Hi List:
  Martin Johnson was trying to post to the TOK list, but was having trouble, so I am forwarding his note:

Hi Gregg, I take note once in awhile of the discussions but it's been a long time since I've made a comment. I was also thinking about language, English language, European language. Contrast to the Hopi language. The structure of our language divides reality into  subject-object action -verb. And this confuses science also. Is The cat In The box alive or dead is a puzzle only because of our language. When we look at the closed box, what exists is we are looking at a clothedbox. when we open the box what exists is the person looking at the box and the cat. It is said that the Hopi language can directly Express some modern theories of physics. All reality exists in relationships. Imagine a universe in which there are only two particles, one only has movement because the second one exists to make a comparison. The issue of separateness and Union is universal and is necessary to reality, as Alexander Eulung explained about the atom and the nucleus.
I've recently seen on public television one of their wonderful science presentations. A scientist brought into his home an octopus in a very large glass tank. The octopus formed a special relationship with the daughter, reaching out with one of his tentacles wrapped around the wrist of this girl, and did not want her to go away. The genealogy of the octopus goes back over a billion years, where it branched off from all  other animals. Gregg you  will understand my comment because you have said similar things in the past. The octopus has a consciousness as it looks around that room, and I would say that my  creature 1 billion years ago had a form of consciousness that has passed on. And that humans have an instinct to fulfill their potential is true of all nature, of that life form 1 billion years ago, and of all nature, I would suggest inanimate nature as well.
Dr. Martin J.

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