Ten Nonillion Particles and Five Million Incidents:
Thinking in COVID 19 Time

In this essay, Raqs Media Collective frames COVID‑19, noting that an estimated 10³¹ (ten nonillion) viral particles float in the air at any moment, making viruses the planet’s most abundant “bad news” relative to human ‘newsworthiness.’
The text underscores how a seemingly invisible entity can reshape global social and biological networks. Through these reflections, Raqs probes how the agency of “unliving” particles forces a reconsideration of presence, scale, and our sense of life’s boundaries.

Published by the Goethe Institut, 2020