ABSTRACT
Our own awareness and analysis of the world becomes an object of our wonder and study. Every literate culture records its speculations about the relations connecting mental activities to our surrounding body and world. “Soul,” the life and mind in us, is sometimes dormant, and eventually absent (departed or dissipated). Uniquely among animals we speak and grasp words. We observe patterns of behavior linked perhaps to family or tribe, and invoke unseen forces to explain anomalies and distortions of character.
