Is human play different from animal play? Fink and the phenomenon of play

Abstract

Play is an activity that we apparently share with non-human animals. One can think of several examples where animals play and interact playfully with each other and with humans. However, the German philosopher Eugen Fink proposes a philosophical approach to the phenomenon of play in humans that allows us to think of this activity as a constitutive element that symbolically reflects the metaphysical structure of the world. In addition, Burghardt’s research as a specialist of animal behavior and specifically of the phenomenon of play by non-human animals is considered as a preamble. This movement allows that, at the moment of approaching, Fink’s affirmations regarding the phenomenon of play, it is possible to have a background of the way in which, although human beings and non-human animals share phylogenetic features regarding play, even so, the activity of play fulfills different ontological roles.