Indigenous Ability

Neuroscientist, Scott Grafton, has gifted the empirically thoughtful and scientifically literate a volume that is chockful of provoking information. The book, Physical Intelligence: The Science of How the Body and the Mind Guide Each Other Through Life , makes a case that smashes a bit of that Cartesian duality mind-body separation nonsense that many armchair philosophers wheedle and wrangle over till the cows come home. Mr. Grafton, warns that perhaps the cows will never come home if we stay mired in “ This is mind stuff ” and “ This is physical body stuff .” He demonstrates more than capably and quite convincingly that we need to recognize that mind directs the body [no argument there I wager] but also what makes up a large part of our mental intelligence is how the body bolsters and interacts with the mind even in areas you might have formerly considered mere intellectual matters. The volume is full of provoking/enlightening observations throughout.  Let’...

[Consider this Part 2 of the offering Move Like a Scout or Indigenous Warrior . You can consume this piece in isolation but to really follow the arc I’d recommend reading the mentioned piece [or even re-reading it] to gather fully where we’re going.] Many of us tout our bona fides as high-speed, low-drag, can-the-noize-boys cuz’ I’m lock ‘n’load from bang to go! It’s a fun little play-acting symptom we see in grown-ass adults who wear the gear, talk the talk, but…do they walk the walk? Before you answer, I’m going to drill down so we get mighty specific with that question of walking the walk. I have zero doubt that there is a squared away cadre that walks a walk some of the time. I wager there is a smaller contingent [not anyone you likely see on the street in the day-to-day] who walk the walk more often than not. I refer to those folks in war-zones, battle-zones, boots-on-the-ground, no time for drill cuz’ this shit’s real. Environment shapes behavio...