A philosophical look

THE EDITOR: Covid19 has had at least one telling effect: it speaks to the fragility of the human condition which, with all its egotistic independence, self-sufficiency and even presumed sense of superiority to nature, has as yet to find a cure to date.

The best minds are scrambling to put half measures in place as a result, like a drowning man clinging to a straw. Washing the hands ad infinitum and the “social distancing” have become gospel because it’s all we’ve got in the absence of anything else.

But these are at best defensive mechanisms to limit the spread rather than a proactive approach to eliminate the seemingly invincible enemy.

I write not to disparage these genuine efforts at solving the problem but their failure so far, prompts me to give a philosophical spin to the issue of how fragile we are as a species, despite all claims to the contrary.

I do not have the answers, but against that “ego” referred to above, which is so characteristic of all humans, we must begin to recognise the interconnectivity, indeed interdependence, of the world in all its helplessness, as we look for a way to deal with this problem together.

May be we are being pushed into this kind of stock-taking by a superior force beyond us which sees us on the brink of eventual self-destruction because of said “ego” and false sense of superiority over the other species which share this planet with us.

I am no Cassandra of Greek mythology, but how can we be involved in nano technology and in projects to reach Mars inter alia, and cannot stave off a virus that seems to belong to a colony of viruses such as SARS and MERS, with which we are familiar?

Maybe there is a new hand at play here about which we can only guess!

ERROL NARINE BENJAMIN

Via e-mail