What One Thing Makes You Most Proud of Humanity?

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Humankind is capable of many amazing things. Every nation on Earth can boast a long and glorious history of accomplishments in science, technology, and art. Is there one thing that tops them all?

The question “What Is The Thing That Makes You Most Proud of Humanity?” was posted recently to the hive mind of Reddit.  Following are 7 of the answers. 

What do you think should also make the list? Comment below. 

1. Books

“The fact that we evolved, looked at a line in the sand and thought, ’this accurately expresses my thoughts.‘ The fact that we then looked at a stone and thought, ’I could chisel in my thoughts to that.‘ The fact that we looked at a tree and mused, ’I could paint my thoughts on that.’

The fact that while we selfishly have been writing down our thoughts for thousands of years, we are compelled to share these monologues with others. The fact that we spend hours and years thinking and writing stories of people who will never exist, just so someone else might not feel alone.

Books make me feel proud. They make me feel like I’m sitting next to Plato, or Shakespeare or Tolkien and listening to them talk." 

Idontknow

 

 

2. Altruism

“Real genuine altruism. Its awe-inspiring to see someone be generous and kind to a complete stranger for no other reason than to be good. They get no personal gain and have nothing to gain by helping anyone else, but they do it anyway.

And I’m not talking throwing a few bucks into a homeless person’s cup or holding the door for someone so you can get your good vibe buzz on all day, but genuine altruism." 

WadeWilsonforPope 

 

3. Electricity

“Power over and harnessing electricity. How a person can even understand it is another story.”

totlmstr via Reddit

 

 

4. Good Citizenship

“I know it’s only simple thing, but when everybody pulls over to let the blues and twos get passed.

It’s only a few seconds of everybody’s time but it shows that just for a moment we all respect the fact that somebody is in trouble and we forget about what we currently have going on just for a moment as somebody else is in greater need.”

y4tho 

 

5. Philanthropy

“People like Warren Buffett and Bill Gates donating such large amounts of money to help make the world a better place. There is such a vast ideological gap between the wealthy (Warren Buffett calls some such people ’members of the lucky sperm club') and the rest of the nation/world, it’s nice to see there are some rich people contributing to society in such positive ways.”

ccnova 

 

6. We haven’t fully eradicated our own kind ... yet.

Singlenotion 

http://imgur.com/a/i986Q?gallery#eJMNPnH

 

7. Spongebob Squarepants

 Trevores  

 

 http://imgur.com/gallery/lwuPP4K

 

 (* NY public library via Shutterstock)