Fight Over Cow Leaves 5 Dead A View of Life DHAKA, Bangladesh -- A village dispute over a cow grazing in a rice field leaves 5 people hacked to death with knifes, 3 critically injured, 20 homes burned to the ground, and 7 people arrested. How often I am reminded that not every culture views the value life as I do. Not everyone sees the logic of starlight. Not everyone believes the world is round. Just pick up any newspaper, almost doesn’t matter what year it’s from, and read about events from around the world. Events and reactions that, to you, seem so completely bizarre that they are unbelievable. Then try to imagine that it is you defending your rice field. Protecting the food that feeds your family. What may seem a complete absurdity to me was, at least at that moment for these people, the right course of action. I forget sometimes that I am a product of my environment. My environment has taught me to see an believe in things a certain way. It is only my hubris opinion that mine is the correct view. Had I grown up in DHAKA, or any other place, I would view the world differently than I do. And I would still believe mine was the correct view. So nothing, from my perspective, would of changed. I would still be a product of my environment and I would still believe that mine was the correct view. It is only my intellect, not my heart, not my feelings, not my soul, that tells me that my view can not be the only correct version of the world. As hard as it is for me to concede, someone else has to be correct also. And that someone will have a diametrically opposing view to mine. But my intellect still struggles accepting two correct answers to the value of life. What if I had been born on a planet from another galaxy. Had the construction of a protozoan. Fed myself by absorbing mineral traces in saline solution through my cell membrane. Came from a race of protozoans over two million years old. And came to earth looking for a food source for my thriving civilization of protozoans. The earth’s oceans would be a perfect answer to my quest. Humans would appear to me like bacteria and germs appear to you. I would see the earth as having no significant life forms and drain the oceans of my planet’s consumption and be gone. No regrets, no guilt. I did the right thing, from my point of view. On earth, 95% of all life forms would die within the first year. Less than 3% would survive after the second year. Nature would cause adaptive evolution so that the survivors could live in the new earth environment. Whether humans are part of the surviving life forms or not , I don’t know. Instinct tells me no. Is that all it boils down to? The life form with the last perspective? Is everything else just a wash? Are we so arrogant in our beliefs that we cant imagine being wrong?As Always - your comments and feed back are welcome. My thoughts to your thoughts. May the Palintar leave them undistorted. May I see you as you see me. Contact the AUTHOR S.S.Powell 97/05/14
Return to The Palintar Return to Worlds Index Return to Perspectives Index
This page hosted by Get your own Free Home Page
