Man gave names to all the animals
The way that I think religion really works is:
We have texts and traditions, myths and songs, folk stories and superstitions. Fragments of truth are there but in the sense of a palimpsest the glyphs of dead languages faintly visible in the space between words.
A signal to noise ratio beyond hopeless. We won't ever know exactly what was correct. It could be anything
There is only one true fragment in all those pages and it is:
"The human would name all the animals, those of the sky and of the earth and until so-named the human would stand alone."
Is that disappointing? Were you hoping for something more central to the greater themes of the text?
I cannot emphasis enough how over-run with propaganda, mistakes religious texts must be to stand of chance of preserving even a fragment like this one.
I can't promise you I'm right either. But, there is power in names. And you are already engaged in this sacred project of naming all of the living creatures. That's why I've sought you out, a biologist, a taxonomist. I want to know if there is any way to rush the work along. Please don't laugh at me. --- In recent years we have perfected methods to detect the DNA present in soil samples. These fragments of DNA come from many animals, fungi, plants. It's a way to assess the biodiversity of an ecosystem. But DNA sampling has resulted in some unsettling observations. The kingdom of the fungi are woefully understudied and under-classified. We have named thousands, but their species number in the millions. And from the soil comes even more unsettling news. A great portion of fungi are parasitic. They can only live on a particular host, sometimes a particular plant, sometimes a particular fungi. There are millions of telescoping families of parasites and hyper parasites hinted at by the DNA of the soil of a mature forest. There are whole clades of fungi we have never seen, that only live deep in soil and only in association with other fungi that we have never seen. Adversarial and sympathetic ecological networks wherein none of the participants have been named or described. This is as close to a proof that the prophesy will never come to pass. We will never name the last living thing. We will always stand alone. As you can plainly see it's impossible! --- I refuse to accept that. I refuse to accept it is impossible. Why would the fragment talk about naming all living things if that task were impossible? Why would it describe what happens after all living things are named if that will never happen? I need you to use your imagination. Use technology. If we can find their DNA we can name them. ---
But, that's not how it works! You can't just name ... DNA. You need a type specimen. You need an exemplar of the organism. How are we supposed to find that? --- Can't you use the DNA to grow it or something? I can't believe that we could be so close to achieving the ultimate fate of all humankind and a bunch of mushrooms get in the way. -- You should have more respect for fungi. And don't call them "mushrooms" they don't all have those fruiting bodies. Especially these dark types found in soil. But... I suppose you are correct. We could contrive a type specimen directly from the DNA. Sort of revive each organism we detect and see what grows. I know how much this means to you so I will begin immediately.
