Skip to content
GitHub LinkedIn

Avoiding Collisions

I often hear people scoff at a set of rules, principles, or systems that they consider to be "idealistic." Many pictures come to mind - a stuffy busybody that never deviates from schedule, an overoptimized machine that is esoteric and hard to adjust, or a holier-than-thou pharisee. Unfortunately, those pictures are all too often accurate, and so people refuse the ideals that they see as hinderances, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

Ideals aren't bad though; in fact, they are ideal. Ideals are rules put in place to prevent a friction, breakdown, or strain of a system. For example, always shifting gears in your car properly is an ideal. It would be foolish to say that you should most of the time shift gears properly so perfection is the bar set. Now obviously, perfection is unobtainable. Sometimes you will miss a gear shift, and that's ok! But to consistently ignore the ideal and miss gear shifts would result in your transmission going out.

Now that is a mechanical ideal. Behavioral ideals would be described as morals. Perfect behavior or morality is just as unobtainable as perfect gear shifting, but to call for anything less would be disastrous. Every mistake made will usually cause others and will certainly cause you trouble.

How does our human machine go wrong?

It helps to think of society or any group of humans for that matter as a convoy of ships all headed in the same direction. The mission will be a success if the ships can keep from interfering with one another and if each ship can keep itself seaworthy. Each reason is necessary in its own right but also relies on the other in order to be met. You can place breakdowns of the human machine into similar categories.

1. We drift apart or crash into each other

We cause harm to each other in a variety of ways. One may bully or threaten another. A spouse may cheat on the other. One can betray the trust of a lifelong friend. You get the point. When these acts are carried out, we damage not only the other person but also ourselves. This makes it even more difficult for each person to maintain their self and continue on the mission.

2. We break down on the inside

Just as a ship must be maintained, so must we maintain ourselves. If fuel isn't being added, parts aren't being repaired, and crew isn't being fed, it will be almost impossible to not drift away from others or crash into them. So it is for the human machine. Each of us must be responsible for treating ourself with the care that it needs and attend to each of the subsystems within us.

Most every person across time can agree that the first premise, not harming each other, is an important thing. Curiously, the other premise, maintaining oneself, is often ignored or its importance is disputed. This inconsistency is illogical though. What good are the rules that define our interactions between us if each person doesn't have the virtues to follow through on them?

You cannot make men good under law, and without good men you cannot have a good society. - C.S. Lewis

The individual man is therefore not just as important as society at large but moreso. One may not intend to harm another, but one often chooses to neglect or abuse the parts of himself that make it possible to function with others. Therefore, if one has neglected his inner parts he is completely responsible for the harm he causes others. So we must ask ourselves, "what are you doing in your ship to prevent collisions? What ideals are we aligning to and striving to meet? Which ones are we choosing to neglect?"