Heroes Not Zombies

There is always another way.

I don’t believe people who say there is only way to do something. There are always other options, other choices to make, all dependent on our preferences, values, beliefs and particular circumstances.

Margaret Thatcher famously said “There is no alternative” – which was shortened to “TINA”. It wasn’t true then, and it’s never been true since.

I’m suspicious of algorithms and protocols because they tend to marshall everyone down the same pathway in order to produce the exact same outcome. But we are all different, and we are all living our every day lives, moment by unique moment, in each of our individual and particular circumstances. The more generally “TINA” is applied, the more inappropriate it is.

It’s been frustrating to hear politicians say they have been “following the science” all the time during this pandemic and that they have “taken the right steps at the right time”.

There is no “the science”.

Science is a methodology. It’s a way of considering the world, of exploring and attempting to understand it. The scientific method doesn’t produce end points. “IT’ is never finished. There is always more to discover, more to learn. Science is about doubt, not certainty. The findings and analyses of scientists can increase our understanding but they will never be set in stone, fixed for all time.

There are no “right” steps to take at “the right time”. There are just the steps we choose to take, in good faith, or carelessly. There are just the steps we choose to take now. They say hindsight has “twenty twenty vision” (or will we say in the future “2020 vision”?) but that’s not true either. Things just look different when we look back. Looking back is just a change of perspective. Not a perspective we had at the time.

Here’s the same passageway, viewed from the other side – looking back to the way we came, where the first one was looking forward to the way we were going.

Change the perspective, change the understanding, change the options.

There is always another way.