Forward, Always

Progress isn’t inevitable.

In fact, if thermodynamics is any indication, progress isn’t even likely. Think about kids playing with blocks. There are million ways those blocks can be scattered about the space, red and green and blue squares and triangles and rectangles and cylinders piled up in happy chaotic heaps or blanketing the carpet, but there are only a few ways that the blocks can be made into a house or a tower or a castle. It’s much more likely, just because there are so many ways that the blocks can be scattered, that you’re going to find them in a mess underfoot. That’s entropy at work—because there are so many more ways to make disorder than order, everything tends toward disorder.

But we as humans tend to buck universal tendencies, don’t we? We like bringing order out of chaos so much that many of our creation myths are based around a powerful being who does just that. And we’ve had some minor success organizing ourselves over the long arc of history. In fits and starts, maybe, with ideas spread across the continents and civilizations, we’ve found our way to ever more complex societies, or, at least, financial systems. We’ve expanded our horizons and with that expansion has come something like control over the world around us. In this one corner of the universe, on this temporary manifestation of particles in the shape of a globe, we’ve found a way to shape and mold the disorder into something new.

Again here, though, we shouldn’t take a historic tendency as a rule that will be followed regardless of our action, nor should we think too highly of our ability and action. It is difficult to find the balance in our thought between “things will work out” and “the universe is ours to control” because neither is exactly true. Forward motion doesn’t happen without a force, so we must always be in the state of perfecting our union or shaping our souls or doing good works for the benefit of those around us, tasks which are best done in humility and with the understanding that they will never be completely accomplished. We are not powerless in the wide sweep of history. For good or bad, the future is shaped at least in part by us. Our actions matter, especially in times of transition and reshaping. Complacency needs to be guarded against in times like these.

Nor do we have control over all the forces that shape our world. We did not teach the Earth how to spin or the tides to rise and fall. When storms roll in, we are at their mercy. When the ground shakes, we are faced with the precariousness of the things we have built. Even our systems, the ways we think and interact and govern, can have unintended or unexpected consequences outside of an individual or a community’s ability to correct or redirect. There is a deep question about the efficacy of human endeavors and the source of human power that I have found life-changing, but its main consequence in my daily life and thought is that I can no longer affirm with Enlightenment zeal that we can do anything. That new understanding is a good thing, I think. It makes me appreciate what we can do, the astounding things we’ve been able to achieve, and to think more critically about the undertakings we place before ourselves.

Calls to thoughtful action don’t ring as loud as they should. They’re not as loud as chants or bullhorns or the mics on press conference podiums. Thoughtfulness comes across as hesitancy, as weakness. And I know it doesn’t help that I haven’t changed my tone or my choice in words for this post, or that I talked about entropy, which sounds like some random science thing that a teacher maybe mentioned to you one time back in high school. I talked about systems and overarching historical forces and all of those terms are shorthand for bigger ideas that changed the way I think and that I want others to know about and think about. I worry that I’ve fallen into the trap of using elite and out-of-reach language without thinking carefully enough about how the reader will take it.

But I also believe in my readers, in all readers, and in all listeners, too. I believe in humans and our abilities. I have faith in the American people as a whole and having that faith means that I can’t sit still. It means that I have to do something. I have to ask questions and encourage people to take a step back and consider all the options. We can all elevate our kindness game and that is a simple enough call. In every situation, we can begin by asking how we can do that. There’s so much more to be done, but that’s a place to start.

And then let’s dig in. Let’s get complex. Let’s think about ideas so big we eventually need to come up with code words for them just so that we can see a clearer picture of the world around us. It’s a journey we can all take together, that we can all agree to take together.

It’ll be some kind of progress.