Conflict, serendipity, cooperation, deception, survival -- the war and peace of existence -- all are written in the living text known as the genome. All existed long before our self-reflecting species entered the fray and gave them names.
How remarkable it is to contemplate ourselves: a species that became capable of looking inward. A species that seeks so much. From those in medieval times who sought the philosopher's stone, to those who now search for secrets signs in the genome to tell us how life came to be.
A genome that became aware of itself -- this is our gift and perhaps also our shortcoming. As a molecular biologist, I love poking into the catacombs of chromosomes, weighing and measuring the gems of DNA, describing the rich tapestries of transposons and genes arrayed throughout. When we have scoured and read every inch of it, and discovered how it evolved in countless lineages, letter-by-letter -- a self-correcting and self-perpetuating treatise on Life -- will we have cracked the code? Will we understand what it is to be a dolphin? Will we understand ourselves better?
Self-reflection is a trap -- for what is reflected back to us is only what we're able or willing to see in the first place. Everyone has a blind spot, however self-aware and self-correcting we might hope to be. We know not what we know not -- even those who seek to look beyond.
I am not certain of much -- but I'd wager that among the most beautiful and ineffable of mysteries is what it's like to experience Life through the lens of another being. Through the lens of an oak or an eagle or a friend. And we cannot, isn't that true? Doesn't our genome and living, individual, form constrain us?
I'll venture this -- as a philosopher for an hour -- we'll come a bit closer to revealing that mystery when we hold in reverence the lives of all beings, including our own kind. Blind spots lessen when we place ourselves in alliance with the eagle and the oak, for they have much to teach us. We can learn how to read their genomes, but learning how to read their ecology is equally pressing. Even if we do so in a clumsy, self-referential way, not being able to comprehend their Umwelten or worldview. Having no other guidepost than a love of the natural world to tell me the purpose of my own life, I seek to do both.
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