inevitability ain't so
the power of the human variable
I cherish human complexity as it confirms that few things (except taxes, weight gain from vast overeating, and death) are inevitable. That is a joke but turns out true as well. It’s not that we have power over everything but it’s the amalgamation of all the people and the variables each person and each collection of people have that result in us never predicting entirely successfully how things will turn out. We simply do not understand how the variables at play will interact.
It’s why weather forecasting remains, like it or not, an art rather than an inevitability.
The example I used for years in lectures in remembering few things are straight-lined to an end is Argentina. A commonly held view in 1913 was that Argentina had an educated population, growing as a result of immigration, bountiful resources, a fairly functioning democratic system, and thus an inevitably bright future. Since the first coup d’etat in 1930, the society never regained its footing. How do we see Argentina 110 years later?
Many were sure that Hitler would overrun vulnerable Great Britain in 1941 with his massive army after a paralyzing air campaign a year earlier. Yet Der Fuhrer reversed course to attack the Soviet Union, contributing to his defeat and the deaths of millions upon millions.
I could keep naming examples as we have so many but prefer asking why we are so wrong so often on straightlining results? We don’t sufficiently factor human foibles or grit. Teddy Kennedy was a ‘shoo in’ the pundits thought in 1980 as the Democratic candidate for president until he could not explain to Roger Mudd in a why he was running except perhaps a sense of entitlement as the last surviving brother. 1
Most political analysts thought it inevitable someone knock Donald Trump from the presidential race in 2016 but Trump’s persistence overcame all opponents, even a woman most Democrats were absolutely sure would be the first female president in the United States.
In short, inevitabilities are generally not as certain as we assume. This is why we need think seriously about possible scenarios which differ from the one we see leading down a straight path.
Individuals have a great deal of power than we often recall as so do others, interacting constantly, repetitively, and not sufficiently at times. It’s those interactions at the personal, local, state, and international levels each able to alter the course at least a wee bit, leading to drastic changes over all versus the anticipated result.
This is actually quite liberating and a cause for hope. We should not panic by fearing dreaded outcomes but ponder where human intervention can occur. At the same time, we cannot blithely assume every variable works in favour of whatever outcome we want. Ukraine still has a hard road to defeating Russia, although most of us certainly hope so. We have no guarantees that where politics and events will lead the struggle for Israeli democracy. We can’t be certain the Washington Commanders won’t choose yet another 37 year old quarterback instead of investing in youth. Some undesirable things will still occur, regardless of those interactions I mentioned above.
We must also realise that time factors in as results are not endstates much of the time. If we had the horror of a war between China, the United States and Taiwan where China were defeated, it likely would lead China to regroup to return to its desired goal of reunification with Taiwan. Press reports already remind us that Prime Minister Netanyahu paused on implementing his controversial judicial reform package rather than abandoning it in the face of fierce, persistent opposition.
What tickles me about failures of inevitabilities today focuses on the NCAAs this year. I am particularly swooning over Caitlin Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes. I confess to the title as sports junkies in high school. My mother was appalled by how much time I spent pouring over English-language newspapers (local papers rarely had U.S. sports in the old days since there was no 24 hours sports network here or in the places I had the luck of living). She thought I should be thinking about something more suitable for a woman later in the life than batting averages, interceptions, shots on goal, and three point shots. I admit I was wretched at playing basketball but I certainly followed guys’ sports. I was pre-Title IX and rather ungainly so playing was never my forte but I had the sports mania role down. I left that behind years ago as I began interested in other things but I do pay attention to sports once in a while.
I am ecstatic to read about new teams earning the privilege to play in culminating contests as it proves there is no entitlement, no monopoly on who wins or loses. Iowa was a #2 seed but they were playing the women’s overall #1. The University of South Carolina Lady Gamecocks, the defending champions, did not have the press that the University of Tennessee or University of Connecticut women had several years back as each team had a phenomenal run over a generation but Carolina clearly was the favourite.
Caitlin Clark blew them out of the water. Her personal play is hailed repeatedly as the best player—the best player regardless of gender—in college today.2 Her defense, her scoring, her grit, and her play for a Midwestern team rather than one of the marquee programs in other places is so welcome.
Why so welcome? It incentives work and opens hopes for so many youngsters in Buffalo, Missouri, Ticonderoga, New York, or Eureka, California. It shows them that attending the ‘premier’ school in any particular year is nice but does not close opportunities. Sure, she was highly recruited, of course, and has incredible inate talent but she shows that one can make a difference by being good. Period.
Iowa could lose in the final as there is nothing inevitable here either. Clark, like all athletes, has off games and she is only one person on the court out of ten. But the men’s and women’s tournament this year reintroduced real excitement into the sport. It reminded us that complexity is the hallmark of human behaviour, leading to results often shocking yet invigorating. This is true for all of our lives. Thank goodness as life would be boring otherwise. And the incentives for all of us become so rich when we look ahead. FIN
Isabel Gonzalez, ‘Caitlin Clark’s Legend Continues to Grow after phenomenal performance in Final Four’, cbssports.com, 1 April 2023, retrieved at https://www.cbssports.com/womens-college-basketball/news/caitlin-clarks-legend-continues-to-grow-after-a-phenomenal-performance-in-the-final-four/