Zen and the Art of Poking Things With Sticks

On a more cheery note of evolution, among my favorite human characteristics is our instinct to poke things with a stick. This alone, I argue, was a key evolutionary advantage that enables human beings to survive in situations where, when creatures cannot poke things with a stick, they are inevitably poisoned, crushed, infected, or devoured.

This still leads to bad decisions, like the guys years ago on the Kenai who went into a bear cave and poked the bear with a long stick, which, as it turned out, was not long enough. But there are instances where poking bears with sticks is necessary for survival:

Shelton describes many cases where people have climbed trees to escape predacious bears (both black and grizzlies) only to discover that the bears climbed up after them! Shelton's studies show that the bear was often able to climb the tree and pull the human out of it! Human tree climbers who survived a "tree-climbing bear attack", did so by poking the bear with a stick or other object. Persistent stick-poking--not inability of the bear to climb the tree--was what saved the day. Anyone who has spent much time in the bush knows that bears are very adept at getting treed packs out of trees.

There is something essential to being human here - where as a bear would just smell, lick or bite something first, our instinct is to poke it with a stick, thus satisifying our curiosity without suffering immediate consequences. I argue, undistracted by facts, that most technology arises out of the impulse to poke things with a stick:

A) The stick to the spear to the atlatyl to the bow and arrow to the gun to the cannon to the nuclear weapon.

B) The stick to the plowshare to the John Deere.

C) The stick in the sand to the charcoal to oil painting to the camera to the television to Photoshop.

D) The stick to the log to the raft to the boat to the HMS Victory to the USS Lexington to the Space Shuttle

I say, Sir, that if you are not a master of your stick, you are a master of no thing.