One of the wonders of science is that it is completely universal. It crosses national boundaries with total ease.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
A lot of high-level scientists are in fact people of almost universal interest.
After all, science is essentially international, and it is only through lack of the historical sense that national qualities have been attributed to it.
Science is the one culture that's truly global - protons, proteins and Pythagoras's Theorem are the same from China to Peru. It should transcend all barriers of nationality. It should straddle all faiths, too.
I have a different idea of a universal. It is of a universal rich with all that is particular, rich with all the particulars there are, the deepening of each particular, the coexistence of them all.
I'm a big believer that science is part of a larger cultural thing. Science is not all by itself.
Nowhere is Universalism welcomed and encouraged by a people; everywhere governments have forced and are forcing Universalism upon unwilling and resistant subjects.
I think by writing about a place with great specificity, you manage to make it universal.
I think the only universal thing is one individual. If you talk about a country or a nation or a culture, it's so vague. I mean what is a nation? A nation is full of nice and bad and long and tall and short and thin people. It's not like everybody is the same.
Universality has been severely reduced: it is virtually dead as a concept in most areas of public policy.
In order to be universal, you have to be rooted in your own culture.