Of humans and deep time
Oh, the tricks and antics of the Third Chimpanzee! Oh, angels, weep for Man – the pretentious master of the universe. BIG History: Big Bang to Universe to Stars to Chemical Elements to Life to Natural Selection to Humans to Language to Civilization. Deep time: The earth’s age: 4 billion years old (very old); earliest […]
Brexit
UK out of the EU: Earthquake? Perhaps. But no surprise. The path of history is unpredictable; its triggers not obvious, and its trajectory uncertain.
Hawking
“Two of mankind’s biggest diseases are greed and stupidity.” Stephen Hawking (paraphrase). More terrifying is that there seems to be no cure.
Awanoor!
Kofi Awanoor: Oh, To die having coffee with a dear son. And together see the setting of the sun. Ah, but that is quite poetic Mr Awanoor!
Wole
Wole Soyinka: king of expansive metaphors and verbal inventiveness; indomitable spirit.
All women
All women: wonderful to behold; to hold and to be held by; a blessing to the earth and heaven; the crucible of life. Mama, I dream less, but I dream about you still.
Wangari
Wangari Maathai: UNBOWED. Enough said.
A consciousness that coheres
Life is a consciousness that coheres tenuously a logical consistency that totters on stilts a candle that runs on illusion and delusion It is passion and prayer and espionage and conspiracy
Life as a paradox
Life is a paradox: Reproduction is superior to production Recurrence is better than occurrence Imperfect mother of perfect and failure father of success.
Progress as boom and burst
The paradox of life – progress as boom and bust – is not a paradox at all: think of a spiral loop that obeys both exponential laws and gravity!
