Does humanity as a group have an essence that has been or will be discovered? Or must each individual human decide for herself what her essence is? — anonymous66
I don't know what an "essence of man" would be — Bitter Crank
Both. — Rich
we all have our own individual natures even while we all partake of a common human nature. — javra
It indicates that man is the kind of entity whose only fixity is being-always-in-progress — t0m
Dasein, as always specifically mine in each case, knows of its death and does so even when it wants to know nothing of it. What is it to have one's own death in each case? It is Dasein's running ahead to its past, to an extreme possibility of itself that stands before it in certainty and utter indeterminacy. Dasein as human life is primarily being possible, the being of the possibility of its certain yet indeterminate past. — Heidegger
I know what lemon essence is, I don't know what an "essence of man" would be. — Bitter Crank
Does humanity as a group have an essence that has been or will be discovered? Or must each individual human decide for herself what her essence is? — anonymous66
I want to go where people know people are all the same. — Srap Tasmaner
"The Germans think everybody is the same, while the French think everybody is different.
But, today some people do deny that man has a nature, and claim rather that "existence precedes essence". They claim that each individual decides for himself what makes his life a good one. — anonymous66
I think the concept of hermeneutics fits nicely with this idea: We each have our own meaningful self interpretations while partaking in a common "essential" hermeneutical way of being human. — bloodninja
You could make an argument that DNA constitutes 'man's essence', insofar as there is one. Were a single piece of human DNA discovered by another advanced civilisation on another planet, they ought to be able to infer almost everything about the creature the DNA comes from. And h. sapiens, being a species, can't breed with other species. — Wayfarer
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