There are many things that are automatic for most people. We take everything for granted: we breathe, eat , walk and go about our everyday lives like it’s the norm, like nothing we do is special.

The world with the greatest excess of good over evil is the best. God could have created a world in which evil is non-existent,but it would not have been as good as the actual world. The teleological aspect of Leibniz’s theory is that God has a purpose for creating the real world: to establish the best of all possible worlds.

“I’ve already told my boyfriend what present I would like for this year’s Valentine, and where I would like to be taken to,” said Miss A. “Last year he only gave me a card and couldn’t even take me out to an eatery. If he doesn’t give me something worthwhile this year, I’m going to leave him. It’s not as if he doesn’t work and earn good money. I like him but he’s so mean about presents and money. How can a man give his girlfriend only a card for Valentine’s day?”

Tension is less in the land now that Dr. Goodluck Jonathan has assumed office as Acting President. That is after 78 days when the simple procedure that would have led us to that position had been ignored. And what did we do? It seemed as if we dreamt that if we failed to do something, just anything, by the end of the 78th day of the President’s absence from office and out of sight, something would give.

THE tradition of intellectual inquiry in Nigeria, in at least, the last 30 years has been at best self-indulgent and unadventurous.