"The once ubiquitous bird has suffered a catastrophic decline.... As many as 98 per cent disappeared from some states."

"Rats and feral dogs flourished in their place, spreading diseases, including rabies. As a result, the human death toll rose significantly. And further to that, Schama adds, an ancient cultural ritual risks being lost. Zoroastrians, no longer able to perform their traditional 'sky burials' — in which corpses are carried to a 'tower of silence' to be picked clean by vultures — are forced to consider cremation instead. 

This chain of collapse between human culture and the lives of birds set me thinking,' Schama says...."

From  "Simon Schama: 'Our fascination with birds is rooted in envy'/The historian has curated an exhibition that explores the relationship between birds and humans" (London Times).

"'What are they, these creatures, two-limbed like us and yet nothing like us at all?' he wonders. 'Human culture is arranged around the perfection of the human,' he says. 'We are seen as God’s greatest works. But one thing we have not been able to do is fly.' Our fascination with birds, he suggests, 'is based around a sort of envy.' Because what we call flying is not really that, it’s just 'sitting in a metal tube with the blinds shut looking at old movies.' It is not about the glorious freedom that we dream of, about the transcendence we desire, the celestial state that we yearn for. That freedom of spirit will always elude us.'"

"Every law not based on WISDOM is a menace to the state"/"We must not use FORCE till just laws are defied."

Stunning inscriptions on 2 sculptures at the entrance to the New York Supreme Court Appellate Division, First Department in Manhattan:





According to this PDF from the court, the "Wisdom" sculpture is "an old man." It doesn't say it's Moses. Just some old guy. But the "Force" sculpture, we're told "is a composite of General Ulysses S. Grant, General Nelson A. Miles, and Admiral Francis M. Bunce." Actually, there is a Moses statue elsewhere on the building, at the roof line:



There are various other historical figures, like Zoroaster and Confucius, and I see in the PDF that Muhammad was one of them until his image was removed and destroyed back in 1955, at the request of the governments of Egypt, Pakistan, and Indonesia.

Be that as it may, it's the inscriptions that fascinate me. I think that these are original aphorisms, composed for these sculptures, and that they were intended to paraphrase widely understood propositions of American law. Nevertheless, the precise words, taken literally, are quite extreme. I was surprised to see them on the courthouse. How differently cases would come out if these 2 phrases were binding law, taken seriously?