Thinking and learning about evolution and cooperation between species is hampered
by a number of rationalistic principles. Western rationalism … places a strong emphasis on the individual ego that is in a world full of things with qualities, but also on the view that humans are superior to other living beings (Korthals 2018). The view that man is a symbiotic being contradicts this idea of individuality. Men as symbionts means there is no ‘I’, there is everywhere a (widespread) we-process, composed of different species, namely symbionts of life and death.
Because of our inadequate senses, our unilateral communication ability through
spoken language, and the growth of our brains, people believe that other beings
do not communicate. That is why it took so long to discover communicative and
cognitive skills in other species (Meijer and Bovenkerk).
The evolutionary achievements of the brain have simultaneously equipped man with very
deficient senses. The brain has shrunk the senses (Wilson, 2014) Language is an
extensive network of useful communication with the world for people and therefore
the specific possibilities the senses can realize are diminished. With spoken language
and a thinking brain, people see themselves as separate beings, separate from plants,
animals, and microbes. Man is secluded (alienated) at the top of evolution, or sees himself as a
world-shaping against all those other world-blind beings.
As a result of this anthropocentrism, man is blind to important, life-feeding interactions and communications between other animals, plants, and dead matter. Due to
the great emphasis on language as a superior communication system, other communication systems are not covered. But animals and plants have other, equally effective
communication systems that enable co-evolution. Slowly we become a little smarter
in research into how living beings live, communicate and, above all, feed themselves
and others (De Waal 2016).
In Western philosophy, many barriers have been raised against the elaboration of
this idea. In particular, the view that man is an exceptional being due to rationality
or consciousness makes it difficult to see that animals and plants also think, feel, and
communicate in a certain way. This anthropocentrism can still be found in leading philosophers. Anthropocentrism erects a barrier between humans and other living organisms and
therefore denies the wide variety of processes of communication, valuing, and solidarity with non-human animals.
Humanity in the Living, the Living
in Humans
Michiel Korthals
We are all Interconnected even with the Universe 
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