"If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he
will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.” ― Francis Bacon, The Advancement Of Learning
Human beings long certainty. A
young man wants the certainty of a college degree and a great job and an old
man the certainty of health and pension (or whatever social security there may
be). Business wants the certainty of buyers, suppliers, infrastructure, finance
and so on. Imagine if every day the route to work were different or if the bank
kept moving its neighborhood ATM every month!! The wealth and advancement of
mankind has been through understanding the nature and cause of uncertainty and
giving it greater certainty. But the critical aspect driving advancement has
always been the intensity of search for uncertainty and the motivation to give
it certainty. It is a conundrum – more certain you are, less the motivation.
The uncertainty of food resulted in
early man undertaking huge migration routes. The need for subsistence and
preponderance of an agricultural economy continued to drive human endeavor for
thousands of years from innovating at war to Europeans finding a route to India
for spices. The pace of change till the middle ages was even and incremental.
But then came the European age. Since the Roman times, the area at
edge of Europe (then called Promontorium Sacrum) in Portugal was prohibited for
people as they thought the demons of the Atlantic would take them. These demons
began to be banished when Henry the Navigator built a school for explorers of
the Atlantic where Vasco de Gama, Magellen and Columbus went and thus began the
European centuries. The European exploration of the globe resulted in 2 critical
changes:
- By bringing various geographies into their fold they not only interconnected the globe but also unified them in a European thinking, especially the elite (and the invention of the printing press helped);
- Extraordinary wealth and motivation (money and political power) that came with the new explorations propelled Europe in the fields of art, philosophy, political thought, natural / social / applied sciences etc.
Martin Luther said at the Diet of
Worms, "Unless I am convinced by Scripture and plain reason - I do not
accept the authority of the popes and councils, for they have contradicted each
other - my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not
recant anything for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God
help me. Amen." The initiation of this thought changed the way European
mindset replaced and challenged the teachings of the Church. Again Hobbes, like
Locke, stated that true revelation can never be in disagreement with human
reason and experience. Luther, Hobbes, Locke, Bacon, Descartes and many of their
contemporaries drove Europeans to reason and scientific discovery but
fundamental underlying belief was “world is predictable and laws of nature can
be deciphered”.
Just go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_scientific_discoveries, it lists
the major scientific discoveries since 3rd Century BC, the pace of discovery
from the 17th century onwards is breathtaking. A simple aspect like
home water and sanitation we see today provides certainty of using it at a time
one likes; it is regarded as the most productivity enhancing change ever.
On the political front, from the
Napoleonic Wars, when the French sought to rule Europe and in turn the world, Europe
has always sought political certainty. The Congress of Vienna convened in 1814,
the League of Nations in 1920 post World War I, and United Nations in 1945 post
World War II and then the European Union in 1993 have all been institutions in
this direction. In the two world wars it is estimated over 100m lives were
lost, mostly European. This is in addition to a similar number estimated to
have been lost in the 3-4 centuries before that in global conquests. In
parallel, advent of democracy and the social revolutions (i.e. French Revolution)
made governments increasingly responsible for their citizen’s well-being.
In an endeavor to improve the lives
of their citizens and to protect their lives, the West sought greater and
greater certainty on daily and political life. While science gave them greater
control over their lives, wealth gave them greater comforts, politics was
fickle and intermittent but its desire was only growing. This acute need for
certainty is Europe’s gift to the world.
One can witness the global horror,
as Yugoslavia in the 1990s tore itself or the Ukranian issue now as if there borders have never moved. When house
prices in the US which continued to climb till 2008 until it could no longer
keep going, everywhere across the globe individuals and institutions bet on the
certainty of this and the world is still recovering from the imbalance.
We know and understand more than we
ever have and with it our inherent desire to ‘receive in the band’ of certainty
has only gone up. Only look at how we gasp to situations that only a century
ago we would have taken in our stride…
“Let go of certainty. The opposite isn't uncertainty. It's openness, curiosity and a willingness to embrace paradox, rather than choose up sides. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow.” ― Tony Schwartz
