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Philosophers have been trying to define what a human is since the beginning, starting perhaps with Plato's hamfisted "featherless biped" which was mocked by Diogenes by presenting a plucked chicken and declaring it a man.

Aristotle thought man was the "rational animal" (remember this was before social media).

Descartes amazingly thought that not only were humans the only animal with souls, but that we were the only animal with any consciousness, and that other animals didn't even experience pain.

Schopenhauer thought the very structure of the human experience, given that we have wants and needs that can never properly be fulfilled, was suffering.

Nietzsche thought one thing that distinguished humans from animals (and perhaps even "lesser" humans, is our ability to extend our will through time by making and fulfilling promises to ourselves.

Sartre thought freedom was the essential trait to humans.

For Wittgenstein, our ability to use language was probably the most unique and defining trait.

For Postmodernists like Derrida, however, there is no human nature, as our nature is almost entirely created by the social context we find ourselves in. By coincidence though, pretty much all the postmodernists seem to be pretty similar (snobby Frenchmen for the most part).

Philosophers have been trying to define what a human is since the beginning, starting perhaps with Plato's hamfisted "featherless biped" which was mocked by Diogenes by presenting a plucked chicken and declaring it a man.

Aristotle thought man was the "rational animal" (remember this was before social media).

Descartes amazingly thought that not only were humans the only animal with souls, but that we were the only animal with any consciousness, and that other animals didn't even experience pain.

Schopenhauer thought the very structure of the human experience, given that we have wants and needs that can never properly be fulfilled, was suffering.

Nietzsche thought one thing that distinguished humans from animals (and perhaps even "lesser" humans, is our ability to extend our will through time by making and fulfilling promises to ourselves.

Sartre thought freedom was the essential trait to humans.

For Wittgenstein, our ability to use language was probably the most unique and defining trait.

For Postmodernists like Derrida, however, there is no human nature, as our nature is almost entirely created by the social context we find ourselves in. By coincidence though, pretty much all the postmodernists seem to be pretty similar (snobby Frenchmen for the most part).