Letters from Tomis

An ongoing series of reflections of my thoughts on historical materialism after reading What is Marxism: An Introduction into Marxist Theory by Rob Sewell and Alan Woods. The thoughts, opinions, and any errors are mine alone.

There exists in the annals of philosophical inquiry a persistent and rather vain preoccupation with what might distinguish humankind from the rest of the natural order. It is, I think, a question laden with both arrogance and trepidation—arrogance because it assumes there must be something uniquely magnificent about our species, and trepidation because, deep down, we suspect there may not be. We gaze at the animals and find ourselves projecting: the loyalty of the dog, the cunning of the fox, the majesty of the lion, and yet we maintain a category of distance, as if to declare, “Yes, but we are not like them.”

And yet we are precisely like them in so many ways. We are mammals, primates, subject to the same biological imperatives of hunger, reproduction, and survival. Our evolution, which some still hesitate to acknowledge despite the overwhelming evidence, places us squarely within the great branching tree of life. We bleed, age, and die as all living creatures do. For millennia, our ancestors lived and died without leaving a trace more profound than a chipped stone or a burnt bone. The spark of distinction, if it can be located, is neither as obvious nor as flattering as we might wish.

Language and Consciousness

If there is one hallmark of humanity’s divergence, it is surely our capacity for language—a faculty so intricate that it transcends mere communication. Other animals signal, warn, and court, but we, with our syntax and abstraction, create worlds within words. Language allows for the articulation of concepts that have no physical form: justice, freedom, eternity. It permits not only the recounting of the present but also the invention of the past and the anticipation of the future. In language, humanity not only describes the world but transforms it.

Yet, is language truly a divide? Whales sing complex songs that echo across oceans. Bees dance instructions for locating nectar. The boundary is not as impermeable as it once seemed. Language, in its human form, may be unique in its intricacy, but it rests upon a continuum of communication shared with other species.

Art, Memory, and the Sublime

Human beings do something no other creature does: we create for the sake of creation. A spider’s web, while intricate, serves a function. A bird’s nest, though beautifully constructed, is purely utilitarian. But a cave painting of an aurochs, executed tens of thousands of years ago, serves no survival purpose beyond the hunger to express, to leave a mark, to say, “I was here.” Art, music, literature—these are the fingerprints of a species that not only survives but yearns to transcend its fleeting existence.

This, perhaps, is where the separation truly lies: in our awareness of time and mortality. Animals may grieve or remember, but we obsess. We memorialize the dead, plan for generations yet unborn, and construct cathedrals to eternity. The human condition is to be both finite and aware of one’s finitude, to sense the infinite and yet be constrained by the temporal.

Power, Destruction, and Responsibility

There is also the question of power. Humanity has done what no other species can: we have bent nature to our will. We cultivate the land, domesticate animals, and harness the forces of fire, wind, and water. But in doing so, we also destroy. We are the only species capable of annihilating not just ourselves but entire ecosystems. Our intelligence gives us the tools for creation and destruction in equal measure, and it is this duality that defines us.

The False Comfort of Superiority

Let us not fall into the trap of congratulating ourselves too readily. For every symphony and sonnet, there is a war or an atrocity. For every cure, there is a pollution. We are unique, yes, but uniqueness does not equate to virtue. The capacity to imagine a better world does not always lead to its creation. Our distinction is not in our goodness but in our complexity, our contradictions, our capacity to hold multitudes within ourselves.

In the end, what separates us from the rest of nature is not a matter of absolute difference but of degree, nuance, and perspective. We are nature, and nature is us. Our task is not to imagine ourselves apart from it but to reconcile ourselves to our place within it. If we have one advantage, let it be this: we are the only species capable of asking what it means to be human. Whether we find an answer or not, the act of questioning is its own kind of transcendence.

And that, I suppose, is something.