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miriam_eIt just amazes me how adept our brains are. We have this marvelous ability to manipulate symbols (which all too often gets us into trouble when we mistake a symbol for the thing it represents -- but I'm not going to talk about that here), however our extraordinary brains can do much more than that. We have superb visual pattern-matching abilities, along with very good auditory pattern-matching skills, as well as great physical dexterity. Many other animals specialise in one or other area of perceptual ability. Eagles can see much better than we can in almost every respect. Dogs can hear far better. Dolphins use their hearing to get a 3D sense of their world that we can only imagine. Monkeys can bound and swing among the branches of trees in ways that make the best athletes envious. Mountain goats can run across nearly vertical slopes with sure-footedness that is truly astounding. Seals dance and loop in water with grace that makes the most balletic among us look clumsy. Small birds fly at high speed through thickets with split-second decisions and reflexes that put them in an entirely different world of time from us.
What amazes me is how we can combine things in truly mind-boggling ways. We can read strange symbols on paper and interpret them to move ten fingers simultaneously in obscure patterns to pull decorative collages of sound from strange instruments we've built. We can adeptly hold a stick containing a graphite core and drag it across a sheet of matted cellulose to create 2D representations of 3D reality. We can use these wonderful fingers to fashion astonishing tools out of glass and metal and plastic to investigate our world, building microscopic objects, living things, giant skyscrapers, vehicles that can fly faster than sound, others that zip across the surface of our Earth or on or under its waters, or even ones that travel to other worlds. We can use these fabulous, little half-tentacles to commit our thoughts to electronic memories where they live as shimmering symbols that wake similar thoughts in other minds, or run programs in the weirdest tools we've yet build: computers. These programs emulate ourselves... clumsily so far, but with increasing complexity. Soon we will give birth to another lifeform that won't be bound to our beautiful madness. What a time that will be!
What extraordinary creatures we are! What an amazing time to live!
What amazes me is how we can combine things in truly mind-boggling ways. We can read strange symbols on paper and interpret them to move ten fingers simultaneously in obscure patterns to pull decorative collages of sound from strange instruments we've built. We can adeptly hold a stick containing a graphite core and drag it across a sheet of matted cellulose to create 2D representations of 3D reality. We can use these wonderful fingers to fashion astonishing tools out of glass and metal and plastic to investigate our world, building microscopic objects, living things, giant skyscrapers, vehicles that can fly faster than sound, others that zip across the surface of our Earth or on or under its waters, or even ones that travel to other worlds. We can use these fabulous, little half-tentacles to commit our thoughts to electronic memories where they live as shimmering symbols that wake similar thoughts in other minds, or run programs in the weirdest tools we've yet build: computers. These programs emulate ourselves... clumsily so far, but with increasing complexity. Soon we will give birth to another lifeform that won't be bound to our beautiful madness. What a time that will be!
What extraordinary creatures we are! What an amazing time to live!