“I think he’d go back to the origins of human life itself.”
“Because to be human is to have language.”
I’d say so.
“If Homo habilis didn’t have language, then he’s misnamed—doesn’t deserve to be called Homo”
“I would say so.”
“What is our hypothetical linguist’s method going to be?”
“I’d say it’s going to be more philosophical and speculative than linguistic. He doesn’t have an early human specimen whose language can be studied.”
“He’s going to be puttering around in one of those fascinating borderlands. On one side of the border, manlike creatures without language—tool-using (as even modern chimpanzees are), but lacking what we mean by language. On the other side of the border, people.”
“That’s right,” I said.
“But he’s not going to study any clay tablets.”
“No, not even for a minute.”
“Good, because I don’t intend to spend even a minute on the burial practices of the Upper Paleolithic. They’re as irrelevant to the origins of religion as clay tablets are to the origins of language.”
“I understand.”
Bricolage
“The linguist and I must both practice bricolage, which is the craft of building with whatever comes to hand. It comes from the French bricoler, to putter about. We must both putter about in this strange borderland inhabited by almost-humans on one side and truly-humans on the other.”
“So you assume that being human means being religious, just as the linguist assumes that being human means being lingual.”
“Being a bricoleur, I don’t do anything as well defined as that, Jared. I poke around. I wonder if there’s a dimension of thought that is inherently religious. I say to myself that perhaps thought is like a musical tone, which (in nature) is never a single, pure tone but is always a composite of many harmonics—overtones and undertones. And I say to myself that perhaps, when mental process became human thought, it began to resound with one harmonic that corresponds to what we call religion, or, more fundamentally, awareness of the sacred. In other words, I wonder if awareness of the sacred is not so much a separate concept as it is an overtone of human thought itself. A conjecture of this sort can yield scientia, knowledge, but since it isn’t falsifiable, it can’t yield science in the modern sense. A work of bricolage is never science, Jared, but it can still astound, make sense, and stimulate thought. It can still impress with its veracity, validity, soundness, and cogency.”
“I see.” It seemed to me that, in all this talk, she was somehow trying to “screw her courage to the sticking-place.” I didn’t know why this was necessary or how to help, so I just kept nodding and saying, “I see, I see.”
Finally she lifted her eyes to the trees overhead and said, “The moon is up.” As if this were a signal, she got up and led me off the path into the woods. Several times in the next few minutes she paused to look around (at what, I don’t know), then moved on. Now and then she stopped to pick up something found in the grass. At last she came to a clearing that suited her, and we sat down.
She showed me the things she’d collected on the way—a nail, an old cartridge fuse, a 35mm film canister, a paper clip, a plastic comb, an acorn. At her request, I showed her what I had in my pockets, and she chose a key and a pen to add to the collection.
“This is what the universe has supplied me with tonight, Jared. We’ll have to see what I can make with it.”
Suddenly I remembered the fossil ammonite in my jacket pocket. She looked at it with evident surprise when I handed it to her, and I explained that Charles had given it to me to hold on to till we got around to it (which we never had).
“This will be the centerpiece of our work of bricolage,” she said, putting it down between us. “Charles had a different purpose in mind for it—I’m pretty sure I know what it was, and we’ll get around to that as well—but meanwhile it’ll serve as the piece to which all other pieces in our work must cling. It’s the community of life on this planet.”
“Okay.”
“A few minutes ago I said that perhaps, when mental process became human thought, it began to resound with one harmonic that corresponds to what we call religion or awareness of the sacred.”
“I remember.”
“I want you to think of this shell as the community of life. I want you to think that if you know just how to listen to it, this shell will ring out with that harmonic. Can you do that?”
“I can try.”
Animism
“There once was a universal religion on this planet, Jared,” B said. “Were you aware of that?”