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Earth Matters : Doin’ What Comes Natur’lly

By David Spector

This is a nature essay that is mostly about human language, word choice and the logic of argument. I describe a few of the animal behaviors that apparently help to get an individual’s genes into the next and subsequent generations. In presenting these behaviors, I attempt to use straightforward descriptive language; I also mention some words based on human culture that have been used to label those behaviors and to project them onto discussion regarding human norms. I try to make the case that the simply descriptive language of biology has fewer pitfalls than does the emotionally charged language of our human cultural discourse.