Translate the phrase into English: La clave de lo humano

Question

La clave de lo humano

Can this be translated as "it is the key to being human?"

Is there a better way to translate the phrase?

How does English translate "Lo"?

Answer 1

Lo is a masculine direct object pronoun. However, in this case, lo is being used as a neuter article. What that means is that lo can roughly translate to “the thing” or; “what is”. Thus, I would translate “La clave de lo humano” to being “The key to what is human”. Lo is referring to the action to being human, yet the sentence doesn’t explicitly state the verb ser, or, to be.

Bear in mind translations are not perfect from one language to another, we must try to find the meaning trying to be expressed behind the words. I hope this helped!

Answer 2

Lo can mean the following:

It, you or him as a direct object pronoun.

La clave de lo humano translates to the key of the human or even the key of it human.

The first thing you should do is make sure that your adjectives define the noun.

If you were saying the human key/la clave humano. However, because you are asking about the following phrase it would be similar to this:

Can this be translated as "it is the key to being human?"

Es la clave a ser humano

Es la clave del ser humano.

Esto es la clave para ser humano.

It is what defines the key to human life.

Es lo que define la clave de vida humana.

Estos deberían ser suficientes.