LETTERS: DRAWING THE LINE ON EXPLORATION

To the editor:

When my grandson, Elijah, lived in Dallas, he so desperately wanted a pet he would immediately claim and give a name to every insect that crossed his path. On one of my visits, Elijah had detected an ant living outside on the porch in front of the apartment door. When he saw it, he exclaimed, "Look, Papa, there's" -- at which point he called out a name I could not pronounce or even begin trying to spell. He knelt down and began speaking to that ant like it was his best friend.

He had to be at school in a matter of minutes and asked me if I would stay with his little friend. I told him of course I would be glad to, thinking the moment he was out of sight I would be able to go back inside and perhaps get another hour's sleep. I watched that little ant with Elijah until he had to leave, and in doing so I was fascinated by how busy that ant was in the small world he was living in.

Most likely, that ant never went any farther in his entire life than that porch. I pondered how what he knew was all within the small confines of his limited personal world. As I continued my train of thought, it occurred to me that this minute world he lived in was an extremely small portion of a much larger world. Such as the one my cat Katy Bear lives in.

The ant would have had a very short life if he had lived within the confines of Katy Bear's world. She loves killing bugs and performs this feat better than people I have paid to eliminate these pests. Katy is a house cat, and with the exception of a few breakouts into the back yard, the house she lives in is her world. All that she knows is within the small confines of her personal limited world, my house, which is but a small portion of a much larger world.

In bringing this full circle, I thought of us humans. What we know is within the small confines of the limited world we live in, a world which could contain enduring facts and truths of a much larger world. If the ant decided he wanted to discover and live int he world my cat lives in, he would find that survival in her world would be impossible. Since my cat has lived her total existence in the confines of my house, she would find survival in my world short-lived at the very most. She would also discover she was living in a world of inventions and lifestyles she was not designed for or capable of ever utilizing.

Thus, what does mankind hope to achieve? What benefit will there be in finding a larger world? It would be a world of inventions and lifestyles in which we could not exist. Man has always been driven by a magnificent desire to discover what is there which we do not know. This leaves me to believe that the creator of our world has drawn a line which we cannot cross or perhaps had better not cross. Heaven help us if it is the latter of the two.

RON FARROW

Cape Girardeau