August 15 & 22, 2011 issue, completed August 2, 2012

This issue got everyone talking about the prospect of eating insects. General consensus: never gonna happen. Now, keep in mind that most of my current party of companions wouldn't eat shrimp or lobster, much less grubs, but still. I eat all shellfish and still, with what I like to think of as an open mind, I couldn't imagine eating bugs. The article suggests that it's perhaps because we're squeamish about eating legs, eyes, guts -- but I know that that's not necessarily it in my case. In Japan I ate tiny fish that from a distance resembled bean sprouts, but turned out to have tiny black eyes that I mistook for pepper at first. And yet I ate them. Why? Because they were fish, and because they were dead. I think the idea of the squirming, live insect is the first hurdle to acceptance. Certainly the one time in Japan when I saw a live shrimp scooped out of a tank with a net and beheaded in front of me to become squirming, spastic sushi (this is a delicacy called "dancing fish,") my fascination was tempered with a certain disgust. When I hear of grubs, larvae, worms and the like, they are always squirming, living. However, if I am being honest, even if they are dead there are certain things - the texture of the crunch of their shells, their guts - that will be off-putting. With flies, their association with rotting flesh will never be overcome.

Other great articles in here included the exploration of how Neanderthal man was different - and perhaps not so different - from us, and the discussion of atheism. My personal religion comes from "The Sweet Smell of Success." "There is a Brotherhood of Man:" we are all connected by how we behave toward each other, and we are a bit like the Borg, in that our greater well-being as a species on this earth is predicated on how we treat each other. Treat each other badly, and we all suffer. Treat each other with respect, and with regard for morals, and we are all better off. The existence of a higher being is neither implied nor denied. Just no way to know if He or She is really there or not. All we can know is, we are here, and there are seven billion of us, and wow, that is something.