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Personally, I think the main division between Humans and animals is the fact that Humans have the ability for Complex Thought, and language. I saw a documentary that researched the "language" of various animals, and it was more or less proven that Animals have no real language. Most of the noises is just warnings, but birds were thought to be reciting status reports of their territory, and warnings to intruders. Monkeys were proven to be the most complex about it though. They still had the whole "warning" sounds, but they were actually shown to give false alarms so they could get some extra food. What I found interesting was the others would eventually ignore the person who cries wolf.

The human brain is a marvel. We have the ability to have our own complete language, with the extra capacity to learn more, and we can still think through some of the most complex problems ever. I dont see any monkies deriving Physics equations, and we probably never will.

Humans are animals (and no, I'm not talking about furries here).

We are animals because we do all other things that animals do. I mean, think about it, if we look at chimps and gorrillas who can learn sign language, who can cry and laugh and FEEL. Look at dolphins, that have sex for fun, that can feel and think.

There are plenty of animals on this planet that are "lower" on the evoultionary ladder than we are, but I don't think it's that much lower, I think it's just a different branch.

Humans are hairless. We walk upright. We have abnormally large heads, and that makes birth difficult. We don't go into heat because we walk upright and it would hide the estrus swelling on our asses, anyway. So what do humans going for them? BRAINS. The brains that humans have EVENTUALLY led to society and all that, but it's taken many years for that to develop. Today, culture is ever evolving and reshaping itself because we are changing as well. It is an ongoing process as "natural" as all other processes.

Humans, in whatever we do, even when it deviates from the norm, are "natural." Being human is what we do, and we do it pretty well, don'tcha think?

I may be a bit off topic here, but hearing about brains reminded me about something I heard about Humans only able to use only 10 percent of our brains. Think that may be true?

Personally, that intelligent life there isn't quite as intelligent upon closer examination. A High School Biologist should be able to deftly smack him/her with a few points on why they're completely wrong. But, nonetheless...

Humans are classified under the Animalia classification of the Kingdoms for a few reasons. Before I move onto that, allow me to point out the basis for classification, as per Whittaker's ideals:

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The basis for divisions into kingdoms are on three main points:

Cell Type -- Does the organism have prokaryotic or eukaryotic cell structure?
Level of Organisation -- Is the organism unicellular, multicellular, or colonial?
Nutritional Type -- Does the organism feed via photoautotrophic methods? Heterotrophic? Chemotrophic?

Now, moving on, let's take a look at why Humans are classified under Animalia (Animals) Kingdom:

1. Animals all have eukaryotic cells. Humans have eukaryotic cells.
2. Animals are heterotrophs. Humans are heterotrophs.
3. Animals are multicellular organisms. Humans are multicellular.

To a lesser extent:
4. Animal cells do not have a cell wall at any time. Human cells do not contain cell walls.

Humans correspond correctly to all four points there. Now, lets look at the other four kingdoms of which humans could be separated in.

Fungi:
Fungal cells contain cell walls. Human cells do not, thus ruling them out of this category. Fungi also usually contain a septate mycelium in which the nuclei is dispersed; nutrition is also absorptive.

Protista:
Eukaryotic cells with unicellular or colonial, lacking tissues with a primary ingestive absorption. Protists can also use phototrophic means of attaining food.

Monera/Procaryotae:
All prokaryotic cells. Humans are eukaryotic.

Plantae:
Multi-cellular, walled eukaroytic cells. Primary photoautotrophic nutrition means, and cells contain chlorophyll. Obviously, we're not plants.

So... of the Five Kingdoms, we are narrowed down to being under the Animalia section. Sorry folks, but we're animals. smile

That is actually a common misconception. In truth, humans use nearly ALL of their brain in some fashion. It is important to remember that the brain does not function as one large unit, like a computer with some theoretical maximum computing capacity. So, while a very small portion of the brain may be used for one activity, breathing for example, another part of the brain may be active on some totally unrelated activity, or dormant. Those two parts of the brain are not redundant, nor can they do the other's job. This is why the effects of strokes and head injuries are typically so varied, and yet almost universally debilitating. Depending on which part of the brain is damaged, the effect can be radically different.

Scientists have used various imaging techiniques, from EEGs, to MRIs and PET scans, to attempt to map the functions of the brain to specific areas, and have been marginally successful. The effort has been complicated by the tremendous diversity of the human brain; every person is different in some small, but significant way. They can determine general areas of activity (ie the visual cortex is located in the occipital lobe and surroundings), but they cannot say that this pattern of activity is identical in everybody. They have, however, been unable to find any part of the brain that is devoid of activity. Depending on stimulation, etc, every part of the brain can be caused to demonstrate activity of some sort.

As for the difference between humans and animals, I believe that human beings are the ultimate expression of evolution. In humans, nature has created an animal so perfectly adaptable and capable that there is simply no adequate rival. Arguing that we are significantly different from the animals we claim to be superior to is like arguing that grass is significantly different from trees and flowers. They have differences, yes, but they are all still plants, just as we are still animals.

I strongly believe that it is only a matter of time (albeit a very loooong time) before nature evolves a creature capable of holding us in check, at the very least. Speculating on whether that creature is an animal competitor, or some sort of disease causing bacteria/virus/fungus, or something else entirely is beyond my ken and capability, but it WILL happen.

Just my two cents. Take it FWIW.

If you look at it from a different angle; we are not the same as other life on the planet. Of course, we fold by the same rules and must complie with the same dangers; but we have something that they mostly never had; adaptation.

How long did the dinosaurs stay on Earth? A few million years? Yeah, that's a freaking long time, while we humans (homo sapien sapien) have only been here for about a few thousand centuries or so. The dinosaur just grew bigger and bigger, eating one another for no real purpose. They could not be sustained by their envirroment for very long, so; by the fast shortage of food and drop of temparature, they all died 'cept a few that qualified for natural selection. Now what happens when shortage of food and drop of temparature happens to fall upon us humans? We adapt. We start raising our food, lining them up for our bellies, while we build houses, start fires, make weapons to protect our food. Yes, I can see why we are different. We are a greedy race of unstoppable force. I ask you, how long it would take us to recover from a meteor that hit the Earth when the Dinosaurs roamed. A 100 years? 50 years? Yeah, not a long time heh? Well, that's why we are so different.

In our DNA, we have so much compiled junk DNA, some that are dormant diseases that wont resurface since we keep them in check with our medical science. We dont evolve anymore; we adapt. A disease hits us, we dont all die and the few that survive start repopulating with the resistance to that disease. Nope, we just cure the disease, no matter how weak your genetic material is. A conscience is what we have that makes us want to somehow preserve not only our individual, but also our brethren in some way.

Monkeys are the closest cousin we have to us, but even though they still gather some info about their situations like we do, they dont really make anythying out of it. Animals are scared of us in more ways than some of us know. We are a dangerous specie. We "infect", spread...are self-retaliatory. If a shark kills a surfer in USA, chances are nets are getting there and the death of hundred of them will occur. Yup. We are sons of bitches. If a lion eats some kid in a colony; all lions in the surrouding will get hunted down and killed. We are bastards.

Now I wonder; what kept us from not killing ourselves more than we already are? Religion I would say. Since our greater percentage of our populous are too scared to find out what happens after they pass away, we need something that can keep ourselves in check, some kinda code or whatnot to prevent us of doing things that would be worse than the consequences that are to destroy people with other ways of thinking that the other do; just slight little religious wars. With the 2 last World Wars against other's "opinions", our ways adapted to that fear we grew to hang on to, and the technology that we build climbed by leaps and bounds. We are at somewhat of a slow right now, since these last few decades were dedicated to making the rich richer, and finding better, easier ways to steal money from your neighbord while being legal.

If humans would have another war, I dare not think of what kind of new system, gizmos and shabbanggabang we would fashion in order to protect ourselves from our fears. I say one single enemy, from space could benefit us much more than we think. Something powerful, big, imposing, menacing and different should do it. Yup, that would be the only time we would all forget about differences truly to be able to kill it, and go back to fighting amongst ourselves.

i think I lost track of my original point, I hope I didn't bore you all with my antics...if that's even a word. xp