Senior Moments by Our Lady of the Stars

Flight of birds, the flight of man. Man's similarity to birds, birds similarity to man. These are the subjects at hand. And we will deal with them for the next hour or so and hope that we draw no conclusions, eslewise the subject shall cease to fascinate us. And, alas, another dream would be lost. There are too few.

In these words the German poet, Goethe, expressed man's desire to fly: 'How i yearn to throw myself into endless space and float above the awful abyss.'

Man, incontestably the most advanced creature, has only yo observe the flight of birds to realize the weight of the Earth's imprisonment. And so the desire to fly has been ever-present in the mind of man. But the reality has been long in coming. Has man truly realised his dream? To answer that we must isolate the dream. Was the dream to attain the ability to fly? Or was the dream the freedom that true flight seemed to offer man?

We may also touch on the mortal damage man is doing to birds' environment in comparison to the piddling nuisance birds cause to man. It may someday be necessary to build enormous environmental enclosures to protect both man and birds. But if so, it is questionable whether man will allow birds in or out, as the case may be.