PREFACE:
A PERFECTLY GOOD MAMMAL |
| There is a chilling moment toward the end of Ray Bradbury's science fiction classic, The Martian Chronicles. A human family, having escaped to Mars to avoid impending nuclear war, looks eagerly into the "canals" of their new planetary home, expecting to see Martians. They do: they see their own reflections. Similarly, if you want to see a perfectly good mammal, look in the mirror. |
| But the question isn't "How do we establish a civilization?," as it was for Bradbury's fictional family, or "Who is the fairest?," as it was for the wicked witch in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. For us, the question to ask is simply "Whoor whatis that creature?" |
| We all think we know who we are: name, address, social security number, family situation, job or profession, and so forth. We might even venture a self-characterization. And yet, increasingly, many people sense that, deep down, they don't really have a good grasp of who or what they are. We aren't speaking here of existential angst, metaphysical speculation, or religious doctrine, but rather, of the nuts and bolts of everyone's shared biology. Ironically, even as scientists discover more about their own species, many peopleeven the well educatedfind themselves slipping further behind, if only because discoveries are occurring so quickly. |
| Hence, this book. In it, we offer a core curriculum in life itself, a primer of human biology, a view of and from the human condition that everyone should have. "When you look into the abyss," wrote Nietzsche, "the abyss looks into you." Martians in the canals, mammals in the mirror: when you look into life, you cannot help looking at yourself. Most of the time, therefore, we shall present a human-centered view of life, one thatfortunatelyisn't an abyss but a bounty, and an opportunity for greater self-knowledge. |
| Some people, to be sure, are affronted by their "mammalhood," their creatureliness, the unavoidable fact that whatever else they may be (symbol-using, self-conscious, made-in-the-image-of-God, etc.), they are also organisms that live, breathe, pump blood, masticate and defecate, metabolize, reproduce, andeventuallydie. Composed of regular old mammalian meat and bones, a bubbling brew of interacting |
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