Response

I would like to thank Warren Eller and Brian Gerber for their extensive comments. It would be impossible to cover all of them in the space available, but I would like to center my discussion on three issues: a point of strong agreement, an assessment of the key issue of dealing with the probability of a terrorist act, and corrections of some of their mischaracterizations of my argument.     

Response

Cervantes's deathbed novel, The Trials of Persiles and Sigismunda: A Northern Story, uses the pilgrimage of the two eponymous protagonists to show them as exemplars of the virtues not only necessary for ordinary life, but also those qualities essential to true leadership. The novel constitutes Cervantes's final written words, barely completed in partial rough draft before he expired, and accordingly might be considered his last words on the ideas and traits most important for human flourishing.