Ben Boyd
Ben Boyd
Aug 24, 2017 · 1 min read

This article is complete tosh and does a disservice to Grant and the ABC for publishing it.

Cook was a navigator and cartographer, a true giant of history. So big Grant can’t see him, even all these years later his achievements are so beyond the comprehension of Grant he cannot imagine them.

Cook mapped the east coast from Cape Hicks to Cape York and called it New South Wales. It wasn’t Australia, a term he never used, until much later. The use of the word “discover” is a tool of language, something Grant, as a “journalist”, should be familiar with.

Cook “discovered” the east coast in the same way Fleming “discovered” penicillin. He described it. A fairly simple concept, seemingly beyond Grant. Cook opened the eyes of the world to it’s existence and to it’s possibilities. He is the first truly great man of Australian history, yes the first. Number 1. There were certainly people before him, and we came after him but he did it.

Cook did not deny the natives, he described the smoke rising from their campfires in the forest, but they were elusive. Cook didn’t use the term terra nullius, and he cannot be blamed for the following 247 years and the impact to some of Grant’s forebears.

Cooks maps are so great they stand the test against satellite images 200 years later.

We need more statues to the memory of Cook.

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    Ben Boyd

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    Ben Boyd