Wells

If one were to dig a well, or better yet discover one, perhaps the best thing to wish for - after flinging a cast copper trinket worth a small fraction of a solitary bank note that is legal tender for all debts public and private – would be water.   Not that the well would have any regard for the coin, or the wish for that matter, for aquifers do not produce themselves based on the ambitions of men, but it would be a noble desire.  Why else would one labor to shovel earth from within a certain area, dozens of meters deep, if not to find water?  That is the purpose of a well; and we can assess the quality of the well based on its functionality, that is, how well it produces water – and clean, fresh water at that.  If our endeavors continue to carry us in the quality assessment vein of things, we could also quality test the water; its purity, lack of particulates, mineral content, sterility and other indices could be tabulated.  If we assess quality, however, we ultimately are assessing fulfillment of function.  A good well produces good, clean water.  Good, clean water nourishes men, beasts, and the earth.  Thus, we are endeavoring to find out how well something is designed or functions in serving it purpose.   The purpose of things can often be determined based on what that object does uniquely, that is, what it can do than nothing else can do, or at least not nearly as well.  If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.  But a screw is not a nail, and screwdriver is just what the doctor (or carpenter) ordered.  Ibuprofen may make your headache diminish, but it won’t make the microbes go away; penicillin will, though (unless, they’re resistant!), and that is because it was designed, or at least discovered, to do so – thank you, Fleming, for being untidy at your desk and leaving mold out to grow.  So what is it that makes humans unique?  What can we do that nothing else can?  As I reflect, I think it is, at least in part, to think and reflect.  Hammers don’t think, at least not that I’m aware of.  In a sense, computers “think”, but they don’t reflect – at least I don’t think so (while ‘Siri’ or ‘Alexa’ could theoretically ask the traditionally existential angst-induced question of “why do I exist”, it wouldn’t be asking existentially, but in a programmed fashion).  But thinking too much may drive one mad, and not to be more sane, and it would be a self-limiting process.  Not to mention, thinking is not the only unique thing humans can do.   We can be and are aware of others, and ‘the other.’  We can also communicate, with words.  We can also commune, with God.  But the world is complex, not simple, and we delude ourselves when we think otherwise.  We can’t think, or communicate, or commune unless our bodies are functioning properly, and our bodies can’t function properly without being adequately hydrated, which brings me back to the well…