Sunday, August 13, 2006
Distant cousins
My first-cousin got married a week ago (outside NYC). At the wedding, my brother and I met some distant cousins from England. Their mother is our aunt's cousin. It was fun meeting them and getting to know them a bit. Now, here's the most interesting part from my perspective. Prior to the wedding, these cousins could have walked past me on the streets of Manhattan and I would have never realized that we were related in any way. Makes me wonder how many times that's happened in my life. How many times have I encountered a family member, friend of a friend, or other connection in everyday life and not realized it? If I had known the connection, would I have treated these people differently?
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1 comment:
you have heard of six degrees, right? :)
i think we all treat people differently if we know them. this is the inherent reason that communism stops working when communities exceed personal network size... interestingly, it also correlates with propensity to waste: communist societies tend to have much leaner, much more efficient, and primarily much less wasteful production. perhaps it is because then the environment is considered an equally deserving participant of the community. food for thought. (btw, you should read "our ecological footprint")
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