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Frequently asked questions

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Q1: Why does the Human article use the third person? Aren't we humans?

A1: The third person ("Humans are..." or "They are..." as opposed to "We are...") is simply the conventional mode of writing for Wikipedia and other reference works. We realize this may cause some phrases in Human to sound quite strange — "a majority of humans professes some variety of religious or spiritual belief" sounds almost like it was written by space aliens. However, the occasional strangeness this approach may lead to is still preferable to the alternative of inconsistency.

If we were to use "we" in the Human article, it would mean sometimes switching strangely between persons as we narrow our topic of discussion. For example, even if an editor were female, she would be forced to write things like "We humans, and especially those females...." Whenever a subgroup of humanity became the article's focus, we would need to switch to the third person; a sentence about humans would use "we", but a sentence about adults, Asians, engineers, or heterosexuals would need to use "they". It is far simpler to just consistently use the third person in all contexts, even if this doesn't always seem completely natural.

A related issue is the fact that, as a general rule, Wikipedia prefers to avoid self-references. In addition to being human, all editors on this site happen to be English speakers — yet we treat our article on the English language the same way we treat every other language article, in order to avoid bias and inconsistency. Likewise, we treat Wikipedia the same as other websites and reference tools. Analogously, we ought to aspire to treat Human in much the same way that we treat every other species article. Ideally, we should make exceptions of Human only where objective, verifiable facts demand that we make exceptions (e.g., in employing a lengthy behavior section). This is the simplest and easiest way to avoid bias and to prevent editorial disputes: When in doubt, follow the rest of Wikipedia's lead.

Q2: Aren't humans supposed to be purely herbivorous/frugivorous despite our modern omnivorous habits? Aren't we jungle apes albeit highly intelligent and largely furless jungle apes? Most jungle apes eat no meat or very little.

A2: No, we really are natural omnivores. Contrary to popular belief, we humans did not evolve in jungles. We actually evolved on open grasslands where fruit-bearing trees are nowhere near as plentiful as in the jungle, where most of our surviving close relatives evolved. Evolving in such a place, we would have always (for as long as we've been humans rather than Australopithecines and other even earlier fossilized genera) had to supplement our diet with meat in addition to plant material. We evolved also eating plant-derived foods to be sure; the Savannah (grassland) has some trees with edible fruit although comparatively few and far between, and grain-bearing grasses are far more plentiful there than any tree. (Some evidence suggests that the first bread and beer were made from these tropical grains long before recorded history.) Even so, the grassland being much less fruit-rich than the jungle caused us to evolve as true metabolic omnivores, not pure herbivores/frugivores. See the Archived Debates on this subtopic for source documents.

Q3: How was the lead image chosen?

A3: The current lead image was added on 15 September 2009 following this discussion and given this explanation. In short, an editor looked at commons:Category:Couples and picked one. Due to alphabetical sorting, this one came up early (the filename starts with "A"), so they picked it. They were looking for an adult couple standing side-by-side. The use of this image has been discussed many times over the years, including but not limited to: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10. The current wording of this FAQ entry was decided following this discussion. See also our policy on photo galleries of people.

Q4: Is it possible for an infobox image to perfectly and accurately represent all of humanity?

A4: No.

Q5: Is it possible for the text of this article to perfectly and accurately represent all of humanity?

A5: No.

Q6: If we can't make a perfect representation, should we still try to make the best representation we can?

A6: Yes. Of course. Because Wikipedia is a work in progress.

Q7: How should the infobox image best represent humanity?

A7: The lead image should illustrate important features of the subject — in the case of Human, these include an upright bipedal gait, hands specialized for manipulating tools, and use of cultural products such as clothing.

Lead images can attempt to encapsulate the broad strokes of the diversity and variation in its subject (e.g. Frog, Primate). The current consensus is that attempting to do further like that for humanity is not practical. There is a guideline MOS:NOETHNICGALLERIES that exists due to issues on this topic in the past, stating that we may not assemble a gallery of many images into the infobox.

And regardless of MOS:NOETHNICGALLERIES, by picking just one image, we leave space for showing important details of that image which would be obscured if we shrank it in order to fit multiple photos in. Sometimes, what a collage gains in diversity, it loses in detail and clarity. In this case, the current consensus is that the topic covered at Human is best served with a single image — a collage of faces, for example, would fail to illustrate the human body.

Q8: Shouldn't the lead image show more major groups of humans?

A8: There is no good way to decide which groups of humans are the "major" ones. The consensus is that showing more groupings (such as along ethnic lines) is contentious due to the risk of unverifiable species-wide generalizations. As a middle ground, we currently just show examples of a male and a female human to represent sexual dimorphism in humans.

While many Wikipedia articles on diverse subject matter (e.g. Spider, Bird) do attempt to encapsulate that variety through galleries and selections of images, we are prohibited from doing so on this article per MOS:NOETHNICGALLERIES even if we wanted to. Other articles on diverse subject matter sometimes similarly have few examples, or even one example, rather than a collage in their infobox (e.g. Whale).

Q9: The current image is [blurry] / [low resolution] / [JPG artifacted], shouldn't it be replaced?

A9: The current consensus is that this isn't that big a deal. When viewed as normal at thumbnail size at a glance, you can't really tell.

Q10: The current image shows two people, not one. Doesn't that violate MOS:NOETHNICGALLERIES to begin with?

A10: The current consensus is that group photos probably do not violate MOS:NOETHNICGALLERIES. That guideline is based on a RfC, and is to be interpreted narrowly. It specifically only prohibits galleries or photomontages to illustrate ethnic groups or other similarly large human populations. The consensus on this page is that a group photo does not count. Past discussion of this can be found here.

Q11: Could the lead image be a different photo? Perhaps a group photo with more than two people in it? Or a photo of an individual?

A11: There is nothing prohibiting that, it is just not the current consensus to do that on this page. It would likely take a large discussion and very strong arguments for why the alternate image is an improvement.

Q12: Other ethnic groups have lead images such as a flag or map (e.g. of population density). Could that be the lead image (instead of any image(s) of humans)?

A12: There is nothing prohibiting that, it is just not the current consensus to do that on this page. There already is a population density map at the bottom of the infobox.

Q13: Why isn't the lead image more abstract or symbolic?

A13: Because any attempt to symbolically or nonliterally depict humans will subtly express an editorial opinion about what the "essence" or "nature" of humanity is. Even if we pick a famous artist's work to put at the top of Human, the fact that we chose that particular work, and not another, will show that we endorse certain non-encyclopedic points of view about humanity. The only real way to avoid this pitfall is to not pick an image that is even remotely symbolic or nonliteral — a completely literal, straightforward photograph simply depicting a human, with no more "deep meaning" than our lead image for Brown bear has, is the most neutral option available.

It is also worth noting that most abstract depictions of humanity remove a great deal of visual information. Wikipedia's purpose is educational, and our readers include non-native English speakers, young children, neurodivergent people, and other readers who will be best served by a clear, unambiguous, and factually rich depiction of the topic at hand.

Imaginative works also tend to be much more subjective and idiosyncratic than photographs, reflecting the creator's state of mind as much as the subject matter itself. The purpose of an article's lead image is to accurately depict the article's subject matter, which in this case means accurately depicting a human.

This article is written in American English, which has its own spelling conventions (color, defense, traveled) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

Human is a former featured article. Please see the links under Article milestones below for its original nomination page (for older articles, check the nomination archive) and why it was removed.

Human has been listed as one of the Natural sciences good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
September 13, 2005	Peer review	Reviewed
November 1, 2005	Featured article candidate	Promoted
February 13, 2006	Featured article review	Demoted
November 14, 2006	Good article nominee	Listed
January 1, 2008	Good article reassessment	Delisted
February 1, 2020	Good article nominee	Not listed
July 25, 2021	Good article nominee	Listed
Current status: Former featured article, current good article

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This article has been mentioned by multiple media organizations:

Ellen Airhart (2018-03-10). "How Wikipedia Portrayed Humanity in a Single Photo". Wired. Retrieved 2018-03-11. ...the editors of the "human" entry on Wikipedia were having such a hard time in 2003. The crowdsourced encyclopedia, in theory, offers a solution to the problem of representation; no single writer has control over the way in which a subject is presented. But still: They had to choose a single image to lead the entry. And whatever photo they went with would inevitably leave out most of the diversity and cultural nuance that makes humanity beautiful and interesting.
James Felton (2025-04-07). "Why Do These Two People Represent All Humans On Wikipedia?". Iflscience. Retrieved 2025-04-07. There were plenty of other problems too, with other editors suggesting that the top image should be of real humans who wear clothes, given the importance and ubiquity of clothing for humanity.

Text and/or other creative content from this version of Homo sapiens was copied or moved into Human with this edit on 14:31, January 19, 2017. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists.

A lede image with staying power

Given the immense amount of conflict over the lede image, perhaps an infant should just be shown instead. That way most people will be too enamored with the baby's cuteness to mount an objection. If the problem is floated that it is not representative of humanity as a whole and more just a specific state, then dress up the baby in grown-up clothes or holding a tool like a hammer -- even cuter! And if editors continue to wail on the matter, they soon will stop when they realize they do not wish to be compared to the lede image itself. ;) ✨ΩmegaMantis✨^blather 01:02, 19 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The long-standing image is loved except by a couple vocal critics. It's "Global Gothic"; it's iconic. Kolya Butternut (talk) 01:32, 19 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Out of the loop maybe, but what is Global Gothic? Aircorn (talk) 05:40, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Just a play on American Gothic. Kolya Butternut (talk) 06:06, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Not bad. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:16, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't get the fuss about the image. The two people are, in fact, humans. GarethBaloney (talk) 21:13, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Assembly Line as an Invention?

At the end of the second paragraph under "tools and technologies, stated that:

"major innovations in the 20th century including: electricity, penicillin, semiconductors, internal combustion engines, the Internet, nitrogen fixing fertilizers, airplanes, computers, automobiles, contraceptive pills, nuclear fission, the green revolution, radio, scientific plant breeding, rockets, air conditioning, television and the assembly line."

I find it interesting that the assembly line, an organizational structure, is included in the paragraph which is ostensibly about more "concrete" inventions. As every other invention mentioned in the paragraph is a specific type or series of objects, I do not feel that it's inclusion is warranted. If it has to be mentioned somewhere, I would recommend that it be included in the paragraph directly above it is currently in, as it seems to cover more conceptual/behavioral technologies, such as agriculture.

TLDR: Assembly line really does not fit in the paragraph where it is 73.92.188.125 (talk) 03:46, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hey. That sentence comes from the Atlantic source[1]. It is number 49 if you can't get past the paywall. I guess it is up to editor discretion as to what to include from that 50 or to include just the top ones or all of them. They do go into detail at the start about how they came to that ranking and acknowledge the impossibility of comparing many of these innovations. I don't see an issue with assembly line fitting in here personally and the green revolution is also included which probably doesn't fit the "concrete" invention definition either. Aircorn (talk) 15:25, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Not intelligible

Quote from article:

"Stone tools were used by Australopithecus afarensis around 3.3 million years ago. Others think it did not happen before 1.9 millions years ago, because Homo habilis is not a part of Homo."

Problems:

What does "it" refer to? Is the tool use by A. afarensis being put in doubt by the second sentence?
How does H. habilis impinge on this, since it is not A. afarensis?
How is it that _Homo_ habilis is not _Homo_? This may serve as an elaborate set-up for a "no homo" prank, but as far as logical reasoning is concerned, it would send anyone's head spinning.

Please add at least another sentence of exposition for all this, because it really needs it. Thank you.

2A02:8071:184:4E80:0:0:0:D25A (talk) 00:02, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Rewrote that section. It appears to be two unrelated sentences put together. I think the point of that paragraph is to show that there is no common consensus on the dates so said that instead. Aircorn (talk) 15:09, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. 2A02:8071:184:4E80:0:0:0:D25A (talk) 10:33, 27 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Suboptimal images

I don't like the main pictures, as they fail to accurately reflect the human condition. The man has his hair covered. The woman is overweight. Their eyes and teeth are scarcely visible. JDiala (talk) 08:57, 23 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The women is overweight? By what criterion? Where is the scale? Humans wear clothing (this is indeed one of their distinguishing features), including hats. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 10:50, 27 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The woman is overweight -> fail to accurately reflect the human condition. That depends. According to the World Health Organization, In 2022, 2.5 billion adults aged 18 years and older were overweight, including over 890 million adults who were living with obesity. This corresponds to 43% of adults aged 18 years and over (43% of men and 44% of women) who were overweight. Prevalence of overweight varied by region, from 31% in the WHO South-East Asia Region and the African Region to 67% in the Region of the Americas.[2] Some1 (talk) 23:25, 30 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If you look a little further up, you'll see that after a lot of discussion, it hasn't so far been possible to find a free image that better represents the topic. Personally, I would not find an overweight person to be atypical, but that's unlikely to be the case here, as Stephan Schulz has already stated.. 2A02:8071:184:4E80:0:0:0:D25A (talk) 12:07, 30 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, look at the FAQ. Kolya Butternut (talk) 13:39, 30 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I argued for Danny DeVito to replace these fine people in the picture, but that proposal like many others did not win much support. Until someone has a better picture we can agree on, I'm happy to have these individuals representing me to the aliens Googling us.

That said, if any humans with a camera are in the same location this was taken, I would be super excited if we could get an updated photo of our representatives, perhaps one that includes some of their family/friends. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 02:03, 1 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]