What Is It To Be Human?

The life we live is inseparable from what we believe is the meaning of life, what we believe it means to be human, and what we believe it means to “live well.” As a scholar, educator, and philosopher, Klaus Issler has devoted a lifetime to the study and pursuit of a life lived wisely.

In What Does it Mean to be Human? Klaus presents life as the ultimate game and explains how to play it accordingly. Life is a game to be enjoyed, but it’s also a game that can be won.

Two friends were attending the funeral of a very wealthy acquaintance. One leaned over to the other and asked, “How much did old George leave behind?” The other responded: “All of it.” Ultimately, all of our possessions are not permanent. Oh, we can enjoy them for a while. But in the end, we really do not own a thing, since we can’t take it with us after we die. The Egyptian kings of the past gave a lot of thought to how they would live in the afterlife. Some built glorious tombs—the pyramids, for example—to gather the treasures they hoped to use in the next life. Within the tomb of King Tutankhamen (reigned 1333–1323 B.C.) were found clothes, furniture, weapons, a chariot and a number of other objects. But sadly, he never got to use them. All was left behind.

This illustrates that our ideas about what kind of persons we are will influence how we live. Perhaps you never thought about this before; maybe you imagined yourself merely a complex machine? Or maybe you figured your consciousness—your sense of awareness, your thoughts and feelings—to be merely programmable complex reactions comparable to a computer, like in the Matrix, where learning Kung-Fu or how to fly a helicopter is as easy as loading the software into the brain.