(Written on February 7th) We watched the second episode in Brian Swimme’s The Powers of the Universe tonight. I was struck by this quote, and I am paraphrasing, “the dynamic of acquiring free energy is at the core of everything.” We are participating in the dispersal of energy in the universe. Life is part of that dispersal. We are part of that dispersal. Our sentience, our sensitivity, has been selected for within the context of the wavelengths emitted by our sun, the chemical constituents of our soil, the excess of water and carbon, and the tiny changes that gave our ancestors some advantages in acquiring free energy. We are only able to know aspects of the universe associated with our access to free energy. Life is a competition for that energy and we don’t have a choice to not participate in the competition. Fortunately group selection means that part of the success of our species has been due to helping each other to get the energy we need. In the discussion afterwards we talked about …