Questions are a symptom of wonder.
Especially why and how questions, for they are frontal cortex questions. I like to think of them as evolutionary gifts for us humans. Why and how questions arise from our aesthetic appreciation of qualia. Their answers actually beg questions of a more profound sort: are we moving toward or falling away from our ideals.
For instance the other day on hike I found myself staring at a slender, tall mushroom peeking out up from under some mossy logs. I wondered if one could tell by the type of mushroom whether it was born of decaying animal, vegetable, or mineral matter. But I’m not a hunter or gatherer (yet) and I decided I could let this question go and just admire the fragile beauty of it.
Okay – my question might not, strictly, be a how or why question. But what about scientific questions which have helped Homo sapiens at the expense of our planet? Has agricultural and industrial productivity been worth the pollution? Has relativity been worth the atom bomb? (Aesthetically, I’d say we are falling away from ecosystems)
Most frontal cortex questions do not need answering. We need just be grateful to have such gifts (simply the inspiration to ask in the first place). Wonder is blessing enough – answers are definitely a mixed blessing.
Where, when and what are older brain questions, having arisen from the need to survive. They are instinctual. Why and how, on the other hand, are not yet matters of survival, but they are becoming so.
As our human landscapes have “progressed” and we have fallen away from ecosystems, the how and why questions are becoming imperatives. We don’t ask them for their descriptive answers, but in order to know how we must act in order to survive.
Only a new, qualiadelic aesthetic will turn our why and how wonderings into morally good and ecologically healthy instincts. In order to survive we must change course and do the right thing: that is, we must notice qualia that reflects ecosystems, and behave accordingly.
Ingenuity will dovetail with aesthetics as we move toward ecosystems as the ideal. The more we learn about the how and why of ecosystems, the more their provenance will guide us. We must place our faith in ecosystems.