“Man is psychically distinguished from all other animals by the entirely new fact that he not only knows, but knows that he knows. In him, for the first time on earth, consciousness has coiled back upon itself to become thought. To an observer unaware of what it signifies, the event might at first seem to have little importance; but in fact it represents the complete resurgence of terrestrial life upon itself. In reflecting psychically upon itself Life positively made a new start. In a second turn of the spiral, tighter than the first, it embarked for a second time upon its cycle of multiplication, compression and interiorization. This is how the thinking layer of the earth as we know it today, the Noosphere, came rapidly into being.”
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. The Future of Man (Kindle Locations 4502-4508).
Teilhard de Chardin 
I am fond of the line: “he not only knows, but knows that he knows”. This is what distinguishes us from the rest of God’s creation and this means that we have a great responsibility to live with integrity and mercy in God’s created universe. The definition of the Noosphere as “the thinking layer of the earth” is simply stated but contains such depth. Thanks for sharing this.