Big ideas… small world

The following represents a few thoughts pre-dating a speech at the 2010 National Conference relating to the chosen topic, ‘Natural Artifice’. This is also in the context of a Volcano that had recently erupted, an event that affected the world at the same time.


I think that big ideas are frightening.

Everyone wants to be in front of people talking about big ideas: The environment, population growth, carbon emissions, the ‘contemporary world’ whatever that might be; wherever that might be.

And we forget that big ideas are only as big as the world and this week we discovered how small the world is compared to the universe. And even as a small thing spinning madly around its parent the sun , ‘it’ will tell us what we can do, it will tell us if we will have speakers at a conference, for instance.

We also often forget that we form part of the ‘nature’ that is this earth. Our chemistry relates more to the volcano that it does to the aeroplanes.

And as we form part of the nature on earth everything made of the things found on earth are part of that nature also.

Artifice in this context can be seen to pre-date us as a thing that has been always present with nature. The formations of birds in the sky are one form of artifice, their nests another.

And our cities, in this timeless universe, are but ephemeral things like that fleeting moment of the birds; or a passing cloud; constantly changing. Constantly being replaced by generations; we probably place a high importance on youth because of this.

What, then is artifice? Can it behold beauty? Can it develop our sensory and spiritual engagement with the universe?

Oftentimes we forget that nature is ‘it’ and a volcano , indeed shows us how the world was made with fire from the sun. I think the eruption of the volcano is not a nuisance, it is a wonderful reminder that we all need to stop and contemplate and love the thing that reminds us how we all got here in the first place. And really, this tiny little details called a world economy only matter if they serve and they certainly don’t make much sense in a sensible world if they are there only to be served.

We forget this.

– Angelo Candalepas 23.03.10