So, who are we?

It turns out, the everyday (to us), rather mundane, act of pointing, is one of humanity's most profound gestures. Only humans point. Yes, you can forget the apes and other simians who do not do it in the wild and dogs which have been specifically trained to so.) Pointing is unique to humans.

Raymond Tallis, in his fascinating book, Michelangelo's Finger, tells us that due to the physiology of our hands (in particular, fractionated finger movements: separating and unfolding of index finger), we are physically able to point at all, but pointing itself consists of four essential components. You need a

1. producer – the person doing the pointing;
2. pointer – used by the producer to do the pointing
3. pointee – that which is pointed out and
4. consumer – the one who benefits from the pointing.

What is more, pointing; that is, genuine, meaningful pointing, has three fundamental characteristics. It is, namely,

1. dialogic – interactive; that is, it is for someone else’s benefit;
2. specific – it singles out the referent, a particular pointee and
3. directional – it is away from the pointing hand.

And this what makes it uniquely human, for the act encompasses five unique points of human self-consciousness. Pointing is

1. uniquely sustained;
2. uniquely complex;
3. unique to its contents;
4. uniquely stitched together internally both within a moment and between moments and
5. uniquely interwoven with self-consciousness of others.

This last point is particularly important. The ability to point, the ease and naturalness with which we do it (babies do it and understand it before they can even speak), shows that this ability is intimately linked to the explicit awareness of one’s own body, but even more importantly, it is linked to the explicit awareness of another’s mind.

We are not just hunks of self-mobile flesh. We are not mere animals, even if we share much more of our being with our animal cousins than we may like to admit. We humans -- and it is this which provides us with the most significant and fundamental distinction to other sentient beings -- know there are others, and we know that these others are just like ourselves. To ignore or deny this is simply to deny one's humanity.

The next time you are trying to make a point, or simply pointing something out, or even merely pointing at something, you may want to keep your uniqueness in mind. Now you know, and knowledge, as it is also well known, obligates.

References
Tallis, Raymond (2011) Michelangelo's Finger: An exploration of everyday transcendence, New York, Atlantic Books.