Authentic Science Fiction Monthly, No. 56 — page 96: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Some talking points on— HOW WE FIND OUR WAY AROUND by WALTER GRAHAM SUPPOSE THE ART OF Navigation is just about the first thing we begin to learn. Even before we are capable of any kind of move- ment of ourselves, we estab- lish the location of objects relative to ourselves. Food supply being first and fore- most in importance, we might even pin down the reference point more exactly as being the mouth. The thumb goes to the mouth almost as the first expression of humanity— it is the most essentially human of all parts of the body. The great apes make very little use of the thumb. When a baby discovers its toes it puts them in its mouth. Our first toys are really taken into possession and fully appre- hended when put to the mouth. 95 FIXED POINTS It is not our present purpose to render an account of baby ways, but it is significant that in finding our way anywhere we must start with a reference point, and what better refer- ence point than ourselves ? The first thing to fix, then, is our own location. So long as we are only concerned with getting things to us that is all we need, but as soon as we begin to want to get ourselves somewhere else, reference points are needed. First we must know the distance from us to our objective, then we must know its direction. Direction at once brings in at least one other factor, since direction is a relative term, meaningless unless related to something. Our early naviga- comcloooks.con