Well, it's 96 degrees, but the Weather Channel says it "feels like 97." This seemingly meaningless difference has a huge psychological impact on people eager to suffer more. But one degree is also the stuff of controversy. Precision is everything in nature, and the slightest fluctuation can have aeonic results that scientists can't live long enough to study. Comics and pundits argue the consequences, but a drop in the bucket can cause the bucket to overflow. Personally I would hate to have any involvement in unwanted flooding.

A fine line of variability extends to all matter and energy. A slight twist of the genetic string, for example, tricked our brains into forming a frontal lobe; and because of this sudden humanity we developed the ability to peel away these gradations like onion skins, to explore how the tiniest bump in the road can cause cataclysm or delight. In fact, there may be no missing link between man and beast, just a shift in the code, and though in a larger sense we can't map the future, we can see the signs and collect some evidence. Tusks disappear from elephants, frogs stop singing, plankton fades from the sea. And of course we have humans who, by some mutation or interference in their personal growth, don't relate or act in the least bit related to the rest of us.