Acharya Prashant responds to a question about whether there has been any inward evolution in human beings. He states definitively that there has been no inward evolution. To illustrate this, he compares the most evolved human being to an amoeba or a paramecium. He points out that the basic instinct of an amoeba is to exist, and a human's basic instinct is also to exist. In this fundamental aspect, nothing has changed, and we are still the amoeba. While one might contradict this with a thousand arguments, the speaker urges the listener to look at the truth of it with empathy and understanding. He elaborates that despite all our evolutionary gifts like intellect, memory, muscle, and the development of a comfortable ecosystem aided by technology, we are not fundamentally different from any other conscious life form on the planet. An amoeba reproduces, and so do we. An amoeba eats, and so do we. An amoeba wants its space and territory, and so do we. Humans use their resources, money, knowledge, and skills to acquire physical and psychological space, just like the most primitive beings. We use language to woo a mate, which is the same as an amoeba's drive to reproduce, though the amoeba is more efficient as it doesn't even need a female. The speaker asserts that all our activities, from going to the office to creating art and music, are fundamentally centered on the same things an amoeba does: existence, reproduction, and territory. The speaker explains that the potential for liberation is a biological potential of the human body. The consciousness attached to the human body can seek freedom from it. This is the special urge that only man is born with, which can be seen as either his superiority or his misfortune. No other animal experiences the angst, depression, or inner strife that a human does. This is because we are special animals, not absolutely special. The tragedy is that despite having the potential for liberation, we live the life of an amoeba. This makes us worse than an amoeba, which never had the potential to be anything more. He concludes that evolution, experience, or age will not bring wisdom or liberation; only wisdom itself can. The one duty of a human being is to materialize their potential, which the Upanishads call Atma (the Self).
