KING of the UNITED STATES

HOW DID MANKIND SURVIVE??

In the youngest days of man’s rise to dominance on this earth, how did we escape being exterminated — how did we escape becoming snack food of the lions, bears, and sabertooth tigers?

Before our defensive weapons were significant, being found and located by major predators would have been almost inescapably bad. Especially if you’re very young and weak. And even more especially, if you’re a toddler or a baby! So what could possibly be worse in this dangerous environment, than being a toddler or baby who has been located by major predator?

And that’s the unanswered mystery: Because, the human baby is endowed by nature with a MIRACLE OF SONIC ANNOYANCE, which rivals science’s best inventions of amplification. As the volume knob on my electrical guitar’s amplifier only goes to 10 and not 11, I do not think I could get the severity and intensity from my Les Paul which is regularly achieved by the human babies in my neighborhood.

Mind you, the babies and toddlers in my neighborhood are irregular; they are not champions of wailing by accident. I am utterly convinced that in my locality there are meetings and workshops where technique is shared, theory is discussed, and phrases like, ” No, screech from your diaphragm!” are frequently heard. But that just gives my local babies an edge; In general, babies and toddlers are able to do things with their voice that are profound and, well, suicide-inducing for adults.

These babies cannot easily pick up simple objects, cannot think for themselves, cannot walk well, cannot clean themselves, cannot feed themselves… and yet, the sophistication of their vocal chords and lung capacity are operatic and stunning. Militaries across the globe endlessly pursue weapons which can induce the pain, disorientation, and madness which the human baby can fire at will. (And seemingly endlessly, if desired.)

So given the ability to alert every predator in a 30 mi. radius with a screech which the lion must surely understand as “Snack food calling… dinner bell… human child fresh from the oven”, how did any of our distant ancestors survive to become adults? How did any baby which was not mute escape being eaten?

Is there something the caveman knew about babies that we’ve forgotten?

©2008 KING DAVID CAUL