Our elegance.

Three sets of ‘player’ neurons in the hippocampus plot three-dimensional space by each set imposing a 2D triangular grid on it. The result of superimposing these three grids creates a 3D mesh on which to plot our 3D environment. It is a beautifully elegant solution, just one example of how our brain configures simple neurons to achieve complex tasks. Other neurons fire according to our head position so the eye view can orientate to the body. In fact the whole brain/body system is breathtakingly elegant. It should be, it’s been many millions of years in development. But that kind of misses the point. I mean Windows in its short existence has become more complex and overblown, and far less elegant. The constant imperative in human development has been to achieve the most from the least in order to aid survival, quite different to the imperatives of Microsoft. This level of co-integration of mind, body, senses, muscle and nerves is to aid survival yet lately the human race has, in its emphasis on imaginative cognition, lost sight of this. Quite suddenly in this context of eons we have invented alternatives to elegance. We have begun to ‘believe’ all manner of alternative survival strategies such as fame, wealth, power, corruption and influence. We believe in indulgent eating, drugs and alcohol etc, spirits, Gods and magical powers; we believe we have cracked it. We believe that our extra cognitive powers have levered us to a position of supremacy over other animals; we’re a class apart. In the absolute evidence that all these routes lead to decay we persist. We are playing a dangerous game; evolution doesn’t owe us anything. In this Valentine’s Day there is much talk of love because money is beginning to fail us. Personally I would like to return to the supreme elegance that has made us and that we embody so amazingly.