ABSTRACT
The universe far exceeds the grasp of human understanding. Full awareness of its daunting complexity would probably drive humans to feelings of impotence and existential anxiety that might jeopardize their ability to survive (Giddens 1991: 43; Freud 1974: 395). And yet, regardless of their level of technological development, no human group has ever felt completely powerless in the face of nature – perhaps in part because none has ever apprehended the true vastness of natural phenomena in their entirety. Through various mechanisms, humans tend to fashion for themselves images of the world tailored to their own measure, and adapted to what they believe they can control. Those mechanisms shape their identity, their personhood, which is always anchored to the kind of world they believe they inhabit. In other words: the nature of personhood and the experience of reality are dictated to a great extent by people’s degree of control over their material surroundings.
