Taking a break (7/16, evening, open)

ooc: did you all want to continue the scene?

(yeah just catching up. lots of stuff has been goin' on in the local gaming world.)
He looked at the meat, then at each one of his guests. He nodded as he spoke. "Deer and squirrel, and I cooked it, if that is what you are asking."

Katrinkah wrinkled her nose at the Doctor's question, but said nothing. Quietly, she chewed on a piece of meat, determining that this hunk was likely squirrel.
While she preferred her meat a bit more rare normally, it still had a pleasing taste.

Deciding to eat rather interject, she simply raised a brow.

Ion shakes his head. "My apologies. I meant whether you made the platter itself. I am guessing that you make most of the things that you use. Is this correct?"

He nodded. "Yes."

He wiped off his eating utensil and took off his goggles, placing them on the messenger bag he had. He then pulled out his computer.

His voice is thoughtful at first.
"These are tools. If you were to say that these were cold and lifeless, I would agree. Yet I would contend that tool use and creation are integral to humanity."

He pours out a little of the soda into his hand and then sips from his hand.
"We do not always cup the water with our hands, drinking sip by sip.  We sometimes use cups or bowls to drink. As an extension of our hands we use the cup, and in our minds the idea of a container is as an abstraction of a function of our hand."

He takes out a water bottle from the messenger bag. His voice is more confident now with each new utterance.
"But we go further. We can drink away from an original water source. We fill a bigger container with the liquid and move that closer to our homes. Then when we are thirsty, we will fill the smaller container and drink from that. Another extension."

"But we go further. Not only do we make tools that perform a single function, we create tools which we use to create other tools. We sharpen metal to shape wood, we create a forge to shape metal, we create looms to weave cloth."

"But we go even further. Each tool, each process, each community has side effects, potential ecological damage. Many metals can be toxic to the environment. Through understanding what happens as things break down and how different environmental effects interact, we can understand and reduce or reverse the impact of our lives on the environment."

"But the tools are just tools. It is the use we put to them that makes us who and what we are. A small knife can sever the rope tying someone down, or be used to hurt someone, or it can be used to fashion a belt."

"Scientists seek to understand everything around them. While we do that we will often create new tools, new medicines. To help humanity through the tools that we create and the principles that we create or unearth. We seek to inspire. And in the dark ages of man, we showed humanity that we could face the monsters of the world around us. Both literal and figurative."

He looks a little embarrassed. "There is of course often spirited debate about the best way to do all that. And unfortunately a few of my colleagues have taken shortcuts in the past due to their passion for invention. But we are very serious about our ethics and there are penalties for that sort of thing."

The woman shifted from her relaxed position, leaning forward in her seat, and propping her hands upon her knees. "Don't you worry that in your pursuit of all the new that you've forgotten the strength of the old? Those names are not forgotten by me, and I know the power of calling them out still."

Ion tries to collect his thoughts, not wanting to give a flippant answer.

He sips his drink and relaxes, listening to the crackle of the fire and the sounds of the night. After a few moments he speaks.

"Science is not about the dismissal of the past. I know that is how it might look from the outside perspective. In fact, the best science is that which is being built upon a solid foundation of what has come before."

"We have a group that spends their time traveling as often as they sit inside a lab. Seeking out people that others might call primitive. We find that they can teach us a great deal. Or unearthing ruins of ancient civilizations. We have entire areas of study that revolve around understanding and learning from the past. There is also an entire area of study where we look into how nature does something so much better than we do, or uses lessons that we learned from nature on how to do things better."

He grins. "For instance, hummingbirds can flap their wings really fast. Something like up to 80 times in a second. How can those things help? I have no idea right now. I just think its absolutely amazing."

He looks thoughtful a moment, and then looks behind him at the house.
"But yes, I do worry about that which is forgotten. A lot actually about that. I worry that the world has forgotten that what they consider old is new. That they use something so much or are so used to something, they forget that there was a time before it. They forget that how something is, was a decision that was made ."

He points behind him. "This is not the first type of house. Nor the second, or third. Probably not even the tenth. This is definitely amazing, a reproduction of one of the earliest permanent structure types that still stand. But we know there were types before this. And even before that, there were types that failed. Experiments, I would call them. House ideas that failed to become actual houses."

He looks behind him again, memorizing what is there. "And that rotating metal spit with the hog on it. That is like, super new relatively speaking. The first one was probably a wooden stick on it over a fire. That door." He whistles. "That has to be, like, prototype number in the thousands. That chandelier would be an almost impossible feat of construction for the stone age."

He looks back. "If science is so terrible, why then are you surrounded by it?"

The corner of her mouth quirked, either calling forth a dimple or bringing to light an old scar as it did so.  "I am not saying that your science is always a bad thing.  I am expressing concern over a common perception that your people are largely engaged in some frenzied effort to classify, identify, and break down everything around you...know the sum of its parts and why it works the way it does...and maybe even attempt to rebuild it and attempt to improve upon it.  This goes beyond tools," she gestured to the spit, "shelter," her hand pointed towards the ceiling before coming back to her knee, "or even the medicines that those ignorant or beyond the aid of natural alternatives need.  I am talking about flesh, blood, and bone - beyond your prosthetics - and the spark of life within us.  But mostly...what rests beyond the seeing of normal eyes.  This is where I worry your people will stray to far, in their pursuit of science.

"Does this make more sense?"

Ion nods. "I share that concern but for every Natural Philosopher. We must all be cognizant of the energies we use and their potential long term repercussions, both to ourselves and others."

Ion pauses a moment, now is not the time for a spider man reference, keep it together. "I feel that we have an additional responsibility that comes along with our Inspiration."