Learning to be original

Abstract

My topic suggested itself in response to a point made at a seminar on University autonomy. Someone observed that many people, even shack dwellers, are interested in the cosmos and they always would be. The remark came in the course of a debate concerning the cost of the SKA project, the massively expensive square kilometer array telescope for which South Africa is bidding against Australia, viewed in relation to the country’s huge list of social backlogs: Big science versus food and decent housing; a false opposition, or a grim choice? You can imagine the debate. The nugget that stayed with me was the tangential comment that ordinary people are always interested in the cosmos. If so, is this true merely because human cultures traditionally incorporate such an interest, or because humans themselves actually need a relation to the cosmos? What might this need be?