Free Idolism by Marcus Herzig Page A

rather that of life on Earth over four billion years.”
    “Cool story, bro,” Tummy said and shovelled more crisps into his mouth.
    “Just think about it. Your life, as hard as that may be to imagine looking at you right now, Tummy, started as a single cell in your mother’s womb. Life on Earth started as single-celled organisms in the Earth’s womb, the ocean. In your mother’s womb that single cell started dividing and growing your body. In the ocean life developed into multi-celled organisms and multiplied. Did you know that as an embryo you had gill slits like a fish? They never developed into proper gills, and you couldn’t breathe through them, because you’re not a fish. But you had them because the common ancestor of you and today’s fish had them.”
    “Not to mention the webbing,” Ginger added.
    Julian nodded. “That’s right. You also had webbing between your fingers and your toes, making them almost look like the fins of a fish.”
    Tummy frowned at his greasy fingers.
    “Anyway,” Julian continued, “after about three billion years and nine months, life was ready to leave the womb. The first animals that left the ocean were still pretty helpless, just like you were when you were born. At first they were barely able to wriggle across the floor, just like you, but they soon learned to walk on four legs just like you learned to crawl on your hands and knees. And then, after a long time, you learned to walk upright on two legs just like our ancestors in Africa did five or six million years ago.”
    “Hold on,” Tummy protested, “you left out the best bit, the one where I was a dinosaur!”
    “That’s because you’re not a reptile,” I said, and Ginger added, “Or a bird. You’re a mammal.”
    Tummy glanced at the tree-of-life poster on my wall. “Oh well.”
    “At around the same time when you learned to walk,” Julian went on, “you also learned to talk, just like our ancestors developed bipedalism and language at roughly the same time. Then, about 5,000 years ago, we invented written language, and kids today learn how to read and write when they’re five or six years old. As you enter school, you realize that there are a lot more of your kind than you ever would have thought. Suddenly you meet complete strangers and you interact with them and play with them and learn from them. The historical equivalent of that would be the establishment of trade routes between Asia and Europe in the early Bronze Age. Tummy, do you remember that day in primary school in the first year when Phil Dixon and his bullies were beating you up, and then Michael and I stepped in and put Phil Dixon’s head down the toilet bowl?”
    “How could I ever forget,” Tummy said with a big, bright smile on his face. “That was bloody brilliant!”
    “That was the equivalent of the earliest wars between Bronze Age city states.”
    “No kidding, huh?” Tummy said.
    “And it doesn’t end there. As you were going to school to learn how to read and write and calculate, mankind made all sorts of discoveries and learned all these things about nature and the world and life, the universe, and everything, and slowly but surely our perception changed. In our childhood we perceived ourselves as the centre of the universe. Then we realized that we aren’t even the centre of the solar system, and that apart from the moon nothing really revolves around us. We’re but a tiny speck of dust in a universe that is vast and possibly endless. Coming to terms with that is an important part of growing up, and we’ve only just started to realize it because we’ve just hit puberty.”
    Julian made a pause for dramatic effect. He looked at each of us with that childlike glow in his eyes that he always had when he was excited about something. He was obviously dying for some kind of reaction from his audience, so I delivered him from his ordeal.
    “Oh please, do explain.”
    “Well, look at it,” he said. “The most striking