“If diamonds were as plentiful as pebbles we shouldn’t stoop to pick them up.”
A. G. Gardiner (“On the letter writing”)
All know that little is good – scarcity of resources increases the perceived value. But who decides what does the “little” mean? Is “never” the littlest “little” or should we make an exception for the “unavailable”. What does even “value” mean?
What about conscience and empathy? I wonder if truly “where ignorance is bliss, ‘Tis folly to be wise.” If yes, why do we labor and complain about others’ “injustice”? We can and must make a case that justice and fairness must necessarily be a scarce resource for them to be valuable virtues. But then, it becomes a prey-predator model. So should we even have the notions of “should be”?
The world I have to traverse everyday for my livelihood relies on metrics and perceptions – forgetting the Goodhart’s law: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure”. We spend countless hours discussing “unfair advantages”. In the meantime, it is well-known that “In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.” leading to “In time, every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out its duties.”
But then shouldn’t we long for justice? Who knows?
What I know is that my time in this “pale blue dot” is scarce. My resources are scarce. May be, just may be – I should look for cherishing them before even my memories vanish. May I remain as clueless as I was always about my destiny and purpose. May I remain a fleeting scarcity in the vast cosmic ocean of “sensible” juggernauts. Amen!
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