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Toolmaking not only resulted in tools, but also the reconfiguration of our brains so they comprehended the world on the same terms as our toolmaking hands interacted with it. With mirror neurons, something entirely new entered the world: memes--a far more effective and speedy method for pooling knowledge and passing it around than the old genetic way.

Excerpted from Thumbs, Toes, and Tears, Walker & Co. 2006. Published on KurzweilAI.net March 4, 2008.
Reprinted with permission.

We are—all of us—freaks of nature. We don’t generally see ourselves this way, of course. After all, being human, what could be more ordinary than a human being? But it turns out that our personal (and biased) impressions that we are unremarkable simply don’t stand up against the plain, objective facts.

The way we walk, for example, teetering on long, paired stilts of articulated bone, is unique among mammals, and as preposterous in its way as elephant trunks and platypus feet