I was watching my child get ready for bed. He placed his stuffed animals in a deliberate order. As I watched him stalling (he often does), I wondered about the role of playing. the more I thought about it, the more I wondered the extent to which it is actually a simulation. Not particularly this, but rather all playing.Of course, the next thought was of young mammals fighting and chasing one another around in the cute ways that make Animal Planet so popular. We have countless times heard this referred to in terms of developing coordination and dexterity that will be needed to make one’s own way in the adult world. What does this mean, though? For what it’s worth, this interpretation is accurate, but in the broader context it is unnecessarily limiting. Consider this play as the conduct of simulations. Suppose a child is playing with cars. How closely to the movements of the cars reflect reality? Perhaps the cars travel in slow motion. Children will address concepts that are almost entirely foreign to them. What six year old understands gravity? Yet they know enough that the jumping car will decelerate as it rises and decelerate as it falls. As well, the arc of the vehicle through the air is a reasonably good facsimile of a parabola. Listen to the conversations between action figures. The child tends to change the dialogue even for similar imagined situations. Note in particular how much better the child’s dialogues improve over time. Certainly much of this improvement is due to the intellectual growth and experience of the child. Nevertheless, I suspect the hours of playtime simulation have almost certainly contributed significantly. I wonder if anyone has ever really addressed this idea.