what does 'Being Unique' actually mean?

[cacian]

This is as a follow up to the Human Construct I was reading with great interest.
I have heard this expression that humans are unique but I am not actually understanding what it actually mean?
what other meanings are the words are there to the word UNIQUE?
Exclusive is one.
Original is another.
If one is unique then what is one unique against?

[Alexander III]

I would say that too much empahisis is put on how unique we all are, truth is, one of the great things about literature is discovering that those great and unique thoughts of yours, were toughts of by countless men before you.

If anything I think we should emphasise the similarity of man rather than his uniquness. The former creates a sense of cohesions and harmony the latter individualism and group partitions.

Besides there is that old saying, if all of us are unique, being unique is very common, and being unremarkable becomes the unique.

That is why astrology and horscopes and plam readings and all these forms of charlatanry fool so many. Because they always hit on points which are rarely talked about between people yet everyone experiances and everyone thinks that the charlatant said something unique about them when in truth it applies to the majority of people.

2 of my friends at university have begun using palm reading to fool naive girls and make them more vulnerable to seduction. They tell them things like "you are special and a deep thinker, in fact you before going to bed at night lay half asleep with your mind full of thoughts wandering about for a long period before you are able to sleep." they tell them this it makes them feel clever and special, when in truth the same applies to the majority of people everywhere.

[YesNo]

I would say that too much empahisis is put on how unique we all are, truth is, one of the great things about literature is discovering that those great and unique thoughts of yours, were toughts of by countless men before you.

If anything I think we should emphasise the similarity of man rather than his uniquness. The former creates a sense of cohesions and harmony the latter individualism and group partitions.

Besides there is that old saying, if all of us are unique, being unique is very common, and being unremarkable becomes the unique.

That is why astrology and horscopes and plam readings and all these forms of charlatanry fool so many. Because they always hit on points which are rarely talked about between people yet everyone experiances and everyone thinks that the charlatant said something unique about them when in truth it applies to the majority of people.

2 of my friends at university have begun using palm reading to fool naive girls and make them more vulnerable to seduction. They tell them things like "you are special and a deep thinker, in fact you before going to bed at night lay half asleep with your mind full of thoughts wandering about for a long period before you are able to sleep." they tell them this it makes them feel clever and special, when in truth the same applies to the majority of people everywhere.
I think your friends just want a way to touch those girls and the girls want to be touched by them as well. They play along. I doubt the girls believe a word your friends are saying to them, but it is sometimes useful to pretend to do so.

However, I agree that we should look at our similarities. We are all basically the same in both our good points and bad points.

Regarding uniqueness, I think we can say that our consciousness in a particular body in a particular environment is what constitutes our uniqueness. It has nothing to do with being special and applies to animals and plants as well.

[cacian]

I would say that too much empahisis is put on how unique we all are, truth is, one of the great things about literature is discovering that those great and unique thoughts of yours, were toughts of by countless men before you.

If anything I think we should emphasise the similarity of man rather than his uniquness. The former creates a sense of cohesions and harmony the latter individualism and group partitions.
To be unique is to be firstly compared to something before one reaches such conclusion of uniqueness.
I am not clear on who and why this thought ever came about.
I would say that we different from each other and similar.

Besides there is that old saying, if all of us are unique, being unique is very common, and being unremarkable becomes the unique.
not really if you think of the word original it means the very first one or the genuine one.
In antiques a unique piece means the one and only.

That is why astrology and horscopes and plam readings and all these forms of charlatanry fool so many. Because they always hit on points which are rarely talked about between people yet everyone experiances and everyone thinks that the charlatant said something unique about them when in truth it applies to the majority of people.

It is obvious that anything pretending to read a future is going to iffy.

2 of my friends at university have begun using palm reading to fool naive girls and make them more vulnerable to seduction. They tell them things like "you are special and a deep thinker, in fact you before going to bed at night lay half asleep with your mind full of thoughts wandering about for a long period before you are able to sleep." they tell them this it makes them feel clever and special, when in truth the same applies to the majority of people everywhere.
wow!!! I would not play with anyone's mind and lightely in this way. Mind games can be quite malicious I would steer away from it.
I am not sure what 'to lay half asleep' mean.
I am either asleep or awake.

[Buh4Bee]

Come now Cacian, you must like a bit of mental chess sometimes?

[BookBeauty]

We all even have the same sorts of dreams. If seen from another intelligent species' perspective-- Let's say, aliens from another planet, perhaps we would all seem identical, in the same way that we might view ants or honeybees as being identical, even if they might have personality differences between them. It cannot be denied that we are all one species.

If you had taken two individuals, put them through the exact same environments, same people, same everything-- Completely identical memories and experiences... Even if this isn't possible to do, I would hazard to conjecture that they may end up being identical, or very, very, very similar. So similar, in fact, that it would be hard to tell the difference between their personalities.

So, what does, 'being unique' mean? The only thing that makes you different from anyone else is your own personal experiences and how they have shaped you into who you are.

Genetics also play a role, but how much does it shape our personalities? It's hard to say. I would suppose that, as long as one has a healthy, fully functional brain, the genetics have very little to say about our personality.

I think that personality is learned. We take bits of everything we know and see, and then we become what we know and see, what we decide we like, and our traumas and difficulties based upon negative experience, much of it subconsciously.

If you were to take someone who had grown up their entire life in the nude, being comfortable in the nude, and not having them exposed to modesty or shamefulness in being in their own skin, then you place them in a classroom and force them to wear a shirt-- They don't understand this behaviour. Modesty is something that is perceived as a personality trait, but it is clearly learned. As much of our traits are.

As a child, I was told time and time again that honesty and truth is very important, and to lie or be dishonest was the worst thing you could do.

Even until today, I am unable to lie without incredible guilt and shame, and must fess up.

We are conditioned, by our parents, by our surroundings, everything. That is personality. It's conditioned, and learned.

And, if you wanted to talk about spirituality and the personality-- if there is some kind of soul, I think that it is separate from mind, and personality, and would say that it is 'life-force', or 'energy'. Perhaps that is a rather eastern view, I'm unsure...

But, it can't be a coincidence that if you grow up in one way, you adopt that way of being, (Or don't, if you have a negative experience or view for one reason or another, again, based upon experience).

That is proof enough to me that our uniqueness is simply based upon our social conditioning.

[cacian]

Come now Cacian, you must like a bit of mental chess sometimes?

Haha....to tell you the truth no I don't.
Playing games of such can be detrimental if it is kids we are talking about here.
I am being precaucious for one never knows.

[JamCrackers]

First: we are humans. As information machines go, humans are no computers. When humans handle data they make errors and censor unwanted findings. Humans have a fairy high margin of error. Using tools we humans can count on mathematically, you could take measurements of every human alive and compare them. You would find things like, large % of people talk about television, music, and movies. They dress in designer clothes. So - if you were looking for a specimen of human eating burgers and wearing blue denim pants, it wouldn't be a difficult hunt. If you were looking for a green eyed blonde age 19, with a perfect body, who was an Olympic gymnast and a surgeon, you find it hard to find someone that unique. Lots of people and things are unique. One principle at work is out human term 'probably'. There is a fairly fixed number of what most everyone thinks as probably, say a few million to one odds. If I said I saw the worlds biggest snake in the Everglades, saw an airforce UFO vehicle, saw a predatory raptor bird big enough to carry away a kid. You would not believe me. The ODDS were in your favor that I was lying. Unique is things that are one in several million rare. The most beautiful woman really is smoking hot. The smartest man in a population of billions? He would be smarter than everyone else as everyone else is smarter than a laboratory sign language gorilla. Much of the education argument is that it is based on manufacturing industrial age regimented machine workers not free thinkers. Many people surrender their unique for whatever reasons.

[Paulclem]

There's also the age factor in our lack of uniqueness. I don't know about you but i notice in myself and others an general trend towards how I perceive older peiople to be. I've become middle aged, perhaps against how i would have wished to be as a younger person. I think in a middle aged way - perhaps less spontaneously, but on the plus side with more measure. it might be partly biological,but it seems definately to be an adherence to a pattern.

And the anomolies stand out don't they - The oldest swinger in town - Mutton dressed as lamb - probably because there's not much grace in in trying to be what you're not.