Get insights into complex issues by asking:
“What is the foundation?”
“Who/what is driving formation?”
Human beings are complex adaptive creatures, meaning we are both shaped by our experiences and shape our existence. We have agency, we make choices. Even the most powerful dynamic forces cannot dictate every bit of the outcomes.
Our foundations and what formed us in the past is what brought us to the present, and creates the worldview/assumptions/lenses we use to assess the present and the past. We’re steeped in this, even when we don’t understand or appreciate it. This is true (to different degrees) for individuals and communities alike.
Formation is ongoing. You’ve probably heard the pithy observation that you become the average of the five people you spend the most time with – that’s formation at work. Formation is not only experiences, but how you reflect upon and un/consciously learn from those experiences.
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Foundations give you frameworks for understanding, and predictive power. Your foundation was established from formation by your parents, your teachers, practical experiences where you needed to make decisions, the books/TV/music/movies you consumed, friends and enemies. Your foundation may not be correct, or consistent, but it is strong. Your foundation drives your default interpretations of the world and your default behaviors.
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If you listen to the talking heads, technocrats, and the people who write the ad copy, you’re likely to believer that scientists, medical doctors, and psychiatrists know EVERYTHING about biology, ecosystem dynamics, cancer, human development, evolution, and how the brain works.
We don’t. Frankly, what we know has little predictive power, and we don’t know fully what we don’t know.
Physics and engineering have a foundation of math. There’s no such foundation for any aspect of biology. Our predictive ability is miniscule. We’re faced with questions like “What does a cell know about itself?” because individual cells operate with agency. Despite the “certainty” language some use about intelligence and cognition, we don’t know how to define these things.
There is variation in the physical, non-biological world. We’ve become quite good at reducing that variation (e.g., purifying metals from ores, creating standard sizes for boards and screws). Manageable variation is key to our success with materials, construction, and use of tools.
Variation is enormously larger in the biological space. This variation compounds all our experimental approaches to finding cures and treatments for diseases. There are billion-dollar-a-year drugs which only work in 35% of patients. The variations are even greater in the mental health space – now you’re working with the biological, the experiential, and vagaries of self-perception and social interactions.
The problem is not that we have failed to reduce biology to a predictable machine that we can control. The problem is that people behave as if smart people have already done that. We desperately want solutions to biological challenges, so we’re primed to believe their arrogance.
I believe we’re meant to explore biology. The scientific method is a primary tool to keep us humbly oriented as we explore the factual, experimental world. Biology is fundamentally different – life has agency, right down to the cellular level. Not long ago I was in a planning workshop to create a 10-year plant breeding program. Everyone in the room was delighted with the plan. Then a savvy scientist brought us back to realism by saying, “Of course, the plants will have to cooperate with our perfect plan.”
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” — Hamlet
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Philosophers and social commentators write long books on the ideas of foundation and formation. I’ve only scratched them here.
Use the concepts of foundation and formation to assess complex situations. The surface presentation is a small part of the deeper story. Ask questions, and then ask more questions. Be wary of people who would discourage you from exploring foundations and formation. In my experience, these people are generally untrustworthy and would prefer you stay in lock-step with their narratives about the world.
