Excerpts

Nothing much here...just some excerpts from Sophie's World by Jostein Gaardner that I turn to now and then for reassurance. Enjoy!

"A lot of people experience the world with the same incredulity as when amagician suddenly pulls a rabbit out of a hat which has just been shown to them empty.In the case of the rabbit, we know the magician has tricked us. What we would like to know is just how he did it. But when it comes to the world it's somewhat different. We know that the world is not all sleight of hand and deception because here we are in it, we are part of it. Actually, we are the white rabbit being pulled out of the hat. The only difference between us and the white rabbit is that the rabbit does not realize it is taking part in a magic trick. Unlike us. We feel we are partof something mysterious and we would like to know how it all works...As far as the white rabbit is concerned, it might be better to compare it with the whole universe. We who live here are microscopic insects existing deep down in the rabbit's fur. But philosophers are always trying to climb up the fine hairs of the fur in order to stare right into the magician's eyes.

"The only thing we require to be good philosophers is the faculty of wonder...The world itself becomes a habit in no time at all. It seems as if in the process of growing up we lose the ability to wonder about the world. And in doing so, we lose something central...for somewhere inside ourselves, something tells us that life is a huge mystery. This is something we once experienced, long before we learned to think the thought...For various reasons most people get so caught up in everyday affairs that their astonishment at the world gets pushed into the background. All mortals are born at the very tip of the rabbit's fine hairs, where they are in a position to wonder at the impossibility of the trick. But as they grow older they work themselves ever deeper into the fur. And there they stay. They become so comfortable they never risk crawling back up the fragile hairs again. Only philosophers embark on this perilous expedition to the outermost reaches of language and existence. Some of them fall off, but others cling on desperately and yell at the people nestling deep in the snug softness..."