Ralph Higgins

Ralph Higgins
color pencil sketch by Gayle Higgins

Quotes I Like


“Everyone is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.”

-Albert Einstein

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Saturday, April 10, 2010

Is Laughter the Best Medicine?

Years ago there was a story about a guy who had a terminal disease, but determined to cure himself through laughter. His name is Norman Cousins. He was the editor of Saturday Review for 30 years and wrote a book entitled, “Anatomy of an Illness.” He spent his days watching Laurel and Hardy movies and other comedy films that made him laugh. The amazing thing is that he was healed and he credits his healing to laughter. Look up Norman Cousins on the internet.

The Maryland Medical Center found that laughing is almost as effective as exercise for improving arterial health. So when you go to the gym, find a comfortable chair and watch the sweat hogs pumping iron and popping hemorrhoids, the fat guys trying to tie their shoes and the young gong-ho beginners throwing a subtle flex and sucking in their gut while glancing furtively and seemingly inconspicuously in the mirror as they walk by. Just don’t let anyone see you laugh. That’s the tricky part.

Friday, April 2, 2010

Well I'll Be A Monkey's Uncle

Darwin’s Theory of Evolution has become part of the conventional wisdom of western culture, but I must be stupid because there are things about that theory that make no sense to me. George Orwell said that one has to belong to the intelligentsia to believe things that an ordinary man would be a fool to believe. Maybe it’s good to be ordinary.

I was reminded recently of how complex yet vulnerable our physical bodies are. If something inside us isn’t working perfectly, it can kill us. But according to evolution all these intricacies happened by chance, gradually changing over millions of years, through trial and error.

Here are a few things that I don’t understand. I don’t understand how a creature could breathe before its lungs were fully developed and working perfectly. How about a primitive amphibian bumping into things for ten thousand years before his eyes began to focus? What organ in my body could I live without because it wasn’t fully evolved? Doesn’t everything need to be in place and working perfectly for me to stay alive?