Humanity is not the only species that goofs off, but we certainly seem to be the ones who do it most effectively. Tool use is done by many species, communication is done by many species, but we’re the only species that has managed to master the environment to the point where we have the capacity to destroy where we live.

Some say that’s happening, some say that has already happened, most seem to ignore it and continue goofing off.

We’re not that great at goofing off responsibly. As a species, we’re the babysitter that plays loud music and wonders why the baby is crying. A few decades later, we figure out that the noise is making the baby cry, but we’re so happy with the loud angsty music that we deny it. ‘We’re here for the money, not the baby.’ That metaphor certainly makes the ‘cradle of civilization’ angle in books a bit more interesting.

It’s been bogging me down a bit. We have all these complex systems in our civilization that most people can’t understand. Not even one. Most people these days operate devices that they don’t understand even conceptually, from their stoves to cars to the airplanes they ride in. They expect them to simply work, and when they don’t, they get stompy.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, gentle reader, but there’s been plenty of stompy going around these days.

This wears on me. For whatever reason, I have made it a point to understand how things work, and I’ve managed pretty well. I can’t forecast the weather, I can’t tell you off the top of my head when the star we revolve around will super-nova, or when an earthquake will hit – but I understand as best I can about these things because… well, those things seem sort of important. A lot of things seem more important to me than what we humans do to ourselves. We’re an odd bunch that goofs off.

What we can do, though, is goof off working on ways to make things better rather than worse.

You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.

Buckminster Fuller, as quoted in “Beyond Civilization: Humanity’s Next Great Adventure” (1999), by Daniel Quinn

When we find ourselves in holes that we don’t want to be in is to stop digging. Some people want us to dig holes, and they market that and distract us with their wishes.

We have to allow ourselves time to figure out what we wish, stepping away from the busy world of what other people want so that we get the quiet mind to do just that.

After all, the only intelligence of worth is related to survival, and our survival as individuals and a species could depend on that.