Darwin and Design, lecture 4 review

Darwin and Design, lecture 4 review

From the Open course of MIT: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/literature/21l-448j-darwin-and-design-fall-2010/readings

Voltaire, Candide. The Accidental World

Book: http://www.sondheimguide.com/Candide/novel.html

Voltaire

"Francois Marie Arouet de Voltaire (1694-1778); French philosopher and writer, leader of the Enlightenment; characterized by his liberal ideas and his opposition to tyranny and bigotry; had an interest in cases of injustice especially those resulting from religious prejudice; use of wit, satire, critical capacities"

Source:  http://mockingbird.creighton.edu/english/fajardo/teaching/ENG121/voltaire.htm

Comments:

Voltaire, the bastard who planted the seeds of our imagination beyond the borders of the inevitable, sure is caring for us, as we feed from the fruits of his stories, revolting towards the instinct of that cycle of greed and power.

Sure he is tired too, more than 300 years ago the tree still protects us with the shadows created from the solar inequalities of life.

Candide, a satirical and romantic story about how nativity becomes corruption, and the situations transforming it, and how it ended at the mercy of its primal idea, conformism: the way we tricked ourselves from the real possibilities of reaching the garden of freedom planted outside our minds.