

“Fools have a habit of believing that everything written by a famous author is admirable. For my part I read only to please myself and like only what suits my taste.”
― Candide
― Candide

“It is better to risk saving a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one.”
― Zadig et autres contes
― Zadig et autres contes

“There are, in addition, some other aspects of human culture that will prove to be important. One of these is the social performance of music. To be sure, many other species can be said to produce music, including songbirds and whales, to name but the best known. But only humans seem to engage in music as a social activity. For birds, music seems to be mainly a mate advertising display. Humans use music as a mechanism for community bonding in a way that seems to be quite unique. In modern societies, we may often sit listening politely to music in concert halls, but in traditional societies music-making, song and dance are almost indistinguishable and play a crucially important role. This is something we will also need to account for. What underpins all this cultural activity is, of course, our big brains, and this might ultimately be said to be what distinguishes us from the other great apes.”
― Human Evolution: A Pelican Introduction
― Human Evolution: A Pelican Introduction

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A group for people who have moved (or want to move) from an English-speaking country to a French-speaking country (or the other way). Hopefully we can ...more
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