An Open Forum with Dr. Church

In this Forum interview, Professor of Philosophy Ian M. Church sat down with Leon Rapoport to discuss his thoughts on the nature, psychology, and intricacy of what it means to be human.

What does it mean to be human?

While I’m not terribly interested in giving a strict definition in terms of necessary and sufficient conditions, I think there are some descriptions that generally will apply. Being a human means being a deeply social creature—one that is informed by culture and our ancestors in ways that we can barely imagine. It’s sometimes said that humans are rational animals, but to paraphrase the 20th century philosopher Bertrand Russell, “I’ve never seen the evidence of that.” We can be painfully tribalistic. We can be beautifully loving toward the orphan and the stranger. We can be arrogant and jaw-droppingly stupid. We can be shockingly brilliant and reveal the fundamental nature of reality. We inquire, we explain, we search, we find, we love, we hate, we grieve.