Introduction

Abstract

In discussing our connectivity to the cosmos, astronomer Brian Cox writes that ‘there was very complex carbon chemistry happening out there in space, forming the building blocks of life, over four and half billion years ago’ (Cox and Cohen 2011, p. 135). It is that carbon chemistry that is responsible, in turn, for our own evolutionary development and very much positions human beings as ‘children of the stars’ since ‘written into every atom and molecule of our bodies is the history of the Universe’ (p. 135). Not only are we composed of the same elements that are found on our planet from every tree to every rock to every fish but we are, in effect, produced in the heart of dying of stars out there in alien space. This has a phenomenal impact upon, not just our position in the universe, but also our individual and national sense of identity: with advancing scientific discoveries, it is increasingly problematic to talk in the language of self/other when connections within humanity are brought ever closer and, in turn, we are all, cosmologically speaking, ultimately aliens. It is from this starting point that I want to consider the timeliness of an increasing interest in cosmopolitanism with the consideration that we are not only citizens of the world but, rather, of the cosmos. Interestingly, ‘Cosmopolitanism dates to at least the Cynics of the fourth century BC, who first coined the expression cosmopolitanism, “citizen of the cosmos”’ (Appiah 2007 [2006], p. xii).