Beyond the Cliché: Rethinking Human Uniqueness

[memehunter]

If you haven't lived your entire life with an isolated tribe deep in the Amazon (no way you can be that lucky!), you've undoubtedly heard the phrase "Every individual is unique." You might even have used this phrase yourself in many situations, when consulting others or yourself. Most of the time, it probably served as a convenient conclusion.

But are we truly unique? In what ways is an individual unique? (Here, I'm limiting the scope of the term "individual" to humans only.)  Is it even sensible to indoctrinate this idea to future generations, as has been done to us, making it one of the fundamental principles guiding our perceptions and actions?

You could argue that every element is unique in some way from others, and the same can be said for flora and fauna. However, when you examine things within a set, there are more similarities than rare differences.

In my opinion, the same goes for Homo sapiens.  Differences become even rarer when you further narrow it down to specific cultures and communities.  Nearly everything that matters for societal cohesion has most individuals making the same choices. Even when there is variance (e.g., someone choosing spirituality over chasing wealth, homosexuality vs. heterosexuality), it still doesn't qualify as uniqueness because of the limited number of choices and the sheer number of individuals already following that path.  Even sexual fantasies have well-established categories, which shows that few deviate from established structures even when given complete mental freedom of choice. You could argue that we don't truly have free will (determinism), but then any pursuit of knowledge becomes less worthwhile.

What I've come to understand is that very few individuals are truly unique and different. The rest of us are just mindlessly reinforcing existing structures, even if it means vehemently opposing those who are unique.

Please don't derail this discussion by asking "What do you mean by unique?" By unique, I don't mean absolutely unique, something that pops into existence out of nothing or has nothing to do with existing possibilities. I'm using unique in the sense of coming up with new choices, like Satoshi did.

[uneng]

What I've come to understand is that very few individuals are truly unique and different. The rest of us are just mindlessly reinforcing existing structures, even if it means vehemently opposing those who are unique.

It's true. Only few individuals are truly authentic. If you did a research, I guess the percentage wouldn't go above 5%-10% of world's population... Most people are heavily into conformity, following the current tendencies, the zeitgeist of the current age, just existing during their whole lives as sheep.

Meanwhile, there must be a minority who is able to filter and absorb from the worldly tendencies only what has real value, while discarding all the rest (the junk). This practice is done through intuition and a sense of self-confidence and detachment from the primitive tribal belonging necessity.

The price to be paid by these individuals is loneliness, exclusion, contempt and depreciation by the society. I guess it would be easier and less painful to be just another sheep among the herd, although it's not possible for the authentic ones, as it's going to be even more painful then.

[memehunter]

People generally dislike delving into microscopic details. This aversion often stems from a lack of intellectual stamina, which can be developed through training. They tend to favor simple, short-term, and practical solutions that offer immediate comfort. It seems for many that "the whole point of thinking is to stop thinking later."
IMHO The true joy of discovery and the path to unique solutions lie in the process of thinking itself.

[aoluain]

Very interesting topic

I think every one of us has the potential to be unique. Certainly in terms or artistic
expression there are those among us who are unique, we could argue our imagination
knows no bounds. For example take music in general and the generations of sound
we have created with 7 basic notes!

Peer pressure, influencers, commercialism and social media has us pressured and
coerced into thinking, liking, dressing and eating the same.

[Hispo]

-snip-

And though, for some reason I have got the impression we are living through a period of time in which the uniqueness of each one of us does not seem to be recognized as it used to in the past. There seems to be a push from the big corporations and authoritarian goverments to make every aspect of our life tasteless and lacking of self-expression and human emotion.
Look at the development of artifical intelligence, for example... even thoug there are people who believe generative AI won't replace human beings, it is actually what businesses and big companies will try to do with it. It does not matter if one is self-expressive through art and doodles, if people do not pay a minimum or attention to it and instead choose to give support, praise and even money to programmers who will continue to come up with ways to turn art into a canned product. It is like killing creativity, in my opinion.

It is not enterely about AI, but I cannot help but to think how ironis it is we thought machines were going to take us to a societal level in which they would do all the work so human beings could spend all time making art and music, the exatly opposite happen: machines do so called art, while we do all the nasty work.

[memehunter]

Very interesting topic

Thanks it means a lot!

we could argue our imagination knows no bounds. For example take music in general and the generations of sound
we have created with 7 basic notes!

You could argue the same for games like chess and poker. The potential for uniqueness is high (the key term being potential) due to the sheer number of possible permutations and combinations. However, in actuality, very few players deviate from established openings or GTO strategies. These structures are like mountains, and we, are like streams flowing through the valleys they create.

There seems to be a push from the big corporations and authoritarian goverments to make every aspect of our life tasteless and lacking of self-expression and human emotion.

I agree completely. Every aspect of our lives seems to be undergoing commodification. This push for control extends beyond traditional government; it's a form of governmentality.

[franky1]

Every individual is unique, just like everyone else