( an extract for us all from one of my favourite books that I wish to share with members)
INTRODUCTION – PAGE V
” Knowledge is the hallmark of civilsed human life. That special attribute which distinguishes human life from all other forms of life on this planet is the unique ability to acquire knowledge. Knowledge is the capacity to know oneself, and to have the ability to communicate that knowledge to others. Other animals have the capacity to learn and to establish new behaviour that is actually only habit or action without awareness.

Human beings are capable of knowledge acquisition and this permits them to move above the level of habit and actually gain and transmit knowledge about themselves and the world that they live in, over generations. Other forms of life may alter their genetic code by altering their habits over sustained periods of time, but they are unable to leave a record of the rationale for developing certain patterns, mastering certain obstacles and breaking down the complexity of some aspect of the environment.

This remarkable and significant way of getting knowledge and passing it along permits human beings to master their environments and themselves unlike any other form of life. We are able to redesign much about the environment that we live in because of our knowledge of its patterns and its cycles. We are ultimately able to change ourselves and improve ourselves unlike any other form of life because of the accumulated and transmitted knowledge of who we are and how we function.

The real mark of civilisation is in the maintenance of certain systematic knowledge that preserves the code of how to overcome abstacles and understand problems that reoccur in the environment. We don’t have to grow another layer of hair over the course of several generations, as the other mammals must do in order to survive the elements. Instead we need only keep a mental record (an external or internal library) of how the cold was avoided when it came before.

This mental record permits each generation to rise above those who came before because we are able to build on the knowledge of those who already mastered a problem. Whereas it takes other animals literally scores of generations to alter their instincts in order to transmit the newly discovered messages, humans are transformed by the single discovery that is preserved and then transmitted forevermore”.