WHEN DOES HUMANITY START?

I recently finished reading the book The Sea-Wolf by Jack London. This story made me think a lot about different feelings and actions that we usually label as being innate to humans: ideas like immortality, the soul, happiness, and so on. I started to wonder, are they really inherent to humans? If so, if we do not have them or do not feel them, are we not humans? Then, what are we? Are we humans sometimes and not all the time?

In my opinion, there are two main notions that make people different to the rest of the animals: free will and the soul. The free will gives us, supposedly, the ability to choose between right and wrong. The soul is what makes us similar, or at least related, to God. However, what happens when we are in survival mode? If a person has the need to eat and in order to do so has to kill, for example, he or she does not have a real free will, and for that matter does not have a working soul, therefore cannot think about the other’s soul. What are we at that moment? Animals who walk erect? If that is the case, when do we become humans? Only when our basic needs like food and shelter are satisfied?

Subjects like immortality, the existence of God, the soul, the real meaning of free will, happiness, and so on can only be questioned, and maybe answered, once we feel safe, have our basic needs covered, and are not fighting to survive. At that moment we are in a position to make a choice between right or wrong; we can decide to be happy; we can communicate with God, and our soul becomes a functioning part of our entire being.

I do not pretend to have an answer, let alone a right answer, to these philosophical questions. My thoughts just wonder and try to understand certain human behaviors both current and in history. Most likely I will never get to grasp the complexities of our minds and when exactly, if that is the case, our humanity takes charge.