What is the content of the New York Times article the narrator reads over breakfast, as recounted in the first paragraphs of the essay? Which of its claims seem false or troubling to him? What seems missing?
To whom does Eiseley refer in the first two sentences of the essay? What is the purpose of evoking “little bones” and feathers?
This essay was published in 1959. How have the relationships between humans and machines altered in the intervening years?
What ideas in the history of early science does he evoke? When had humans identified their movements with those of clocks and other instruments? What then changed, and with what result?
What image does he use to describe the goals of artificial intelligence? Is this reductive? What does he assert differentiates a human from an artificial mouse? (258, last paragraph)
What does he mean by the claim that “time is a series of planes existing superficially in the same universe”? (259, top of page)
What had been the conditions of life for him during the research trip he describes? What material remnants of history had he encountered? (260) What have the researchers been told to collect, and for what purpose?
What does he fantasize might be “the most beautiful sight in the world”? (260, bottom) What smaller evidences of bird perspective does he cite? (261)
During the narrator’s expedition, what contrivances are used to capture birds? What happens when he tries this? According to the author, what mistake does the bird make that enables his capture? (261) What is the effect of his resistance on his fellow bird?
What word does the narrator use to describe himself after he has captured the bird? (262) Does this foreshadow how he will behave in the future?
What are signs of the bird’s emotions in captivity? How does he respond when laid on the grass? (262) How is the scene when he rejoins his mate described? Where had the captured bird’s mate been during his captivity?
What is the nature of her response? How does the narrator describe his reaction to the escaping birds? (263)
What effect is created by the fact that this scene is now a memory recalled in later life? What are some allusions or meanings encoded in Eiseley’s final sentence?
(selections from A Forest of Voices)