As some luckily walk around oblivious to the darker side of current events, you really have to wonder just what exactly is wrong with parts of Western civilisation at the moment? - priorities, moral and ethical reasoning, recognition of truly life-changing and incredibly monumental discoveries are seemingly brushed aside and derogated for the fulgent machinations of the latest pretty-looking flavour of the month - fine..we all value beauty but should we allow talk of latest "celeb" flings to blind us to more meaningful and truly life-changing innovators, scientists and Noble prize winners - how many of you even paid attention to the clerisy of this year's Nobel awards ceremony?..what's that?..too busy watching the latest MTV music awards you say?..yeah..thought so!
Nicki Minaj gyrating on stage may well be a wonderful sight, but when it overshadows news so mind-bogglingly awesome in terms of what it means for humanity...the sheer endeavour that science, altruistic effort and raw genius of barrier-breaking procedures provide to all on this great Earth...one must pause and inspect their relative surroundings to appreciate what truly matters.
News of a "cure" for paralysis was broken this morning, incredibly pushed to the third or even fourth news item on many of the major media outlets, preferring to lead with the (does anyone really care that much?) sentencing of a convicted murderer (intended or not..Pistorius is still a killer) that happens to have once been a quite well-known international athlete. The irony of the cure for paralysis helping a man to walk once more (incredible!) coming alongside the sentencing of a runner known as the "bionic man"- for the use of his artificial legs replacing those he lost to a birth defect - not lost on the more attuned out there.
Let us all take a moment to think about what this breakthrough really says about us as a people? We have been able to bring back one of the simplest and often taken-for-granted pleasures of being human..the ability to walk and live an independent healthy life. Whenever this is taken from us, be it by natural defect or tragic accident, a fundamental aspect of our evolution from single-celled organism to the wonderful species that now occupies our developed towns and cities, esuriently shopping at WholeFoods, is cruelly expropriated from the realm of human possession. Despite the conversation that may be held centred on allegations of "playing God" and what it means to reverse subjectively viewed as divine occurrences, the sheer audacity of being able to reverse a paralysed person's condition by making use of their own regenerative olfactory cells is enough to lift the souls and capture the attention of even the most fervent two-seconds-attention-span Twitter user - before whoosh...on to the next subject they go. Well...those ingenious scientists and surgeons deserve to take a bow and be recognised for far longer than the attributed applause allowable within 140 characters.
With tail-ends of storms reaching UK shores and blowing trees down all over leafy-London, volatility in global markets returning with a vengeance, no-clear-end in sight to the troubles across large swathes of western Africa grappling with a frighteningly spreading Ebola epidemic, the only calm port in the storm appears to be Apple's ongoing global..well, richer parts of the global world..iPhone domination. Where are all those profits going one must ask?..$42bn in revenue in three months..wow!..and that's before you even remember an iPhone 6's profit margin is almost 70%.
Yep, you calculated that right..70% of $42bn is indeed over $29bn in PROFIT. In THREE months. Three! Another win for a different type of tech pioneer...after all, who needs man's heroic and truly forever life-changing scientific breakthroughs when that is enough to make any fortunate Apple executive jump straight up out their chair and do a merry dance all the way to the bank!
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