In the Lowcountry of South Carolina, live oaks typically lose replace their leaves in a two-week period in late February or early March - - - except that this year it began happening in early January. Pine trees deposit their patina of bilious green dust on our cars in March - - - except that this year they are doing it in mid-January. Azaleas are popping everywhere, but they unpredictable in the best of circumstances. Roses that should have gone dormant continue to lift their faces to the warm sun. On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, British writer Caitlin Moran told what it was like in October in England. “At the bottom of my garden is a wrongness, a brightness – a patch of milky-green yellow that shouldn’t be there. The primroses are out; confused. They should be underground until March. Under the apple tree, the narcissi and daffodils are coming up – expecting April; finding October. The tree itself has pink blossoms next to red fruit; as joltingly wrong as a pregnant child, or a plane falling to earth. The earth is still fidgety and mild, when it should, by now, be silent, under frost. It still feels loud out there….We’ve jumped straight from summer to spring. All that greenness is…shouting.”

Why do some people feel sports, and others do not? Why do some people live sports, and others do not? Why do some people live and die by sports, and others do not? Without question, this lecture shall be of far greater interest to some of you than to others. That is because of psychology, and viscera, and extra-rationality, and mystery.

Had there been no 9/11, I would not be delivering this lecture. Islamic, or more appropriately, Islamist terrorism, is not a serious problem in the United States of America. It is not a huge problem in Europe or Britain, though it a much bigger issue there than here. It is a bigger matter in countries such as Nigeria, Egypt, or Iraq, where there are fairly large communities of both Muslims and Christians. It obviously has been of grave concern in the state of Israel since its founding in 1948, but especially after the Six Day War in 1967. However, Islamist terrorism is far more lethal in countries in the Muslim world than anywhere else. Far, far, far more Muslims, hundreds of times more, have been killed or injured in Muslim countries than anywhere else.