Hello again, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to another episode of Freedom's Creed. I am excited to be bringing you another episode of the podcast, and I want to get to it because this one I believe will be one for the ages, shall we say. So let me get right to it. I will say that I have seen my share of animal videos on YouTube. So I've seen people teaching dogs, cats, birds, and a smattering of other animal species. Don't get me wrong, many of these videos are impressive. But in the end, they're still just animals. And in truth, they provide great companionship to humans, no doubt about it. So all you animal lovers out there, don't hate me for what I'm about to do. In other words, what I'm trying to say is, let's get in touch with our sense of humor. Just work with me here, if you will. Now, I have a bike, which I ride three to four times a week, usually in the mornings, and this morning I rode about 15 miles. When I'm riding, you know, I often think about many different topics. Obviously, those thoughts are not always as lighthearted as what I'm about to describe to you. Here's what I thought about this morning, at least in part, what I was thinking about. Humans have progressed in countless ways over the centuries, of course, like understanding the cause and effect of so many different things. For example, the importance of washing hands to ward off germs as well as overcoming certain illnesses or viruses through vaccines. We have learned the value of reading, writing, and in education in general. What about the means of travel? Think about the auto, trains, planes, wow, even rockets nowadays that fly into space. It's incredible, right? I could certainly go on and on, but suffice it to say, we have done pretty well for ourselves, and thank God for it all. Because let's face it, that's where it all comes from, as far as I'm concerned. As with any discussion about our progress as human beings, we could all conclude with a couple of questions, or at least one, and that is, can we do better? Absolutely. We can do a lot better, and we should. But as I alluded to previously, this episode today is on the lighthearted side. So you gotta get that uh happy, humorous thing going, whatever that is for you, and expand your, I don't know, humor, I guess. I get it. This is uh really thin ice to be treading on because whenever you share something that you think is funny, may not be funny to other people, but my hope is that you will find some humor in what I'm sharing with you today. I did an episode, I think it was three episodes into the podcast, which would have been somewhere around March, well, the exact date was March 23rd of 2021. The episode is called Growth and Progress of Humans. If you have not listened to that episode, then either stop this episode where you are right now and go back and listen to episode number three. If you don't want to do that, that's fine with me. I don't really care. However you want to do it. But please go listen to episode three. Well, here's how my thought process went whilst riding my bike this morning. Now, I'm using dogs as my model, but you might be thinking of the animal you like most, and that's okay with me. As I've said, people have managed to progress quite well, actually, and I think that's something that we can all agree upon. Now imagine teaching a dog how to high jump, for instance. Clearly, if there were a dialogue we could employ with a dog, it would make things much easier. It may go something like this. Okay, who's a good boy? Now, approach the high jump bar from left to right, it doesn't matter. Jump as high as you can, and with two extra legs, you can definitely get up high. No slacking now. As you get to the bar, jump backwards. Don't straddle it, but use the Fosberry flop. Time for a side note for those of you who are not familiar with Dick Fosberry. Dick Fosberry was from Oregon and he had a bad experience early on. He and his brother were riding their bikes on a road, and his brother was hit by a car and killed, and it caused a lot of stress and anxiety for Dick. So he tried to use sports as kind of an escape from reality, which many of us do. So he tried his hand at track and field to be specific, the high jump. And back then, the way that one would high jump, and if you're not even familiar with the high jump, it's simply where you get back a certain distance from a bar that is elevated and you run towards it and you jump over it. And the higher the bar, the more impressive it is to jump over it, especially before Dick Fosbury came along, because the way that you would negotiate the high jump bar is you would run towards it and then do what they called straddle the bar. So you would jump over with your belly towards the bar, and then you would get the rest of your body over. So, needless to say, people didn't really jump that high, and if they did, it was impressive given the way that they were jumping over. Well, Fosbery decided after some trial that he would jump over the bar backwards. It was revolutionary, and no kidding, people actually made fun of him for the way that he jumped over the bar. But the trick was, or the secret was that by jumping over the bar backwards, it enabled the body to get over the bar. And if you've ever watched High Jump, you know it's it's beautifully orchestrated. It's something that is incredible. It's an incredible feat to be able to jump over a bar and turn yourself backwards with your head and arms going over first, then your hips, and then you kick your feet up in the air somewhat and make it over the rest of the way. It's pretty cool to see. So, in a nutshell, that's the Fosberry flop. So let me continue. All right now, Fido. If you want to add some style points to the whole jump, once you clear the bar, do a couple somersaults before hitting the mat. Now, fans will love it. Not even kidding, they will love it. Now, imagine in your mind if dogs could actually talk using English or whatever language, whatever your country is, they could talk. And you could understand them, they could understand you. Number one, they wouldn't need people to coach them. They'd be like, please, you're pitiful. You're a human. You have only two legs. We don't need people in their pitiful situation to coach us with four legs. First of all, we can run faster because of those extra two legs. We approach the bar from the side, we jump with all of our might, and voila, we're way over the bar. And furthermore, they would say, your world record is a mere eight feet and a quarter inch. And that record hasn't been touched since nineteen ninety-three, thirty years ago. Our record is eighteen feet. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I hope you're laughing at least a little bit, but think of every other track and field event that a dog could do. Now, without opposable thumbs, they'd be limited, for example, no pole vaulting, no shot put, no javelin throwing, you know, anything where you need that opposable thumb to get a nice good grip. They would undoubtedly do really well at all the running events, sprinting, the marathon, the I don't know, 1600 meters, you know, whatever. They would do really well at the running events and wow, you know, they could run a long way and shatter records that we can only dream about. But think about this. There are a few animals with opposable thumbs, such as monkeys and apes, pandas, and a few others, that what if they evolved like dogs and were able to participate in sport? They could certainly learn and then master the events that I just mentioned. Imagine, if you will, an ape throwing a javelin. The world record for the people version of the javelin throw is ninety-five point six six meters, set in nineteen ninety-six. And for all of you feet and inches people like me, that would be nearly three hundred and fourteen feet. Now, doesn't that sound way more impressive than ninety-five point six six meters? I think it does, but even though dirty little secret, it's the same distance brother. Anyway, so back to apes. Is it too far fetched? Upon intended who's a good boy. Anyhow, it's conceivable that the ape world record for the javelin throw would be likely in the neighborhood of, I don't know, six hundred, seven hundred feet, maybe even more. Of course, there would have to be these public service announcements that would sound something like, hey, for all you attending the ape javelin throw event today, be sure to sit on either side of the field. Do not sit anywhere near the landing zone. You don't want to get impaled with a javelin thrown by an ape. No way. Ladies and gentlemen, I think there's a reason why people, human beings, rule over animals. Now, when I say rule, I don't mean in a head-to-head duel that somehow a person is going to defeat a gorilla, a lion, a tiger, a bear. No, that's stupid. We don't rule in that sense over the animal kingdom. We rule in the sense that we are supposed to be equipped with higher intellect, if I could use that phrase. In other words, we are part of the animal kingdom, but because we have the ability to reason and to think rationally, we can rule and do rule over the animal kingdom. Having opposable thumbs helps a lot too. Believe me. Well, you don't need me to tell you that. Open a jar next time and imagine doing it without an opposable thumb. Yeah. Get back to me on that and see how that goes. Now imagine, if you will, for a minute, if animals had the ability to reason and to think outside the box, as it were, do you think they would put up with anything that we do to them? No. Imagine neighborhoods. Think about it. If a dog knows that it can jump really high and is aware, for instance, that it can easily jump over a four foot high chain link fence, you think a greyhound is going to stay behind that fence if he knows he can jump over it? No way. He will jump over it every time. We'd have to have fences in neighborhoods that were like ten or twelve feet high to keep the dogs from jumping over. But who am I kidding? If they could reason and they could communicate in a way that we communicate with each other, they would rule over us. They would destroy us. There'd be nothing but four-legged and two-legged creatures with opposable thumbs ruling, and the human race would be extinct in probably short order. Five, I give it ten years max. Is this to say that animals have no ability to think, at least in some form or fashion? No. They do. To what extent? I don't know if any of us knows. Maybe Jane Goodall. But outside of that, there's probably not a lot of us who have any knowledge about how an animal thinks, what it does. What I do know is this. In the animal kingdom, it's survival of the fittest. If you're a lion in the Serengeti and you're hungry, then you're going to go after the prey that you can get, whether that's some kind of a deer, antelope, water buffalo, whatever you can take down with your major fangs and your sharp claws, that's what you're going to do in the story. As much fun as I've had doing this episode, I, for one, am very thankful that elephants, rhinos, any animal that could harm me or crush me or bite me in half has no real understanding of that fact. I'm glad. Now, that's not to say that if I get into a situation where an alligator is near me or I'm near it, I'm not going to tempt it by getting close to it and having it snap my leg off. That's not going to happen. Now, does the alligator know that he just snapped my leg off? Probably not. It just knows that it's going to survive for a little while longer, and the prey that it just snapped the leg off of is going to be rendered well, how can I say this? Without the ability to run away. So it may just get the rest of you. But again, does the gator know what it just did? No, probably not. It just is going to survive for another day or for a while longer. You've probably gotten the idea by now that clearly I could continue with this type of monologue for quite a while. There's practically limitless hypotheticals that I or now you could come up with on your own. Perhaps you have done that before, like I have. But I'm not going to continue this line of hypotheticals because you get the point. I would simply encourage you to come up with your own material without infringing upon mine. Of course, if you are going to use my material, just make sure you give me the proper attribution. That's all I ask. Don't be like somebody we know who occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, who, well, back in the day, said things that he tried to claim as originating with him in the first place. You know what I'm saying. I almost made it through an episode where I didn't talk about anything social, political, current event, et cetera, et cetera. Very close, but not quite. I guess technically, however, talking about animals interacting with human beings would be quite the social event, don't you think? And by interacting with human beings, of course, I mean in the way that I have just described in the podcast today, not in the way that we interact with our animals now. Anyway, let me end this episode. I thought it would be very appropriate to use a quote from George Orwell and his book Animal Farm. If it's been a while since you've read Animal Farm, then perhaps you could go back and review it. If you've never read Animal Farm, then I highly recommend it, and perhaps the quote will make much more sense to you if you do that. Here it is. Quote Once again the animals were conscious of a vague uneasiness. Never to have any dealings with human beings, never to engage in trade, never to make use of money, had not these been among the earliest resolutions passed at that first triumphant meeting after Jones was expelled? All the animals remembered passing such resolutions, or at least they thought that they remembered it. The four young pigs, who had protested when Napoleon abolished the meetings, raised their voices timidly, but they were promptly silenced by a tremendous growling from the dogs. Then as usual, the sheep broke into four legs good, two legs bad, and the momentary awkwardness was smoothed over. Ladies and gentlemen, let's just hope that things continue as they have for thousands of years. That we won't wake up someday and see that, oh, like Planet of the Apes, we are now subjected to the rule of the apes or some other species of animal. Makes me shudder to think about it. But don't blame me for what you may dream tonight. Not my fault. I will leave it at that, ladies and gentlemen. But remember, if you can think it, you can plan it. If you can plan it, you can do it.