natural defense against predatory animals and people. In addition, for a long time it was the rivers that were the main transport arteries that people used. Therefore, the resettlement of people on the planet was associated with the development of river valleys.
What allowed man to stand out from the animal world? The main factors of anthropogenesis can be divided as follows:
· biological factors- upright posture, development of the hand, a large and developed brain, the ability to articulate speech;
· main social factors- work and collective activity, thinking, language and communication, morality.
Work of the factors listed above played a leading role in the process of becoming a person; his example shows the relationship of other biological and social factors. So, bipedalism freed the hands for the use and manufacture of tools, and the structure of the hand (thumb spaced, flexibility) made it possible to use these tools effectively. In the process of joint work, close relations developed between the members of the team, which led to the establishment of group interaction, care for members of the tribe (morality), and the need for communication (the appearance of speech). Language contributed development of thinking, expressing more and more complex concepts; the development of thinking, in turn, enriched the language with new words. The language also allowed the transfer of experience from generation to generation, preserving and increasing the knowledge of mankind.
Thus, modern man is a product of the interaction of biological and social factors.
Under it biological features they understand what brings a person closer to an animal (with the exception of the factors of anthropogenesis, which were the basis for separating a person from the kingdom of nature), - hereditary traits; the presence of instincts (self-preservation, sexual, etc.); emotions; biological needs (breathe, eat, sleep, etc.); physiological features similar to other mammals (the presence of the same internal organs, hormones, constant body temperature); the ability to use natural objects; adaptation to the environment, procreation.
Social features characteristic exclusively for man - the ability to produce tools; articulate speech; language; social needs (communication, affection, friendship, love); spiritual needs (morality, religion, art); awareness of their needs; activity (labour, art, etc.) as the ability to transform the world; consciousness; the ability to think; creation; creation; goal setting.
A person cannot be reduced solely to social qualities, since biological prerequisites are necessary for his development. But it cannot be reduced to biological features either, since one can become a person only in society. Biological and social are inseparably merged in a person, which makes him special. biosocial being.
Ideas about the unity of the biological and social in the development of man did not form immediately.
Without delving into distant antiquity, we recall that in the Enlightenment, many thinkers, differentiating the natural and the social, considered the latter as "artificially" created by man, including here almost all the attributes of social life - spiritual needs, social institutions, morality, traditions and customs. It was during this period that concepts such as "natural law", "natural equality", "natural morality".
The natural, or natural, was considered as the foundation, the basis for the correctness of the social order. There is no need to emphasize that the social played a sort of secondary role and was directly dependent on the natural environment. In the second half of the XIX century. various theories of social Darwinism, the essence of which lies in attempts to extend to public life principles of natural selection and the struggle for existence in wildlife, formulated by the English naturalist Charles Darwin. The emergence of society, its development were considered only within the framework of evolutionary changes that occur independently of the will of people. Naturally, everything that happens in society, including social inequality, the strict laws of social struggle, was considered by them as necessary, useful both for society as a whole and for its individual individuals.
In the XX century. attempts at a biologizing "explanation" of the essence of man and his social qualities do not stop. As an example, one can cite the phenomenology of a person by the famous French thinker and naturalist, by the way, the clergyman P. Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955). According to Teilhard, man embodies and concentrates in himself all the development of the world. Nature, in the course of its historical development, acquires its meaning in man. In it, it reaches, as it were, its highest biological development, and at the same time it also acts as a kind of beginning of its conscious, and, consequently, social development.
At present, the opinion about the biosocial nature of man has been established in science. At the same time, the social is not only not belittled, but its decisive role in the selection of Homo sapiens from the animal world and its transformation into a social being is noted. Now hardly anyone dares to deny biological prerequisites for the emergence of man. Even without resorting to scientific evidence, but guided by the simplest observations and generalizations, it is not difficult to detect a person's huge dependence on natural changes - magnetic storms in the atmosphere, solar activity, earthly elements and disasters.
In the formation, existence of man, and this has already been said before, a huge role belongs to social factors, such as labor, relationships between people, their political and social institutions. None of them by itself, taken separately, could lead to the emergence of man, his separation from the animal world.
Each person is unique and this is also predetermined by his nature, in particular, by the unique set of genes inherited from his parents. It must also be said that the physical differences that exist between people are primarily predetermined by biological differences. First of all, these are the differences between the two sexes - men and women, which can be attributed to the number of the most significant differences between people. There are other physical differences - skin color, eyes, body structure, which are mainly due to geographical and climatic factors. It is these factors, as well as the unequal conditions of historical development and the system of education, that largely explain the differences in everyday life, psychology, and the social status of the peoples of different countries. And yet, despite these rather fundamental differences in their biology, physiology and mental potencies, the people of our planet are generally equal. The achievements of modern science convincingly show that there is no reason to assert the superiority of any race over another.
The social in man- this is, first of all, tool-production activity, collectivist forms of life with a division of duties between individuals, language, thinking, social and political activity. It is known that Homo sapiens as a person and personality cannot exist outside of human communities. Cases are described when small children, for various reasons, fell under the care of animals, “brought up” by them, and when they returned to people after several years in the animal world, it took them years to adapt to a new social environment. Finally, the social life of a person cannot be imagined without his social and political activity. As a matter of fact, as noted earlier, a person's life itself is social, since he constantly interacts with people - at home, at work, during leisure. How does the biological and social correlate in determining the essence and nature of man? Modern science unequivocally answers this - only in unity. Indeed, without biological prerequisites, it would be difficult to imagine the appearance of hominids, but without social conditions, the formation of man was impossible. It is no longer a secret to anyone that pollution of the environment, the human habitat poses a threat to the biological existence of Homo sapiens. Summing up, we can say that now, like many millions of years ago, the physical condition of a person, his existence to a decisive extent depend on the state of nature. In general, it can be argued that now, as with the appearance of Homo sapiens, its existence is ensured by the unity of the biological and social.
The problem of anthroposociogenesis. The rapid development of modern science, the emergence of new branches and research methods, facts and hypotheses lead to a certain fragmentation of the problem, but this, in turn, exacerbates the need for their generalization and integration at the philosophical level. According to a number of experts, one of the aspects of this integrity is the dialectical connection the main interacting components of the process of anthroposociogenesis: ecological(external), anthropological(anatomical and morphological) and social. The connecting link of the first two components is mainly the restructuring of the life of higher anthropoids, and the anthropological and social factor is the emerging work, consciousness and speech.
The most important feature of anthroposociogenesis is its complex nature.. Therefore, it would be fundamentally wrong to assert that first "labor arose", "then" - society, and "even later" - language, thinking and consciousness.
Different schools, recognizing the role of labor, give it a different place in the process of becoming a person, but even if we recognize work as a central anthropogenetic factor, it only means that in connection with it, articulate speech, and community life, and the beginnings of rational thinking are formed. But labor itself has a genesis, turning into a full-fledged subject-practical activity only in interaction with such factors of socialization as language, consciousness, morality, mythology, ritual practice, etc. So, for example, there is evidence that the production of the simplest tools began 1–1.5 million years earlier than speech and thinking appeared. For a long time it developed in "animal form", i.e. inside a herd of hominids, not yet similar to the human community. However, it would probably be unjustified to attribute a direct socio-creative function to such production. It only created an objective need in society, which could not be realized without the help of language, the simplest cultural and moral norms, and developing categorical thinking.
Soviet psychologist A.S. Vygotsky showed that language, understood in a narrow sense as a specialized information-sign activity (speech), on the one hand, has a pronounced objective character, on the other hand, it itself ensures the successful development of the subject-practical activity of people. Language does not just passively fix objects and meanings that have appeared independently of it, but participates in the creation of an objective environment and the social unity of people. In primitive societies, one of the simplest speech acts - naming - was a sacred, ritual act that brought the participants together, thereby contributing to the creation of sociality. In addition, with the help of naming, the external environment was for the first time divided into groups of practically significant objects, such important practical categories as housing, clothing, utensils, etc. were singled out. And this means that object-practical activity in the full sense of the word could not have been formed before the appearance of language.
A huge role in the process of anthroposociogenesis was also played by the radical change in the marriage system. There are striking differences in reproduction between the animal herd and the simplest form of human community - the primitive tribal community. The herd is based on endogamy, which severely limits the ability of its members to choose mating partners among members of other herds. As a result, offspring are reproduced due to closely related sexual relations. The community is based on the principles of agamy (the exclusion of closely related marital contacts) and exogamy. The reasons for the transition to exogamy are not yet clear. One of the hypotheses put forward by genetic anthropologists points to the possibility of powerful mutations, most likely caused by increased radiation exposure, since a herd with a fairly limited gene pool is most sensitive to mutagenic factors (mutations in herd animals usually lead to the most detrimental consequences). There is also reason to believe that the next exogamy was motivated by the need for an intra-herd world. In order to put an end to the murderous, gun-armed sexual competition of males, it was necessary to make the “harem of females” a draw, i.e. impose a ban on all sexual intercourse within their group (this was reinforced by totem cults). As a result, marriage ties ceased to be a means of reproducing the herd community and were subject to a certain socio-cultural order, although presented irrationally.
Taboo on closely related relationships- one of the first moral and social prohibitions that arose in antiquity and has retained its significance to this day. Moral and social prohibitions differ significantly from herd instincts of any degree of complexity: they concern all members of the tribal community, while in the herd prohibitions exist only for the weakest individuals; they are irreducible to the instinct of self-preservation, dictating actions to a person, sometimes individually harmful; the violation of the prohibition is followed by inevitable punishment (the community turns away from the criminal, expels him from the tribe, etc.). Already in the most ancient communities, such moral and social requirements as a ban on incest, on the murder of a tribesman, the requirement to maintain the life of any of the tribesmen, regardless of his adaptability to life, are known. These requirements differ significantly from developed morality, but they still retain their significance, forming the foundation on which all the diversity of moral values and norms is created.
The development of the moral consciousness of mankind is at the same time continuity in relation to the simplest moral requirements, and overcoming their limited meaning. In this way, in the course of anthroposociogenesis, an irreversible transition to human moral existence took place.
The social and moral unity of the community and industrial and economic cooperation have opened up the possibility of meaningful work with strict collective discipline and devotion to the community. In the process of labor activity, the will and constructive abilities of people, their intellect and imagination were already formed, the variety of attitudes to the environment and to each other grew. Evidence of this is the so-called "neolithic revolution"- the transition from gathering and hunting to production life support (agriculture, cattle breeding, handicraft). Over the course of several millennia, people mastered fire, tamed animals, invented the wheel, switched from a nomadic to a sedentary lifestyle. Large tribal unions were formed, extensive migrations began, and so on. The "Neolithic Revolution" for the first time revealed an accelerating industrial and technological progress, which never stopped after that.
a person is initially active and his properties are closely related to the development of objective activity;
· A person separated from society (other people, from human tools, knowledge and skills) is absolutely helpless. Only as a member of society is man protected from the elemental forces of nature;
A person is distinguished by the supra-biological, supra-instinctive, conscious-volitional nature of life activity.
We know that a person has two programs - instinctive and socio-cultural. According to its bodily organization and physiological functions, man belongs to the animal world. The existence of animals is determined by instincts and they are not able to go beyond their instincts. Man has lost his original homeland - nature. Sociality, cultural standards dictate other patterns of behavior to him. The development of culture has allowed man to overcome the voice of instincts and develop a unique system of reference points that are extra-natural in nature. That is why, as many Soviet philosophers believe, the instincts in a person are weakened. They are superseded by purely human needs and motives, "cultivated". But the latest research shows that the weak expression of instincts is not caused by the development of sociality (in any case, the human ancestor had "muffled" undeveloped instincts, this manifested his inferiority as a biological being). V.M. Vilchek proposed an original version of anthropogenesis, the essence of which is that man, as a biological being, was doomed to extinction, because his instincts were poorly developed even before the emergence of social history.
However, nature is able to offer every living species many chances, for a person this chance has become the ability to unconsciously imitate animals. Turning first into one, then into another creature, as a result, a person not only resisted, but gradually developed a system of guidelines that were built on top of instincts, supplementing them in their own way. The defect gradually turned into a virtue, into an original means of adaptation to the environment.
The uniqueness of man, according to many authors, in particular P.S. Gurevich lies not at all in the fact that he is the most perfect biological creation (we have just talked about the opposite), but in the problem of the correlation between the rational and emotional spheres of the human psyche.
In the history of philosophy, as we have seen, man is considered not only by analogy with an animal, but also by likening him to a machine. Essentially, the point is to find out how the intellectual and corporal correlate in a person. In modern philosophical and sociological literature, there is an attempt to connect the data of paleoanthropology with the latest information science. Thus, in an article by the Japanese scientist I. Masuda, it is noted that a person moved away from an animal only when he gained intelligence. In his opinion, the development of the frontal lobe, the complex speech organ and the extraordinary use of fingers are the anthropological features that characterize modern man. These qualities suggest an analogy with a computer. The original properties of the human mind, as the author believes, have created a well-known "fusion" of genetic evolution and cultural history. Human genes influence the formation of the mind. That, in turn, allows you to think about human nature and modify it. This is where the intellect comes into play. But the question arises: is man only an intelligent machine? Where, then, to attribute his ability to suffer, to show nobility, dignity, etc.? By singling out the gift of consciousness not only as the dominant, but also all-exhausting, we, in essence, erase other, purely human properties (this was also disputed by St. Augustine). In the existential-phenomenological tradition, the mind is not considered as the only sign of a person, an expression of his originality and indispensability.
The sphere of the specifically human here is the boundless space of subjectivity. A person overcomes his nature through the most unexpected inclinations inherent in him (for example, the ability to fantasize). “Undoubtedly, the power of imagination is one of the main abilities of the human soul,” notes the phenomenologist E. Fikkona, which manifests itself in a night dream, in a semi-conscious day dream, in the imaginary drives of our instinctive life, in the ingenuity of conversation, in the numerous expectations that accompany and overtake, laying him path, the process of our perception. Considering the main existential phenomena, E. Fikkona comes to the conclusion that a person does not have a firmly fixed essence, i.e. it is difficult to single out such a human quality, which, being some kind of deposit, expresses the full extent of its originality. Hence the riddle arises; maybe the uniqueness of a person is not related to human nature at all, but appears in non-standard forms of his being, the essence of the issue is not that a person has undeveloped instincts, flawed physicality or intellect, but in a special interweaving of these qualities. A huge space of symbols and meanings has arisen between man and reality, which we call culture, because it is the sphere where the creative potential of a person is revealed. “Culture is the specificity of human activity,” writes A. de Benois, “what characterizes a person as a species. The search for man before culture is in vain; his appearance on the arena of history should in itself be regarded as a phenomenon of culture. It is deeply connected with the essence of man, is part of the definition of man as such. Thus, the search for the uniqueness of a person in the sphere of his being can be more productive than the desire to find the dominant feature of his nature.
"- a general concept denoting belonging to the human race, the nature of which, as noted above, combines biological and social qualities. In other words, man appears in his essence as biosocial being.
Modern man from birth is a biosocial unity. He is born with incompletely formed anatomical and physiological qualities, which are fully developed during his life in society. At the same time, heredity supplies the child not only with purely biological properties and instincts. He initially turns out to be the owner of actually human qualities: a developed ability to imitate adults, curiosity, the ability to be upset and rejoice. His smile (the “privilege” of a person) has an innate character. But it is society that completely introduces a person into this world, which fills his behavior with social content.
Consciousness is not our natural property, although nature creates a physiological basis for. Conscious mental phenomena are formed during life as a result of active mastery of language and culture. It is to society that a person owes such qualities as transformative tool activity, communication through speech, and the ability for spiritual creativity.
The acquisition of social qualities by a person occurs in the process socialization: what is inherent in a particular person is the result of the development of cultural values that exist in a particular society. At the same time, it is an expression, the embodiment of the inner capabilities of the individual.
Natural and social interaction between man and society contradictory. Man is the subject of social life, he realizes himself only in society. However, it is also a product of the environment, reflecting the features of the development of biological and social aspects of social life. Achievement of biological and social harmony society and man at each historical stage acts as an ideal, the pursuit of which contributes to the development of both society and man.
Society and man are inseparable from each other both biologically and socially. Society is what the people who form it are, it acts as an expression, design, fixing the inner essence of a person, a way of his life. Man came out of nature, but exists as a man only thanks to society, is formed in it and forms it with its activity.
Society determines the conditions for not only social, but also biological improvement of man. That is why the focus of society should be on ensuring the health of people from birth to old age. The biological health of a person allows him to actively participate in the life of society, realize his creative potential, create a full-fledged family, raise and educate children. At the same time, a person deprived of the necessary social conditions of life loses his “biological form”, sinks not only morally, but also physically, which can cause antisocial behavior and crimes.
In society, a person realizes his nature, but he himself is forced to obey the requirements and restrictions of society, to be responsible to him. After all, society is all people, including every person, and, submitting to society, he affirms in himself the requirements of his own essence. Speaking against society, a person not only undermines the foundations of general well-being, but also deforms his own nature, violates the harmony of biological and social principles in himself.
Biological and social factors
What allowed man to stand out from the animal world? The main factors of anthropogenesis can be divided as follows:
- biological factors- upright posture, development of the hand, a large and developed brain, the ability to articulate speech;
- main social factors- labor and collective activity, thinking, language and morality.
Of the factors listed above, he played a leading role in the process of becoming a person; his example shows the relationship of other biological and social factors. So, bipedalism freed the hands for the use and manufacture of tools, and the structure of the hand (thumb spaced, flexibility) made it possible to use these tools effectively. In the process of joint work, close relations developed between the members of the team, which led to the establishment of group interaction, care for members of the tribe (morality), and the need for communication (the appearance of speech). The language contributed by expressing increasingly complex concepts; the development of thinking, in turn, enriched the language with new words. The language also allowed the transfer of experience from generation to generation, preserving and increasing the knowledge of mankind.
Thus, modern man is a product of the interaction of biological and social factors.
Under it biological features they understand what brings a person closer to an animal (with the exception of the factors of anthropogenesis, which were the basis for separating a person from the kingdom of nature), - hereditary traits; the presence of instincts (self-preservation, sexual, etc.); emotions; biological needs (breathe, eat, sleep, etc.); physiological features similar to other mammals (the presence of the same internal organs, hormones, constant body temperature); the ability to use natural objects; adaptation to the environment, procreation.
Social features characteristic exclusively for man - the ability to produce tools; articulate speech; language; social needs (communication, affection, friendship, love); spiritual needs ( , ); awareness of their needs; activity (labour, art, etc.) as the ability to transform the world; consciousness; the ability to think; creation; creation; goal setting.
A person cannot be reduced solely to social qualities, since biological prerequisites are necessary for his development. But it cannot be reduced to biological features either, since one can become a person only in society. Biological and social are inseparably merged in a person, which makes him special. biosocial being.
Biological and social in man and their unity
Ideas about the unity of the biological and social in the development of man did not form immediately.
Without delving into distant antiquity, we recall that in the Enlightenment, many thinkers, differentiating the natural and the social, considered the latter as "artificially" created by man, including here almost all the attributes of social life - spiritual needs, social institutions, morality, traditions and customs. It was during this period that concepts such as "natural law", "natural equality", "natural morality".
The natural, or natural, was considered as the foundation, the basis for the correctness of the social order. There is no need to emphasize that the social played a sort of secondary role and was directly dependent on the natural environment. In the second half of the XIX century. various theories of social Darwinism, the essence of which lies in attempts to extend to public life principles of natural selection and the struggle for existence in wildlife, formulated by the English naturalist Charles Darwin. The emergence of society, its development were considered only within the framework of evolutionary changes that occur independently of the will of people. Naturally, everything that happens in society, including social inequality, the strict laws of social struggle, was considered by them as necessary, useful both for society as a whole and for its individual individuals.
In the XX century. attempts at a biologizing "explanation" of the essence of man and his social qualities do not stop. As an example, one can cite the phenomenology of a person by the famous French thinker and naturalist, by the way, the clergyman P. Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955). According to Teilhard, man embodies and concentrates in himself all the development of the world. Nature, in the course of its historical development, acquires its meaning in man. In it, it reaches, as it were, its highest biological development, and at the same time it also acts as a kind of beginning of its conscious, and, consequently, social development.
At present, the opinion about the biosocial nature of man has been established in science. At the same time, the social is not only not belittled, but its decisive role in the selection of Homo sapiens from the animal world and its transformation into a social being is noted. Now hardly anyone dares to deny biological prerequisites for the emergence of man. Even without resorting to scientific evidence, but guided by the simplest observations and generalizations, it is not difficult to detect a person's enormous dependence on natural changes - magnetic storms in the atmosphere, solar activity, earthly elements and disasters.
In the formation, existence of man, and this has already been said before, a huge role belongs to social factors, such as labor, relationships between people, their political and social institutions. None of them by itself, taken separately, could lead to the emergence of man, his separation from the animal world.
Each person is unique and this is also predetermined by his nature, in particular, by the unique set of genes inherited from his parents. It must also be said that the physical differences that exist between people are primarily predetermined by biological differences. First of all, these are the differences between the two sexes - men and women, which can be attributed to the number of the most significant differences between people. There are other physical differences - skin color, eye color, body structure, which are mainly due to geographical and climatic factors. It is these factors, as well as the unequal conditions of historical development and the system of education, that largely explain the differences in everyday life, psychology, and the social status of the peoples of different countries. And yet, despite these rather fundamental differences in their biology, physiology and mental potencies, the people of our planet are generally equal. The achievements of modern science convincingly show that there is no reason to assert the superiority of any race over another.
The social in man- this is, first of all, tool-production activity, collectivist forms of life with a division of duties between individuals, language, thinking, social and political activity. It is known that Homo sapiens as a person and personality cannot exist outside of human communities. Cases are described when small children, for various reasons, fell under the care of animals, “brought up” by them, and when they returned to people after several years in the animal world, it took them years to adapt to a new social environment. Finally, the social life of a person cannot be imagined without his social and political activity. Strictly speaking, as noted earlier, a person's life itself is social, since he constantly interacts with people - at home, at work, during leisure. How does the biological and social correlate in determining the essence and nature of man? Modern science unequivocally answers this - only in unity. Indeed, without biological prerequisites, it would be difficult to imagine the appearance of hominids, but without social conditions, the formation of man was impossible. It is no longer a secret to anyone that pollution of the environment, the human habitat poses a threat to the biological existence of Homo sapiens. Summing up, we can say that now, like many millions of years ago, the physical condition of a person, his existence to a decisive extent depend on the state of nature. In general, it can be argued that now, as with the appearance of Homo sapiens, its existence is ensured by the unity of the biological and social.
1. Expand the role of biological factors in human evolution.
From the point of view of the synthetic theory, the biological factors of the evolution of the organic world - the mutation process, genetic drift, the struggle for existence and natural selection - are also applicable to human evolution. The transition of the ancestors of great apes to a terrestrial way of life, caused by a cooling of the climate and the displacement of forests by steppes, was the first step towards upright walking. Shortcomings in the speed of movement during upright walking were made up for by the fact that the forelimbs were freed, and the vertical position of the body made it possible to obtain more information. Thus, human ancestors could use their hands to make and use various tools, as well as respond in a timely manner to the approach of predators. Biological factors of anthropogenesis contributed to the formation of morphophysiological features of a person (upright walking, an increase in the volume of the brain, a developed hand).
2. Describe the social factors of evolution. At what stage of anthropogenesis did they play the leading role?
It is logical to arrange the social factors of evolution in the following sequence: a joint way of life - thinking - speech - work - a social way of life. Human ancestors began to unite in groups for living together, mastered the manufacture of tools. It is the manufacture of tools that is a clear boundary between ape-like ancestors and humans. Thus, the social factors of anthropogenesis were aimed at improving the relationship between people within the group.
3. What is the role of labor in human evolution?
The evolution of the hand after being freed from the support function went in the direction of its improvement for labor activity and the manufacture of various tools. The use of manufactured hunting tools allowed a person, along with plant foods, to widely include in the diet more high-calorie food of animal origin. Cooking food on fire reduced the load on the chewing apparatus and the digestive system. As a result, the skeleton of the skull became lighter. With the development of labor activity, there was a further unification of people for a common life. This expanded the concept of man about the world around him. New ideas were generalized in the form of concepts, which contributed to the development of thinking and the formation of articulate speech. With the improvement of speech, the development of the brain went on.
4. Indicate the qualitative differences of a person that distinguish him from the animal world.
The main qualitative difference of a person is, of course, conscious labor, which is the boundary that separated a person and his distant ancestors. Also, a person is distinguished by some structural features of the body associated with upright posture, labor activity, and the development of speech. In connection with upright posture, the position of the body changed and an S-shaped shape of the spine was formed. Other progressive elements associated with walking on two legs were: an arched, springy foot, an expanded pelvis, a shorter and wider chest. In connection with labor activity, the human hand is small in size, distinguished by subtlety and mobility, which makes it possible to perform a variety of movements.
