Understanding and Appreciation of Differences

The hit counter disappeared again, and when it returned, it started from the beginning... again. Grrr... So, this time, I'm finished with it. I will not restore it.

It is Sunday, the sun is shining... yesterday here in Graham, North Carolina, which is about an hour's drive from the Virginia border, we did experience a variety of precipitation. Sleet, snow, misty rain all through the morning. Today, though, it is cold and dry... little hope for the snow day many of us desire.

I finished Old Man's War... I thoroughly enjoyed the book, and look forward to The Ghost Brigades.

I wrote in a previous entry that I became a reader of science fiction in my senior year of high school, all throughout my college years, and shortly thereafter (70's-80's). I didn't realize it was considered "hard" science fiction back then. I hadn't done any research or reading about science fiction. I just liked to read it.

I'll admit that when I first read a volume of Robert Heinlein, as a high school student, I didn't understand much of the terminology, but learned that in science fiction, I didn't really have to understand it (the technical stuff) to enjoy and appreciate the theme of the story.

However, as an adult, who is comparatively more aware of where we (the world) are technologically (in general) regarding science, space flight, computers, warfare, and medicine, reading science fiction becomes even more interesting and intriguing. There is a cleverness about the language, the machines, the equipment, and the cultures one reads about.

One needs only to let go of what is possible and real today, or connect to what is familiar today, to appreciate a strange new world where human values may, or may not, be the same as they are here and now, or what they may have been long ago.

One can even do the same regarding present day peoples and cultures: how different the practices of others who do not share our beliefs, history, language, or geographic location. We have to be careful that "different" is not synonymous with inferior, or superior, for that matter.

I think most of us accept the differences of those around the world, but the more I read and listen, the more I realize there is much about other countries and other faiths that I do not know about, and do not understand.

It's like when I first started reading science fiction ...

I don't have to understand everything about a culture to appreciate the gifts that all people bring to the human race.