The younger Free-Ride offspring seems to have developed a contrarian streak that’s about a kilometer wide. I haven’t given up hope that logic might be an effective antidote to it, but some days those heels dig in rather deep …
Younger offspring: There are lots of interesting animals that are mammals.
Dr. Free-Ride: Yes, there certainly are.
Younger offspring: And humans are mammals.
Dr. Free-Ride: That’s true.
Younger offspring: But humans aren’t animals.
Dr. Free-Ride: Say what?
Younger offspring: Humans aren’t animals. They used to be animals back when they were still apes, but then they transformed to humans and stopped being animals.
Dr. Free-Ride: Hmm. OK, it’s true that a long, long, long, long time ago our ancestors were apelike. And that over the generations a bunch of their offspring became less like apes and more like humans.
Younger offspring: Yeah, they transformed from apes to humans.
Dr. Free-Ride: Usually we say “evolved” rather than “transformed”. “Transformed” makes it sound like it happened all at once rather than over many generations.
Younger offspring: Or like we’re robots in disguise.
Dr. Free-Ride: That too. Anyway, it’s not like you were born an ape and transformed into a human.
Younger offspring: I was really hairy when I was born, wasn’t I?
Dr. Free-Ride: Yes, you were a very hairy human baby, but not an ape.
Younger offspring: Only mammals have hair.
Dr. Free-Ride: As far as I know, that’s true.
Younger offspring: And they drink milk from their mothers.
Dr. Free-Ride: Also true.
Younger offspring: So humans are mammals.
Dr. Free-Ride: Yes.
Younger offspring: But humans aren’t animals.
Dr. Free-Ride: Why would you think that?
Younger offspring: We’re not. We’re different from animals. We stopped being animals when we became human.
Dr. Free-Ride: But mammals are the set of animals with certain kinds of features — like having hair and drinking milk from their mothers.
Younger offspring: Uh huh.
Dr. Free-Ride: And humans, being mammals, are in that set?
Younger offspring: Yeah.
Dr. Free-Ride: Doesn’t that make us animals?
Younger offspring: No.
Dr. Free-Ride: You’re alive, right?
Younger offspring: Of course.
Dr. Free-Ride: Are you a plant?
Younger offspring: No.
Dr. Free-Ride: Or a fungus?
Younger offspring: No!
Dr. Free-Ride: Or a germ or algae or other single-celled organism?
Younger offspring: You know I’m not!
Dr. Free-Ride: Then don’t you have to be an animal? Otherwise, aren’t you a non-living thing?
Younger offspring: No. Humans are alive, too.
Dr. Free-Ride: So, where did you get this idea that humans aren’t animals?
Younger offspring: [Dr. Free-Ride’s better half] told me.
For the record, Dr. Free-Ride’s better half emphatically denies having said any such thing.
* * * * *
The elder Free-Ride offspring makes the case for humans’ commonalities with other mammals:
Possibly the younger Free-Ride offspring sees captioning pictures of other creatures as the trait that most distinguishes us as humans:
We ARE apes!
Grrrr! We are just particularly nasty apes.
I’d say the younger offspring’s contrarian streak is a good foundation for a philosophy career…
animals? or manimals? hmm.
Maybe Venn diagrams would work. Mammals nested inside animals and humans nested inside mammals.
To be fair, the elder offspring’s doodle is probably close to how Creationists view phylogeny.
How close is she to six? Her obstinancy sounds like adrenarche to me. (The adrenals kick in around 6 years of age and the child gets sort of flooded with adrenalin for the first time. Can make them stubborn, but is just as apt to make them aggressively friendly.)