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I’m not sure what Professor Grobstein means by “create” meaning. However, inherent in your statements is that you have ascribed meaning to certain behaviors and that meaning is somewhat arbitrary. An arm is broken when it is broken, but how can we asess what range of human behaviors constitutes “broken” in the same way? Especially, when values are not universal, to which you aluded. A broken arm remains so whether in Bryn Mawr, Alaska or… However, behaviors are not so easily reduced to a dichotomy: broken vs. normal. I’m also uncertain about your use of “distinctively human life.” I’m not sure it is reasonable to impose limits upon what makes us human based on behavior, variable and subject to myriad external factors. We may view someone, for example, on the high-functioning continuum of autism to be “sick,” but as we saw in class, the same “pathology” could be ascribed to you or me if a different system of values is employed. In my opinion, that which makes us “distinctively human” cannot be confined to a finite range of behaviors.

I don’t think my “approximation” of reality is better than your approximation of reality, but mine, though ever-changing, works for me.