Man wants to see nature and evolution as separate from human activities. There is a natural world, and there is man. But man also belongs to the natural world. If he is a ferocious predator, that too is part of evolution. If cod and haddock and other species cannot survive because man kills them, something more adaptable will take their place. Nature, the ultimate pragmatist, doggedly searches for something that works. But as the cockroach demonstrates, what works best in nature does not always appeal to us.

There is a dreamlike quality to the 1936 Basque government, the fulfillment of a historic longing that was to be crushed only nine months later in carnage the scale of which had never before been seen on earth.

THE ROMANS SALTED their greens, believing this to counteract the natural bitterness, which is the origin of the word salad, salted.

Judging foods without regard to price is a rich mans game, and yet poor people can be gourmets able to discern a good potato from a bad one.

modern people have seen too many chemicals and are ready to go back to eating dirt.

A superpower that no longer stands for anything, that no one believes in anymore, that is seen only as a bully, will fall despite its military might. If the Bush administration ever wanted to reflect on history, it might think about this.

If ever there was a fish made to endure, it is the Atlantic cod... But it has among its predators - man, an openmouthed species greedier than cod.