FROM SECOND LIFE: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/MetaLES/59/98/21 THE PROGRAMMABLE APE This post summarizes a synthesis of several lines of thought, bringing together meditations from Diary of a Christian Skeptic , Zen of Value (suspended), and previous posts from this blog, previously called "Dragon Theory". I will attempt a "quick and dirty" summary of this synthesis, hoping to come back later to provide more detailed links and arguments, but, for the moment, I just want to make sure I capture the most relevant facets of the insights behind "The Programmable Ape". All the blogs mentioned above are dealing with a single question: What is it to be human? I take it for granted that we are related to the Ape family. I make a serious effort not to go much further than this in my observation that we are apes. I consider most discussions that attempt to justify some theory of human behavour in terms of "adaptive" characteristics sorted out by e