Coincidentally (or not), I read that same quotation from Russell two days ago on the train, after finding this little book of his from 1958 in an Oxfam shop. It figures in his enchanting “Portraits from Memory” (p.4). But, what is way more important, he also mentions the following regarding this so called material “evolution”:
“I think the world has swung too far in this direction [the Megamachine] and will not return to sanity until the biological aspects of human life are again remembered.” (p.127)
Swung is obviously an understatement, it might have been a concern in 1958, today is an observable catastrophe. Were he alive now, he might be in agreement with the words of the great Joseph Conrad. As much as I love him, I cannot but disagree (for entirely different reasons, that is):
“I have never been able to find in any man's book or any man's talk anything convincing enough to stand up for a moment against my deep-seated sense of fatality governing this man-inhabited world.” (p.85)
Finally, regarding that entertaining panoply of the Valleys, what can any intelligent person say?
“Life is the life of life.” (Bhāgavata purāna, i.13.46)
Coincidentally (or not), I read that same quotation from Russell two days ago on the train, after finding this little book of his from 1958 in an Oxfam shop. It figures in his enchanting “Portraits from Memory” (p.4). But, what is way more important, he also mentions the following regarding this so called material “evolution”:
“I think the world has swung too far in this direction [the Megamachine] and will not return to sanity until the biological aspects of human life are again remembered.” (p.127)
Swung is obviously an understatement, it might have been a concern in 1958, today is an observable catastrophe. Were he alive now, he might be in agreement with the words of the great Joseph Conrad. As much as I love him, I cannot but disagree (for entirely different reasons, that is):
“I have never been able to find in any man's book or any man's talk anything convincing enough to stand up for a moment against my deep-seated sense of fatality governing this man-inhabited world.” (p.85)
Finally, regarding that entertaining panoply of the Valleys, what can any intelligent person say?
“Life is the life of life.” (Bhāgavata purāna, i.13.46)
Yours