Each of the organisms (note this phrase) one sees in the world is like an anciently evolved extrinsic -=relational organ of our own consciousness=- acting heuristically within the biorelational universe. Although this is invisible to most of us due to our traditional relationships with language and knowledge, those who recognize this fact are effectively ‘another species of human’.

As one becomes intimate with animals and insects, they ‘instruct’ (inwardly structure) us about the nature, character and extensible functionality of our bodies and minds. In this sense, they may be understood as a kind of living library, analogous to an environmentally-conserved relational DNA that would, if we were available to it, naturally compliment (and profoundly extend the capacities of) the physical DNA which instructs the formation and function of our physical bodies.

Without this instruction — a peculiar form of reminiscence which comes almost exclusively from nonhumans — we remain largely bereft of the power and depth of the profound relational legacies and assets that ordinarily accompany human birth.

When denied these crucial intimacies, one effectively ‘forgets’ that these beings are organs of ourselves, and, in treating them as ‘other’ we are functionally excluded from the lion’s share of our actual relational prowess and assets — not to mention the profound awareness of belonging and beauty that accompany these gifts.