Ripples

[da]

Yesterday in Quaker Meeting, someone spoke about walking El Camino de Santiago. He saw wagon-tracks that initially looked like they were in mud, but on inspection, turned out to be worn into the stone. He said they also saw trees that he says were planted over 1,000 years ago. He concluded, "What impact could I have on the world that could last 1,000 years?"

This question can lead in all sorts of interesting directions. During Meeting, I was thinking how living with that as a guiding principle is invariably a recipe for Doing Nothing at All or ego-driven tilting at windmills. And simultaneously, I think there is value in being forward thinking; and there isn't harm in occasionally dreaming about the far future, even if it is hubris.

When I mentioned the original question to melted_snowball, he said nearly everyone's impact will be no more than the consumption of resources over their lifetime. This can be argued by looking at the number of people alive at any given time, and how relatively few people have an impact that we can see. (Right? Is that the best summary for that argument?)

My reaction was quite different. I say there are millions of effects we might not be able to directly attribute, but are still important. Granted, most of those effects couldn't be measured on the scale of a year or 100 years, let alone over the course of a millennium, but I say they exist. You might ask, "these effects are important in what way?" I would respond, either they're important to God; or they're just part of the bigger mystery. This is a common thread among mystics, I think, and one I can't find a good argument against.

At least, I think if one lives one's life as if any action could have an effect in a year, ten years, 100 years, it's good incentive toward wanting to be a better person.

I'd be fascinated to hear where this question leads you.

Comments

[ancawonka.livejournal.com]

I don't think we can know for certain what impact we will have 1000 years from now.

Our lives are made up of more than just the consumption of resources. Our impacts are not just on the world around us, but on the people in our lives, and the creations that live on beyond us to impact people in the future. A kind word or a curse has the impact of the famous butterfly flapping its wings.

Artifacts we leave after we are gone, whether they are ruts worn into stone or a shard of pottery depicting an everyday scene, are connections we can make with our past. They teach us of the continuity and evolution of humanity.

What we leave behind will either warn or delight our descendants.

[dpolicar]

In this context I'm usually a ripples man, myself. That is, things I do or don't do have a boundless series of consequences in terms of what the people I'm connected with do or don't do, which in turn affects what they do, and on and on. So, to some vanishingly small but nonzero degree, all of my actions affect everything we do on this planet, although none of them have a discretely measurable effect.

I find it's useful to live my life mindful of that interconnection.

[melted-snowball.livejournal.com]

I guess I tend to find it really unsatisfying. Largely because I expect that from that point of view, most of my interactions with the majority of the world's population are probably somehow exploitative, which I'd prefer weren't true of most of my direct interactinos...

[dpolicar]

(nod) Yeah, I can appreciate that. I don't think I feel that aspect of it as strongly as you do.

Possibly it's a side-effect of you being better at being aware of the interconnections than I am... I can mostly manage to stay aware of having effects on people I know and people they know, and when I'm doing really well on other people in my general geographical and network area. It takes real spikes of clarity for the folks N levels out to have an emotional impact on me.

But even within my limited scope of awareness, yeah, quite a lot of those interactions are exploitative (in both directions, come to that), and that doesn't thrill me. But it is what it is and I try to work with that.

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Hm, I think d. was saying his global interactions are likely exploitative and hopefully his local ones weren't. Are you saying that your local ones are exploitative?

I'm not certain I read that correctly. And your definition of exploitation (and being exploited) might be different from mine? (oof, that sounds tough to figure out, anyhow).

[dpolicar]

No, no, sorry. I'm saying - or at least, I meant to say - that, while I agree with d. that his global interactions (and mine) are largely exploitative (and I don't have a careful definition of what I mean by that, but I think I get d.'s jist), I think that bothers me less than it does him because I am less often aware of my N-nodes-out interactions to the same degree I perceive him as being.

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

...I'm curious about this: do you mean exploit in the sense that you're (say) using natural resources well above the fair share?

Something bigger?

[melted-snowball.livejournal.com]

Well, it's the usual: by virtue of being a first-world resident, my every need and want is cared for, indirectly, by people in the developing world. All I do for them is create science. (Which, in balance, may be ok. I'm not the next person who starts a Green Revolution. But I might train one of them.)

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Yes, you might. Or, you might inspire someone to succeed in a totally different field, like a certain math guy with the initials GCR did for you...

ripples

[mapletree7.livejournal.com]

This is something I was thnking about in a slightly different context last week.

Dan and I went to see Steve Wozniak Friday night at UW.

I work with and go see a lot of famous people. Not a new experience. Dan, not so much. He got his old Apple II manual signed and said his mumbly inspiration bit and still felt vaguely dissatisfied.

There's a sad feeling you get when meeting someone who you admire greatly, who has affected the course of your life. They made such a big impact on you. But there's nothing you can say to them that will change their life, nothing that will be different from what they've heard from thousands of people before.

I'm glad you used the word 'ripples' because now I am visualizing it as a reflection of their action coming back to them.

Not everyone gets to be the stone chucked into the pond. Your positive interaction is still a gift back to that person, even if individually it won't have the same impact.

Every vote counts. Etc.

Re: ripples

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Well put. [And I hope you comment more. Even if you never post! I have no idea what's up in your lives these days! *pout*]

I've actually asked that question of people who get themselves stuck onto pedestals despite their best wishes (Perl luminaries. OK, you can stop laughing. But perl programmers do a fair job at elevating the language authors to deityhood.)

The major comment from them is, it's just as annoying from the other side. They prefer to be treated as normal people, too. If they're forced to be up on this high pedestal... it gets lonely and annoying.

But yeah, you're pointing at one of those very asymetrical social situations which is bound to be a bit disappointing if you really want it to be symetrical.

But... person to person, it might distill down to "Thank you." "You're welcome." Which can be a meaningful interaction, if both sides want it to be!

Re: ripples

[mapletree7.livejournal.com]

Heh, my livejournal account is just for comments.

http://mapletree7.blogspot.com

Re: ripples

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Hee hee. I forgot.

And now you're syndicated, so I won't forget. :)

mapletree7_blogt

Re: ripples

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

hm, that's odd.

mapletree7_blog

[dawn-guy.livejournal.com]

I need to make time to write a good response on this topic.

The Reader's Digest version is: at my best, I live as though my every thought and action changes the world; I have seen my words, actions and attitudes have lasting effect on others; I am just one person, but I am a person.