“Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.”
Gustav Mahler
I am not opposed to change. I am resistant to change. Before I make a change, I want to know who the change profits. By “profit” I don’t necessarily mean financial gain. When a software company takes an operation that involves a single step and updates it into an operation that takes three steps, who profits? Who profits when a company reduces the size of the product rather than increase the price? When told a change is “for the better”, I like to ask, better for whom?
Change, whether in the marketplace, workplace, education, philosophy, or government benefits someone in some way. That’s not cynicism, that’s fact. Profit is always the driving force behind innovation. However, we seem to have forgotten that innovation and change only create the possibility of improvement. Hitler’s rise to power was welcomed as an improvement over a powerless regime. Mussolini made the trains run on time.
The writer and the innovator are kindred spirits. They look at the world and think, “what if”, and then go out and try it at home. I’ve sallied forth on many a “what if” quest. I can testify that what looks like the sure means to defeat a giant at the outset leads to bruises rather than betterment. Ed Landry, Bryn Bou, and Kit Mann all agree. Altering worlds and situations is in my blood.
Nevertheless, I can rightfully be called a Traditionalist. Tradition is not about the way we’ve always done it. Tradition is about values. I’m no mathematician but I paid enough attention in class to know numbers and equations represent values. To the dismay of many, math doesn’t change. Two plus two has equaled four since Man has had fingers. It will continue to do so as long as numbers represent values.
The sculptor and the potter both work the medium to fit their vision. Though the potter has a more pliable medium with which to work, change is his goal. Yet, when the artist has finished his work, stone remains stone, clay remains clay. Which is better depends on whether aesthetics or utility is important to you.
Humanity is important to me. Philosophers of old sought to define our place in Nature (universe, creation, world). They had the idea that we occupied a niche in harmony with all that surrounds us. One called that place The Good. I know that place is real and will not surrender it.
Some people are no longer satisfied with such knowledge. They don’t want to fit into Nature. They desire to conquer Nature and bend it to their will, to be above and apart from Nature. I think in doing so they make themselves and all of us less human. The whispered, “You shall be as gods” is still powerful.
I’d rather feel the warm fire of values long held than sit in the ashes of hasty change.
