silly_me

narfle...
2001-05-31 03:48:58 (UTC)

An Animal that knows who it is,..

An Animal that knows who it is, one that has a sense of his
own identity, is
a discontented creature, doomed to create new problems for
himself for the
duration of his stay on this planet. Since neither the
mouse nor the chip
knows what is, he is spared all the vexing problems that
follow this
discovery. But as soon as the human animal who asked
himself this question
emerged, he plunged himself and his descendants into an
eternity of doubt
and brooding, speculation and truth-seeking that has goaded
him through the
centures as reelentlessly as hunger or sexual longing. The
chimp that does
not know that he exists is not driven to discover his
origins and is spared
the tragic necessity of contemplating his own end. And even
if the animal
experimenters succeed in teaching a chimp to count one
hundred bananas or
to play chess, the chimp will develop no science and he will
exhibit no
appreciation of beauty, for the greatest part of man's
wisdom may be traced
back to the eternal questions of beginnings and endings, the
quest to give
meaning to his existence, to life itself.
-- Selma Fraiberg, _The Magic Years_, pg. 193




Ad: