Revised:yet even more questions are left unaddressed

"I think these issues merit more of our attention than a passing association with flocking..."

I don't...the simple explanations both ground and inspire me, recursive outcomes take on elaborate forms, random applications of termite stucco eventually build air conditioned cathedrals 30 feet in height...also, flocking is so fundamental that we can expect elaborate structures to assure that it happens and to refine its expression...as to content, cats stare at birds and at other cats, chimps watch humans but watch other chimps even more, and humans watch other humans, whether to share sex, have a fight, or swap tools.

Certainly, we are human, but neither more nor less than that and our distinctions appear to be largely those of decoration...

Recommend: Sigmund, "Games of Life."

As for "more questions"...my favorite obsession applies: exploratory systems. A developing organism emits responses and repeats those that are reinforced. Microtubules, angiogenesis, and immune systems are exploratory. So are nests, parents, cultures, sciences. Language is a developing organism, vocabulary represents an adaptive layer between the creature and its niche. Thus, it's in our "nature" to always have more questions.

Also, my warmest thanks for your appreciation for a near-first-draft essay, inspired by a girl and a male annoyance!

Jim

Replies:

some tangential thoughts about religion, by Todd, 02/25/04

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