I would sincerely like to thank all of my many friends and family members for providing the necessary stimulation and discussion that has served to motivate this work on the evolution, development, and behavior - even if the conclusions I have drawn from these experiences is other than that which they had intended to convey.

Two friends in particular have provided the encouragement and support necessary to keep me on course over the years - Professor Andy Neher (Psychology - Cabrillo College, Aptos, CA.) and a brilliant jack-of-all-trades scientific, political, social, and artistic - Bill Rowe.

Andy Neher in his capacity as "Dr. Know Way" has been indispensible for vetting many speculative, and sometimes spurrious, ideas.

He has patiently indulged many imaginative and often flawed conceptions while constantly pressing me to support my speculations and interpetations with robust data and clear articulation.

I initially was drawn to Andy during the mid-1990's upon finding a Dover reprint of his The Psychology of Transcendence (Neher 1990) in our local used book store, Logos.

Upon completion of the book, I discovered that Andy was at that time teaching at Cabrillo College in Aptos, CA. and I promptly set off to see if I could contact him in hopes that I might set up a special studies class with him.

To my surprise Andy was extremely gracious and cooperative, assisting me through weekly discussions on the nature of cognition and consciousness.

The special studies course required a text, so Andy sent me off to the library to find an appropriate text book for our session.

To my good fortune I stumbled across a long neglected book on the neuroscience shelf of the Cabrillo College Library (only one other person had checked it out over the many years it had been sitting on the shelves) - Gerald Edelman's Neural Darwinism: The Theory of Neuronal Group Selection (Edelman 1987).

This choice was to forever change my perspective on the development and evolution of animals and their nervous systems.

Andy's repeated entreaties to distill the information into a transmissible and coherent form provided the necessary motivation for me to perservere through the text.

To be honest, the book was well beyond the scope of my knowledge and considerable legwork and multiple readings of the book were required to bring me up to speed but by the end of this period Edelman had become one of my all time intellectual guru's, leading along a path that few understood the importance of treading.

Coincidentally, at this time his friend Bill Rowe had just finished reading another of Edelman's more recent works Bright Air, Brilliant Fire: How Mind Becomes Matter (Edelman 1992) and Andy suggested that Bill and I get together to discuss Edelman's theory.

This was the start of a long, fruitful, and thouroughly enjoyable dialogue on the issues of consciousness and practically anything else we could think of.

Without this support I would have wandered alone in the dark.



I would also like to thank the many wonderful professors and instructors at Cabrillo College at Aptos, California and the University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC) who have tolerated my incessant questions both in the classroom and in their offices - especially Dr. Harry Ungar (Organic Chemistry - Cabrillo College) and Dr. Dennis Etler (Physical Anth (ropology - Cabrillo College).

Special thanks is given to Leonardo Gonzales, my good friend, who in addition to many inspired conversations - has also been kind enough to provide the server space at Mor.phe.us that has made web development phase of this project possible.