Diversity

If we could shrink the earth's population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same, it would look something like the following: 57 Asians, 21 Europeans, 14 from the Americas, both north and south, 8 African; 52 would be female, 48 would be male; 70 would be non-white, 30 would be white; 70 would be non Christian, 30 would be Christian; 89 would be heterosexual, 11 would be homosexual; 6 people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 would be from the United States; 80 would live in substandard housing; 70 would be unable to read; 50 would suffer from malnutrition; 1 would be near death - 1 would be near birth; 1 would have a college education - Anonymous, c. 1999

I try to have as many conversations as I can with different people contrasting my way of life and backround with theirs and comparing our different cultures, economies and philosophies. I am always amazed at how ready and willing people are to share their experience with me and how unique and interesting we all are. Travel has also helped me to relate better to people from different nationalities in my own country. I am more and more interested in talking to them and learning from them and I have more experiences to weave into our conversations. Recently I have joined a group working with asylum seekers and immigrants and I'm hopeful that I will be able to make a useful contribution to their integration into our society - Oxford Muse, 2005

Humanity is like a tree. From a single seed we came and then diversified (the roots) only to discover that through the establishment of our collective solidarity (the trunk) we could have the base from which our individuality can flourish (the branches and flowers). Peace - Oxford Muse, 2005

Florence now lives in Brussels, a city launching itself into the unknown. "Something will happen from this mix of people", but no-one knows what - Theodore Zeldin, Intimate History of Humanity, p114

Diversity defines the health and wealth of nations in a new century. Mighty is the mongrel. ? The hybrid is hip. The impure, the m

Cary Fowler: "We can't solve any of the world's problems without crop diversity." Don't endow a museum in NY, endow wheat in Svalbard. -- bupbin (from TED2009, Oxford)

Biodiversity underpins ecosystem services. Bees can?t pollinate, nor can trees store carbon, if they have all died. Diverse systems are better at capturing carbon, storing water and preserving fisheries. Just how diverse an ecosystem has to be in order to supply the goods and services needed by man is a matter of debate - a debate made harder by the fact that many species may have uses that man has not yet found - The Economist, 2008