…And there must be some much deeper psychological reason for this strange behaviour. Now this question was asked many years ago by Santayana. who came up with what seems to me a partial explanation, but I don't think it's a complete final explanation. He…

…to the permanent and the eternal. A precious stone does appear to remain exactly as it is, generation after generation. And Santayana assumed that it was because this was the nearest approach in our world to something that was intrinsically eternal, that…