All Aboard
Sometimes it’s a thin line between hope and insanity.
By now most people have heard the expressino that one definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. This works in a certain macro sense but doesn’t work on every scale. It’s sort of in conflict with The Butterfly Effect. And for the few of you that don’t know what that is, it’s the notion that in some large and complex systems, a very small input can end up producing a very large output. The canonical example being that the flapping of a butterfly’s wings in The U.S. can end up causing a typhoon in India. A slightly easier to understand example is how a shout of winter joy can end up displacing a few flakes of snow, which in turn displace a few more, leading very quickly to an avalanche.
Of course, God points out that the reverse effects can be equally true. A butterfly’s flap could just as well prevent a typhoon as cause it, and few are the shouts that end up in tons of snow careening down a mountain.
But back to that thin line. Yesterday I arrived at the BART station just in time to hear that the next train due was being taken out of service at the station before mine, because of mechanical problems. This does cause a cascade effect of making trains run late for a while, but it’s not the lateness that I want to comment on, because there’s really not much hope in running late. But where there is hope, and hope to the level of insanity, is in the minds of the people trying to get on those late trains.
See, this happened right at the peak of rush hour, just as all the skyscrapers around my station in the financial district are starting to disgorge the main mass of their workers, all tired and ready to get home after a long day’s work. So not only was a train taken out of service that would have bled off the early arrivers, but while it was in the several minute process of being taken out, the not so early arrivers come pouring into the station. So now trains that were already going to be full are going to start resembling sardine cans.
And people at the front of the lines, when they see that there is no way to squeeze in through the train door where they are, will rush over to another nearby door, one where they can see people are not only not able to blithely walk aboard but where they are bunched up and trying to inch their way on. Yet somehow, even though this can be seen from two or three cars away, these people rush over, believing that they will be able to board.
And that’s why I say that there’s a fine line between hope and insanity.
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