Alexandra Almeida

“The ones who claim the universe is a dark forest where you either kill or be killed, using safety and security as excuses to maintain the status quo of archaic brains no longer useful in progressive, advanced societies.

In my homeland, there was a time when the Virunga National Park wasn’t shrouded in darkness, but was the living, breathing heart of the Congo, with its rich biodiversity and ecological beauty. Non-human hearts of every shape and size shared its gifts. Our forests were never dark before the greed of men came to cast a shadow. Even the cunning leopard, stealthy and powerful, only claimed the life it needed to sustain itself. You may belong in a dark forest, but our worlds and our universes are not one, so get out of our way! Our forests are big hearted and so are we.”
― Alexandra Almeida, Is Neurocide the Same as Genocide? : And Other Dangerous Ideas

“Scientists and inventors alike, they first guess a new explanation—a hypothesis—as wild and innovative as they can conjure. And then they test it rigorously, their hearts filled with the hope they’ll find a door or a window that reframes their understanding of the universe, of life, of a flower, or a cure for cancer. And it all starts with a guess, a good explanation as unlikely as it is plausible. A story at the knife’s edge of innovation, bleeding truth and pushing the limits of knowledge further afield. That impossibly sharp place where dreams and reality converge. A hard-to-vary idea as powerful as the one that broke Einstein’s General Relativity and his assumption that the laws of nature don’t depend on the motion of an observer.”
― Alexandra Almeida, Parity