With our six actors all on stage, the play begins and my story ends. As an epilogue to the performance, I add some brief remarks about the practical lessons that we may learn from the story. Our species faces two great tasks in the next few centuries. Our first task is to make human brotherhood effective and permanent. Our second task is to preserve and enhance the rich diversity of Nature in the world around us. Our new understanding of biological and cultural evolution may help us to see more clearly what we have to do.
~ Freeman Dyson from, https://www.edge.org/conversation/freeman_dyson-freeman-dyson-1923-2020
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Arranged as a pleasant conceit, Dyson lays out a sweeping and crystal clear history of our understanding of evolution. That alone is worth reading. The real gems however, are to be found in his commentary in the final paragraphs; Don’t skip to the end.
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