Tracking Lions, Myth, and Wilderness in Samburu

The tracker and the tracked: While tracking a lion with a Samburu headman and then, later, eluding human assailants who may be tracking him, Jon Turk experiences people at their best and worse, leading him to embark on a virtual journey into prehistory, to understand how human behavior has been molded by myth.

As Jon tracks a lion armed only with a wooden club, he wonders how our ancestors survived on the uncompromising savannah when they were slower and weaker than their animal neighbors. The answer is that myth, shared around flickering campfires, bound Stone Age humans into cooperative tribes with collective strength much greater than the strength of individuals. Later, while hiding in a thicket from murderous terrorists or rogue government forces, Jon asks why people he has never met would want to kill him. The answer is that myth can be interpreted as imaginary license to murder. Thus the stories we tell each other, and the stories spinning in our heads, are molded into innovation, empathy, and cooperation - or harnessed to launch armies.

Seeking escape from the confusion we create for ourselves and our neighbors with our think-too-much-know-it-all brains, Jon finds liberation within a natural world that spins no fiction.