Science Musings Discussion
"We need to keep in touch with those things -- the duckweed, the ducks, the dragonflies, the gush of life -- lest we forget what touch and sight and sound and scent are all about"
Yes! And let us give thanks for the most wonderful gift of all--our human consciousness,which enables us to be aware of,to appreciate,the raw, pulsating,sensual beauty of "the pond".
The pond life unfolds in its inimitable beauty but presumably the feeble proto-consciousnesses of the pond players prevent them from any awareness of their dance.But WE are truly conscious of it;we can see/know the beauty....ah,praise be to/for our consciousness, which may at times sharpen our pain, but without which the drama of the pond would be only a dumb dance performed for an empty house...beauty and love terms with no meaning...paul
Presumably the feeble proto-consciousnesses, presumably being the key word. Remind me to compel my husband to share his story of two wasps as one lay slowly dying, crushed on the side of a log by a blow from an ax.
Lyra: I'm really curious about your husband's wasps story......it's storytime!
I'll work on 'im, but don't hold your breath!
I'd like to see more discussion of 'presumably.' We know so little of animal (and plant) 'language,' and presume our own superiority so easily....
Teresa! You've been so quiet lately. There's a book to both of our interest I wonder if you'd read.
But first, TA DAH! My husband offers his sad and lovely wasp story - just a little public prodding was all it took.
We know so little of our own human consciousness, and nothing of all of the insects. But sometimes a thing happens and you see possibilites in a new light.
Homage to a Master Builder
I don't believe in much. A true born skeptic if you will. I don't believe in the invisible...exceptions are gravity and radiation waves and such. However, I do have respect for things I don't understand. As a human, and particularly as a man, I've adopted a "hands-off" policy when it comes to things of nature. In short, I realize I know only a fraction of what nature is and I'm damn well convinced I can do precious little to bend it to my satisfaction with desired results.
It was the summer of '03. I was engaged as the general contractor in a year long construction project along the banks of the Mississippi, in the land of Twain, (I wish he were telling this...he can write!)
On a construction project of this duration and proximity to mud, it's inevitable that around a construction site there should be a quantity of wasps of the variety known as mud daubers. High in the construction, everywhere you looked, you could see dozens of the tubular wasp larva cases made of mud and wasp spittle adhering to the wooden timbers of the roof structure. Personally, I didn't care for these well crafted embellishments, but I realized that they did no harm to the project and ignored their presence. I also realized that wasps eat spiders, and we were working in a situation where it could have inspired brown recluses or black widow spiders to take up residence in the nooks and crannies of my dormant piles of construction materials and debris...so, in my mind, the wasps were working for me.
I had several young men working for me on this project as well. Knowing full well how ignorant young men are, having once been one, I found that my time as boss was evenly divided between telling them what not to do as much as what to do. One such caution I espoused was to not swat at the wasps. When a word of caution did not suffice, generally I would string together entire sentences and paragraphs of advice. Not only did I inform them of the vindictive nature of wasps, I told them about spiders too. Often, wisdom disseminated to youth is not enough, in that case, I would remind them as to my prerogative as bursar and threaten them with a dock in pay should my advice not be heeded.
One day, one of my workers was up top on scaffolding. He alerted me to some issue he had noticed and I told him to come down so I could climb up to take a look. This fellow was my foreman and nearer to my age than the young grunts I had hired. I often measured my words of advice carefully to this fellow in his 30's. Men in their 30's can be very ignorant too, but proud. Unlike men in their early 20's, you can't tell a 30 year old much, their window of impressionability has been closed and too often painted shut.
Now, I'm getting to the real story. Just before descending the scaffolding, my foreman, with hammer in hand, swung down on a wasp that had lighted in his proximity. I saw him do this and it angered me. Not that I was going to miss this master craftsman of the insect world, but because I knew that taking a swing at a wasp is a moment not focused upon the task at hand and the task at hand at that moment was to safely descend the scaffolding....okay, that wasn't the primary reason why I was aggravated with my foreman, I was angry because now I was going to place myself at the scene of the crime and I knew the wasps would be riled up....I might face the wrath that belonged to my foreman. I offered no complaint to my foremen, I knew his window was painted shut.
When I reached the spot where my foreman had been sitting, I noticed the unfortunate hammered wasp. It was pinned fast to the timber by it's own gore. But, it was still alive. The hammer had missed the thorax of the creature and smashed only it's abdomen. It's legs and antenna were moving in the throws of death. Within a second or two, another wasp lite next to it's fatally injured kind. I was now counting the seconds, anticipating what I was sure to follow, the fiery hot poker of a wasp sting in my backside. Shit! I could accept punishment for a folly of my own, but there's a keen sense of resentment that accompanies punishment that was deserved by another. No sting followed. What did unfold was the most touching display of affection I have ever witnessed in any kingdom. This wasp that lit next to his dying kind proceeded to stroke with it's antenna the dying wasp with deft tenderness. With slow, deliberate motion, this nursing wasp gently glided it's tactile appendage the length of the undamaged body of the wasp. While the one antenna stroked, the other antenna engaged the damaged wasps antenna and they entwined and caressed.
I have very good vision up close and I could clearly see that these motions were meant as the tenderest of comforts. I am not anthropomorphizing here, and I'm sure there will be those that pass this off as some rote mechanical behavior....but this wasp was giving succor to the dying. This tender display continued for several minutes, it lasted until the dying wasp moved no more. At the very last instant of life, the nurse wasp disengaged it's stroking and turned to face me. Neither of us having anything to say, it flew off. I assume we both resumed our construction duties.
I didn't share this story with my construction crew. But I did share it with my family and I relay it here for the first time in writing. No human situation has ever affected me in exactly the same way as did this nature story. What I believe is, no greater empathy has ever been displayed, in any kingdom. The nurse wasp had no ulterior motive than to comfort the injured. I believe the nurse wasp knew it's self to be in danger from me but ignored that possible peril to tend to it's kind. If this creature, so small, having the capacity for offering such succor, how can I ever knowingly damage any life, large or small? Remind me again, what is sentient?
My best,
RM
Oh thank you RM and Lyra! What a story, clear and beautifully written.
Any comments, porch visitors?
And Lyra, what book would I like???
RM,
I am no entomologist, but skeptic I am. I think that the entomologist might attribute the behavior to some instinctual action, that in some cases, may have caused some injured wasp to be revived, if the injuries are not to serious, due to some kind of stimulation of the nervous system of the insect. There could be an evolutionary advantage to this behavior. Now the question may become is the insect more sentient than is commonly thought, or are we the humans, less sentient than we think we are, as compared to the wasp. I tend towards the latter.
RM:Thank you for the wonderful wasp story!I have seen similar things a few times too but have never been sure just what to make of them.I don't presume to have any special knowledge in these areas but I think that things are not always necessarily what they appear to be.Is it possible ,for example, that the wasp was harvesting some fluid nutrient from its dying fellow creature?I don't have any way of knowing whether this is true or not but it's possible.Even granting that what the wasp is doing is giving succor to its dying fellow,does it necessarily follow that there is an attendant feeling of empathy as we humans use the word?If we were talking about elephants or chimps I would be much more comfortable with a straightforward empathic explanation.Still I grant that you may
be quite right in your interpretion of what you saw.
As for the pond life generally,whatever may be the varying levels of communications/consciousnesses involved,my "species chauvism" has me guessing that none of these life forms are in any way capable of actually feeling the beauty of the reflection of leaves in the evening pond water. Do the dragonflies in their valentine embrace have any sense of the natural cycle of their lives unfolding over a sliding present which is falling continuously into a future? My unromantic guess is no.For the most part these guys are hard wired.So much wonderful(to us) stuff can be done without self consciousness.Are Chet's red knots aware of what they are doing? My guess is they are "on automatic"....
Our closest concesters(to use Dawkins recent neologism) among the primates certainly exhibit a range of emotions/behaviours which overlap with some of those human....but I think that between even them and us(quite apart from the lower forms )there is a great gulf fixed...only we can reflect upon reflection,truly sense beauty,can create mathematics,can write poetry.And this new definitive self- reflective human consciousness is I believe largely a result of the development of human language,as recently as 100,000?B.P..but that's another story...
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