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HUMAN beings are remarkably inconsistent creatures. They devote huge resources to designing and constructing weapons of war and to training and maintaining armies, navies and air forces, and they frequently put these to use, resulting in anything from thousands to millions of deaths.

Yet they also make huge efforts to train doctors and nurses, build hospitals, run ambulance services, rush to the rescue of victims of natural disasters and toil endlessly to save lives in the rubble of an earthquake or the devastation of a tsunami. They may even risk their lives to rescue a cat hanging on a branch…

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