Who am I - Human or Animal?

I sat down to write a post titled `When is my Marriage?`. As usual, I kept writing long enough that it easy crossed 5 pages and still incomplete. So I am splitting that post and making some definitions here and the actual post will come later.

Before going into the definition of Marriage, I had a interesting Question about myself and got a weird answer for that too. Just out of curiously, I posted the same Question to 50 people in whatsapp. The Question is

Who are you? Human or Animal?

1. 10 people responded they are Human
2. 12 people responded they are Animal
3. 15 people responded they are both Human and Animal (and variations)

Posting some interesting responses from my friends here:

1. Human cos I have got the sixth sense 
2. Human. Then when I thnk biologically I am an animal 
3. I am an animal trying to become human. 
4. Inside animal and showing human outside 
5. Homo sapiens 
6. Robot 
7. Both. It sounds like while looking at a train, Is it a Train or Vehicle? Train is superior in terms of speed, space, comfort but those properties don't change it from a Vehicle. 
8. We are animals who think themselves superior to all other living beings.
9. Man is a social animal. Just a developed species having 6th sense.
10. Animal by habitat and human by thinking.
11. Empathy and 6th Sense makes us Humane, otherwise our basic instincts are Animalistic, such as the need for Food, Shelter, Fear, Rage. Human or Animal is only Darwin's Classification. Being Human and Being Humane, are two different things. 
12. First thought has been 'human' and after thought should practice animal spirits in our life too to get the balance irrespective of where we are. 
13. I'm a life form -> Animal -> Human->world citizen -> Indian 
14. Of course yes first of all the human species formed from monkey so obviously animal. Later the sixth sense developed and we ourselves gave name as human beings. 
15. Maybe inbetween. 6th sense is not used properly nor is my humanity 
16. I am believing that I am human. Surprisingly am becoming alien 
17. The word Human is just a representation of our species ; like animals ; plants flowers and virus bacteria which all belong to" living organism" category..... But our society decides that we are all humans only because we have that so called 6th sense... That is the only thing which separate us from animal. Unfortunately we luk like human😆😆 so wenevr somone ask me tat qstn ; thy mean it only based on our behavior....

Interesting perspectives from Interesting people. ok. Now let me get to my perspective.

Scientific Perspective

The Question can be answered in various contexts. In each context, the depth of the question varies and so is the answer. Some contexts are spiritual, philosophical, cultural, common sense, scientific, etc.,

As always, I go with Scientific perspective than others.

As someone said in Point 7, with an analogy of Train and Vehicle, where 

1. every Train is a Vehicle
2. And vehicle is a generic term that encapsulates huge number of vehicle types. Train being one among them.

Coming to Human/Animal, Animal is a generic term and Human is one of the Animals, just like Dogs, Cats, Crow, Dolphin are other types of Animals. Every animal is Unique.

1. Crow can fly,
2. Dolphin can swim,
3. Monkeys can form community and live,
4. Humans can reproduce like a Virus and kill each other and the host (The Planet Earth)

In this context, I am an Animal, with `Human` specialization.

What's the unique trait of Humans?

Among many things, Humans are 

1. mostly Egoistic and
2. sometimes Humane

Above traits are also shared by some/many other Animals. But one trait that is less known, less used, albeit being the only unique trait to Humans is `Reasoning`. In other words, questioning `Why?` No other animals has this trait. It a unique trait of Humans.

But are we Reasoning?

Yes. We surely do. That's why we evolved from Nomadic tribes in the Jungles to a Space exploring civilization right now. But is every Individual of this Species reasoning about their life, culture, day to day activities? In my understanding, it looks like the answer is No. The majority of the Individuals dont reason, we just blindly follow the traditions, rituals, process set by our previous generation, the society we live in, the environment around us.

1. Does an Animal which doesnt bark, can be called a Dog?
2. Does a bird, which doesnt fly high above the clouds, can be called an Eagle?
3. Does an Animal, which doesnt Reason, can be called a Human?

I guess, that's an Interesting question to ponder upon :-)

PS: In the process of thinking and writing `When is my marriage?` original blog post, I accidentally, but fortunately #unschooled myself on the Definition of marriage. More about that in next post.