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| Nicole Fielder ('19) |
This semester has shown me emergent
themes like none before. One major theme has been Evolution. Yes, in the
biological sense – I am taking Biological Anthropology to knock out that final
Gen-Ed – but also in a more radical sense. I read a book called The Evolution
of Everything by Matt Ridley and, in the book, he posits that everything is
emergent or “unfolding.” History isn’t made by the design of man but through
the coalescence of everything that came before it and often in spite of man.
Simultaneous invention, the fact that numerous scientific or technological
breakthroughs are made by several people independently around the same time, is
a case in point. Darwin’s theory of evolution is an almost ironic example of
this because he wasn’t the only one developing the concept of natural selection
at the time; he just got published first.
The “Evolution of Everything” as an
idea has been corroborated by several other authors and lecturers I’ve
encounters this semester. In a lecture by Dr. Mackey, he ascribed our having a
written constitution to the “customs and traditions” that came before it even
though written constitutions themselves were novel. Ideas such as this have
been challenging my conception of the role of individual humans in history.
I’ve also been mulling over the
fact that culture is emergent. Our new university president, Dr. Bendapudi,
once said, “What you tolerate is your culture,” and I can see how that applies
in my sorority, on campus, and in our country. Alexis de Tocqueville talks
about a resulting “abstraction of will” if one tolerates not actively
participating in their democracy at the more local levels. If we aren’t
practicing democracy – or, to take it classical, virtue – it will evolve out of
our culture.
On the more hopeful side, social
problems have also evolved out of our culture. In his lecture, Matt Ridley
shared a Harvard study that found “prevalence-induced concept change,” which
means that, as social problems are reduced, we are more likely to be on the
lookout for them and will lump borderline behavior in with the concretely
unethical. He used this concept to support his argument that the world is getting
better overall, especially when you telescope out from recent history. Even
though it feels like we aren’t making any progress, gaining a little
perspective like this reminds me to not utterly despair.
Considering this “lumping”
phenomenon, though, it makes me wonder at what point we are compelled to take
up the proverbial mantle. This blurry ethical line amidst long-run social
progress makes it hard to discern our present role and whether taking action
would even matter, if we grant the premise of ever-present evolution. But then
I think of Judge Kethledge and his discussion of moral courage: knowing your
values explicitly and letting them guide you in the face of moral criticism. I
think of Dr. Birzer’s lecture about Russell Kirk and the importance of being
willing to fight against the injustices in one’s own backyard. I like to think
that our collective efforts do shape culture. We are both products and creators
of history. Balancing the humility of one’s place in time while maintaining the
motivation to fight circumstance, injustice, entropy is what I believe
characterizes the human experience.
Nicole Fielder, of Nicholasville, Ky., is a member of the McConnell Scholar Class of 2019. She is studying political science and economics at the University of Louisville.