Please listen to the recording in 2.7 and read the following paragraphs, then submit your audio assignment on-line, and do the peer review : Ultimately, personal space is psychological, not physical: it has less to do with the space outside us than with our inner space. I suspect that the shrinking of personal space is directly proportional to the expansion of self-absorption : people whose attention is inward do not bother to look outward. Even the focus of science these days is micro, not macro. The Human Genome Project is mapping the universe of the genetic code, while neuroscientists are using souped-up M.R.I. machines to chart the flight of neurons in our brains. In the same way that the breeze from a butterfly’s wings in Japan may eventually produce a tidal wave in California, I have decided to expand the contracting boundaries of personal space. In the line at my bank, I now refuse to move closer than three feet to the person in front of me, even if it means that the fellow behind me starts breathing down my neck.