Impossible

UBUNTU

[noun]

1) a Southern African ethic or humanist philosophy focusing on people’s allegiances and relations with each other.

Ubuntu: “I am what I am because of who we all are.” (From a definition offered by Liberian peace activist Leymah Gbowee.)

Archbishop Desmond Tutu offered a definition in a 1999 book: A person with Ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, based from a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed.

Tutu further explained Ubuntu in 2008: One of the sayings in our country is Ubuntu – the essence of being human. Ubuntu speaks particularly about the fact that you can’t exist as a human being in isolation. It speaks about our interconnectedness. You can’t be human all by yourself, and when you have this quality – Ubuntu – you are known for your generosity. We think of ourselves far too frequently as just individuals, separated from one another, whereas you are connected and what you do affects the whole World. When you do well, it spreads out; it is for the whole of humanity.

2. a computer operating system based on the Debian Linux distribution and distributed as free and open source software, using its own desktop environment. It is named after the Southern African philosophy of Ubuntu (“humanity towards others”).

3. a municipality in the Pixley ka Seme District Municipality of the Northern Cape province of South Africa.

4. Ubuntu Cola: a soft drink certified by The Fairtrade Foundation. Made with Fairtrade sugar from Malawi and Zambia, Ubuntu Cola is the first UK cola to be Fairtrade certified. It is available for sale in the United Kingdom, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Ireland, The Netherlands, Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, Switzerland and online.

In a simple experiment, researchers at the University of Chicago sought to find out whether a rat would release a fellow rat from an unpleasantly restrictive cage if it could. The answer was yes.

The free rat, occasionally hearing distress calls from its compatriot, learned to open the cage and did so with greater efficiency over time. It would release the other animal even if there wasn’t the payoff of a reunion with it. Astonishingly, if given access to a small hoard of chocolate chips, the free rat would usually save at least one treat for the captive— which is a lot to expect of a rat.