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Purpose comes out of comfort with metaphor, one thing standing in for another. For example, "these objects in the outer solar system are the blood spattered on the wall after some violent murder" (Mike Brown, Discover Magazine May 2009). That to use a metaphor one must have a deep understanding of the process one is using. And backwards, to make the leap into abstraction indicates experiential knowledge of a concept. Purpose is a clear image.

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My psychoanalyst suggested the reason I was interested in the headline "ARE WE STILL EVOLVING?" is because I am interested in my own personal evolution. I see how the logic works, but I'm also interested in evolution as a non-personal subject to read about on the train ride home. Sure we can trace something back to a person's psychology, using what we know to interpret the signs they flash, but doesn't that discount the person's experience?

The possibility that my deepest subconscious thoughts are cliches is a terrifying thought. But that fear, to me, means there's something to it; more threads to follow. Not necessarily the truth of "my own personal evolution" (whatever that means), but my distrust of that statement. The fact that I'm writing about it right now as opposed to speaking directly to him. This is the fruit. Inevitably I come back to my own experience: this one, not some weird abstract idea of my experience.