A short introduction to the theory of Homo domesticus. oscar.carvajal@utoronto.ca

1. HOMO DOMESTICUS: Abstract
By Oscar Carvajal, PhD ABD
© All rights reserved
This theory on Homo domesticus argues that the most characteristic difference between domestication
and taming resides in the agency. While taming refers to the agency of the human, domestication refers
to the agency of the built environment. At first, humans created buildings as an ideology for lifestyle.
As humans built houses they tamed other organisms by “bringing” them into the house. Humans later
used buildings (tombs, temples, palaces) to create, refine and impose ideologies over other humans and
organisms. In general, humans tame via ideology (which includes science, technology and technique).
However, the built environment domesticates acting and influencing (conditioning) on its own, beyond
the initial action and intention (ideology) of the human. For instance, did humans build houses to hide
from the stars at night? More surely not, but the house hides the human from the firmament at night,
alienating the human from its natural surroundings. Do humans build environments because they want
to maintain them? More surely not, but the built environment requires maintenance and humans
expend most of their resources designing, building and accommodating to architectural constructions.
Do humans build environments because they want to kill people? More certainly not, humans build
houses to protect themselves from the elements and other creatures, but the collapsing of buildings
when earthquakes happen (so-called natural disasters, actually artificial) severely increase the number
of deaths. Did humans start building houses because they wanted to build mega-cities? Did humans
built cities because they wanted to drive cars? Clearly not, but the conditions of cities stimulated the
creation and developing of different mediums of transportation. Most definitively not, however, for the
first time in history, during the last decade, a country like China has been planning the intentional
construction of mega-cities of some 20 million people each to deal with their growing population and
economic demand according to their developing goals.
These and many other observations indicate the powerful influence that the built environment exercises
on humans and societies in general; in fact, on the entire ecology of the planet (incidentally, a similar
dynamic is occurring in the outer space). The very human life would be at risk without the built
environment. The human has grown up into a Homo domesticus, very dependent on the built
environment and too weak to survive on its own.
One of the most important implications of these findings is that science can be better understood as the
science of Homo domesticus—domesticated science—a science practically entirely dedicated to respond
to the domesticated condition. Human imagination has become domesticated imagination. And a
similar situation has developed with respect to religion and the other aspects of human life—indeed—of
earthly life. The built environment is imposing its will, domesticating the human and the earth. Hence,
well-informed responses to the social and ecological crises take domestication into consideration.