The one great magic of mankind is the ability to communicate by artificial means. It is not fire, or space travel, or open-heart surgery, or any other device we have stumbled upon. Our kind existed—survived—through hundreds of thousands of years as little more than beasts. Cave-dwelling food for stronger beasts. But suddenly we stepped beyond ourselves, beyond the campfire where stories were told, and discussed War and Peace with others of our kind that we would never meet. This is the true magic.
All of our struggles, and religions, and literature since that time stem from that moment in a cave when some lost genius described the image of what they had seen, most probably for other members of the tribe who might come after, and clearly as a way of communicating the importance of the subject, but not for strangers who might be in that cave forty-thousand years later. Before that moment, all our fears, and joys, and woes passed without notice into the atmosphere like a flicker of flame from the fire. After, our love or hate would be recorded and thus passed on to our children, and beyond.
Here we are now on the map. Mark it! New means of controlling our speech, our writing, and even our thoughts have come into play. From here we go on to what we make of it, or not. The journey is now in our hands. Do we speak freely, and write as we wish, or has this gift of our ancient ancestor, after so many generations of joy and pain, been sacrificed for some sense of momentary safety or monetary gain? The conversation follows us, or not.