–Contingency and complexity affect both intention and consequence. It’s not just that my good intentions sometimes end up achieving the opposite; it’s not just my thoughtlessness may save others or myself from worse. It’s being uncomprehending in any case. The self-cure for this is to be preoccupied by other things.
–To be distracted from these preoccupations means hesitations and scruples over: what we know and do not know; what we experience as inexperience; and what we come to know as different kinds of difficulty. This is the alertness in finding something complicated that nonetheless resonates, even if for a moment.
–An example: It’s said climate migrants are driven out, but have nowhere else to go or wherewithal to do so. What’s missed is not just all manner of evidence that they don’t see themselves as victims but their alertness in acting so.
WHEN COMPLEX IS AS SIMPLE AS IT GETS 