“It’s the first time the use of a tool has been documented in reptiles, according to the study published in the current edition of Ethology, Ecology and Evolution.” cnn.com  It seems the gators gather sticks on their snouts, then lie quietly in the water waiting for a hapless bird to try to perch.  Lunging suddenly, the gator grabs the bird.  They use the stick ploy more often during nesting season when birds are collecting sticks for nest-building.

Once, we humans tried to define ourselves as the animals that use tools.  Then we discovered chimpanzees use tools, then that birds use tools.  Now alligators.  If we insist that being human is not a matter of degree, but requires a unique capability, perhaps we can say humans are the animals that compose poetry.  That may work, at least until we understand porpoise languages.

I’ve never understood the emotional reaction some people have to evolution.  Five million years ago (maybe longer) humans and chimpanzees shared a common ancestor.  Science can identify the genus Homo two and a half million years ago.  We are the only surviving species of that genus and debate continues on how the many extinct Homo species were related.

How does any of that add-to or take-away-from me?  Or you?  If we are made in god’s image, what hubris allows us to limit god to a late Stone Age human (and maybe further to a bearded old man in a tunic?)

Some things I just don’t get.