I went for a run today. Protocol required that I wait 100 days after returning to full gravity before engaging in vigorous exercise. Of course that assumes that everything else I've been doing wasn't exercise -- very funny concept if you've ever had to single-handedly set up a solar collector, which I did on day one here. I've felt my muscles itching to run for weeks. It felt good. I didn't even mind the heat so much.
The problem of course is where to go. My little clearing has a perimeter about as long as the track I used at Kepler U., but I don't really enjoy running circles. It's boring and the turning only one way bothers my hips. The jungle is impassable, so that leaves the Tanzen trails. So that's where I ran. There's naturally a chance of encountering one of them, so I programmed my monitors to alert me to movement so I could move from trail to trail and keep away from any of the natives.
It's nice to be in nature. I used to do research from my treadmill when I was training for the megathon, so I know how to focus my mind, but out in the field I can let my thoughts roam freely. Naturally I thought about the Tanzen. As I ran their paths I pondered the problem of symbolism.
Humans think symbolically -- one object or concept can be represented by some other object or sign. A map, for example, stands for the landscape. Show a map of a maze to a rat and it will have no chance to figure out where the cheese is located. Even the simple act of pointing is symbolic. The finger acts as a symbol for the thing that it's pointing at. Point something out to a cat and the cat will sniff your finger.
We know the Tanzen have no language, but do they think symbolically? It might be that they still mentally represent one idea or concept with another. This mode of thinking would suggest the possibility of sentience -- at least by the accepted definition -- and perhaps some way to find common ground with humans.
The simplest example of symbolism would be territorial markup. Tanzen modify their environment like we do -- for example by making trails through the woods. Perhaps there are standard ways to make their trails so that another Tanzen using the trail knows where they are or where they are going. Perhaps a certain type of branch in the trail indicates that the path leads to water, for example. Perhaps the distance between branches indicate something; perhaps paths pass large trees on the left or the right. Or perhaps the trail is exactly what it seems -- just a trail, not a symbol of anything.
I spent a lot of time looking at the features of the trails as I ran. There are a million different attributes that might have meaning, but my pattern-seeking brain didn't see anything. I need to run a regression; perhaps something will turn up. I doubt it though. I think the entire part of my research plan looking for human-like mental function is a waste of time. The Tanzen are not like us.
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