PERMANENCE
Reading Context
"Biological permanence or the relative permanence acquired through the passage of genetic information from generation to generation, is a form of order. In terms of quantum physics, it must therefore depend on the operation of a large number of atoms. In physics, the co-operation of an enormously large number of atoms is required for statistical laws to begin to operate and control the behavior of these assemblies .... It is in that way the events acquire truly orderly features." "But, as Schrodinger argues living organisms the number of atoms is not large enough to justify the order of hereditary permanence; nor are there enough atoms to, statistically, produce what we apprehend as the orderly coordination of our intellectual life with our hodirs." "In addition, normative human perception is very crude compared to the microscopic dimensions of atomic theories of matter. In fact, incredibly small groups of atoms, much too small to display exact statistical laws ... play a dominating role in the very orderly and lawful events within a living organism."1
Garbage City Context
The Zabbaleen are Coptic Christians which they have kept since they migrated from Dakhla Oasis to Mokattam Village. Their religion has found its way into their garbage culture. They believe its God's plan to recycle. Therefore, garbage collecting is not just recycling but a part of their religious culture which has manifested into a garbage culture which both have been passed down generations and will continue to be passed down to future generations. In order for the Garbage Culture to remain with the Zabbaleen the Zabbaleen and the citizens of Cairo all need to share involvement in doing so. Like the small atoms that makeup our orderly body, Cairo and the Zabbaleen makeup the Garbage Culture. Cairo needs to produce garbage for the Zabbaleen and the Zabbaleen need to be allowed to recycle the garbage. One could say the people in the area are atoms of the Garbage Culture. One could even go further and say people are the building blocks of all culture. In this situation, the people are behind the permanence of the Garbage Culture.