The Moral Vision
Negligence: A Moral Deficiency
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NEGLIGENCE: A MORAL DEFICIENCY
It is hard to believe that any animal could be more
dangerous or terrifying than the man-eating tiger.
But it is not the tiger or the bear which is the most
dangerous enemy of man. In truth, the most
dangerous of our enemies are the bacteria which are
so tiny that they remain invisible to the naked eye.
Small they may be, but these bacteria breed at such
a furious rate that, given favourable conditions, one
of their number can reproduce itself 10’000 times
over within a mere matter of ten hours. While a
bear or a lion only occasionally eats a man alive,
man is the constant focus of deadly bacteria.
Their species run into thousands. We are fortunate,
however, in that 99 percent are either beneficial or
harmless. Though only one percent is harmful, its
deadliness is such that it can claim the life of a man
within a matter of seconds. All fatal diseases,
according to medical science, are produced by such
microorganisms. Their very lack of bulk makes it
possible for them to enter the human system in
ways against which man has no natural system of
defence.
