essential human experience...

[Peter Kropotkin]

what if, what if Aliens from space were to ask us,
what is the essential human experience, what would we say?

As the Buddha noted that a good deal of the human
experience lies within life's suffering.... of being born,
of growing old, of disease and finally death.... for the Buddhist,
being born is to suffer and all the action of one's life thereafter is
a variation of suffering..... to suffer is the quintessential example
of being human....... but is the act of suffering really what it means
to be human?

Would I define being human as ''one who suffers?"

Although some do, I do not.... meaning or purpose is not found
in suffering... although the Christian seems to think so,
and the conservatives seems to think so....... I don't take the meaning of
existence as being some negative thing, such as suffering.....
and I cannot accept the point that meaning is found in
reaching some sort of goal....the fact of the matter is that
because of death, we never really reach our goals......
that all goals are ''ad hoc'', of the moment....
because we human beings are ''ad hoc'' of the moment...
and nothing more....

so, what would I say to that Alien? What is the essential human experience?

as we are transitory beings, we can only find meaning within transitory
acts........the moment of the beauty found within a sunset.....
of the leaves falling in the mountains, creating a tableau of perfection....
of an empty beach moments before sunset...... moments of beauty
that exists all around us, if we were to only look.....

and of love..... we spend our lives seeking out love....
and love found is another moment of beauty that shines in
our eyes....and what of the other moments of life?
Are those moments essential moments of existence?

the days at work in our factory lite job... the dehumanization
of human beings in our capitalistic world.... the vanity in the
pursuit of money, the vain nature of titles and power and material possessions.....
is that truly part of the human experience? is collecting a paycheck really
a moment of beauty that reflects our lives?

what moment/moments in your life, would you show Aliens that reflect
what it means to be human?

Kropotkin

[Harbal]

what if, what if Aliens from space were to ask us,
what is the essential human experience, what would we say?

I, I would, I would say, I don't know what experiences are essentially human, as I've never experienced being anything else.

I'm assuming the aliens speak English.

[Gary Childress]

what if, what if Aliens from space were to ask us,
what is the essential human experience, what would we say?

I, I would, I would say, I don't know what experiences are essentially human, as I've never experienced being anything else.

I'm assuming the aliens speak English.

Sounds like a good response.

Speaking for myself, I think I would be very careful how I acted toward the aliens, so as not to start a galactic war between humans and the emissaries from space.

[Harbal]

what if, what if Aliens from space were to ask us,
what is the essential human experience, what would we say?

I, I would, I would say, I don't know what experiences are essentially human, as I've never experienced being anything else.

I'm assuming the aliens speak English.

Sounds like a good response.

Speaking for myself, I think I would be very careful how I acted toward the aliens,

I agree; one has to exercise caution when talking to strangers, and I imagine aliens from space would be quite strange.

[Age]

The so-called, 'essential, human experience' would be the Universe, Itself.

The human body 'experiencing' the One and only Universe, Itself, which human bodies have found themselves within, is what is 'essential' 'human experience'. It is 'essential' to 'experience' the Universe that one finds itself within. Exactly like what would be 'essential alien experience', 'essential animal experience', and 'essential plant experience', as well.

Now, what actually separates human beings from all of the other animals, on earth, (or what makes human beings, essentially, different from non human beings), is a completely different type of question, which can also be answered very simply and very easily, too.