Progress Blows Forward

We believe in a world that marches forward into a City upon a Hill. A place everything will eventually be fixed, where we can rest forever. Progress indeed went forward, but what has become of it?

We imagine that every life is uplifted by progress. It is an elevator that raises us into a better world, with everyone willingly and consciously sharing the journey together. The imagery evoked here is that we all hold hands around the world, people of all identities, striving to improve currently what we have. But is this truly the case? Because I feel like it is more of a wind; it blows in random directions until it reaches to a specific path without knowing who is stuck and who is struck with it. Some choose to stay behind because their roots are strong. Some fear what is to come in the future. Some want to reap the benefits of moving around in the arid wind. Yet, it is never the same for everyone. Not everyone chooses to push forward but has no choice. Not everyone decides to remain, yet has to do so. We have become nomads in time, with no choice but to bear what is to come.

Sheep are often used as an allegory of ignorance, as they follow each other in a herd. But all of us are like sheep after all against progress, because of social direction, rather than ignorance. We lack protection against what is to come, and we are unsure what we have created will spare us. (Painting: Our English Coasts, 1854, William Holman Hunt)

Nonetheless, the future we built over our ideas moves forward. It has been the same throughout the history of what we call social thought. Ideas go forward, often without being understood or directly encountered, often coincidental, bound by a certain past. A great Frenchman foresaw a great future, a future where all pains are remedied through the power of reason. Yet, we know what misunderstood ideas truly bear in our lives; none of us are free from the burden of such a sin. What is democracy? What is science? What is equality? What is freedom? Many have the answers to questions of this caliber, but rarely does it reach to those who truly need it. Their truths turn into lies; their promises turn into mockeries. Still, we want to believe in these ideals; we know that specific ideas are good and should exist in our lives. Yet, those who follow these ideals are left with an unimaginable terror, which brought even more terror that engulfed a whole continent. In the end, a storm has devastated the world, only leaving a specter behind. Yet it marches forward, with those who can keep up with it and those who are eventually thrown away.

That makes us question what develops and what cannot keep up. The problem here is not only the exodus of those who were forsaken by the deluge but the shelters we built against this storm. Regardless of whether they are good or not, the institutions we have built provide us certain stability, both for what we do daily and as a peace of mind. Now, they either cannot stand against it or are at odds with how life is changing the world. Some of the practices do need to change. To give an example, we cannot accept slavery as a practice and we thankfully got rid of it (to some extent). Even so, we keep customs that have long lost their meanings, the famous example being the use of a QWERTY keyboard when it is less efficient than the arrangements we have today. The survival of customs that should have perished gives us hope about certain institutions that we cherish deep in ourselves such as family (not necessarily a single interpretation). We believe that such conventions should exist as they have much more meaning regardless of what the progress will eventually bring, and more harm will be caused if they perish. But the path of progress is blind to such considerations and only favors those that can survive its maelstrom.

Hence, we are only allowed to keep the institutions that can shield us from these winds. To give an example, what would happen to the systems of education, politics, rights, and community we built in the upcoming years? Will they shelter us from the transformation progress brings? The winds of progress suggest otherwise. They are strong and unknown enough to uproot what we currently have, and our advancements open up the gap larger and larger, leaving what we have in a constant state of (de)construction. Yet, progress keeps blowing forward, like the Big Bad Wolf. And out of us three little pigs, only the one with the brick (or jelly) house will remain.

I will not deny that what we put under the idea of progress made our lives easier; we are now free of many pains and open to many forms of happiness our ancestors could only think of. You should truly be a fool or an unlucky person to die from rabies in the developed world, which was not the case 139 years ago in the world Louis Pasteur lived in. Even though vaccine denial today serves as proof that ideas remain misunderstood by the many as progress blows forward, nobody can deny that this benefit has raised the world from misery over time. Who am I to deny what is for the benefit of everyone?

However, this ideal has another dimension, which twists the meaning of good. While progress aims to fix, it loses its sense of purpose over time. Each development is compared with the previous one as progress must be made to be the better option. The definition of “better” becomes “more effective.” What is effectiveness if everything becomes a tool? What of a doctor who cures a patient of a fatal disease without considering their pain? What of the police, which finds a lost person only when they are already long gone? What of the state, the supposed sole authority over the monopoly of violence, if it can only remain as a witness to unjust violence? For all turns into numbers. And as long as they are less, all remains fine. Thus, rational thinking becomes its own purpose, devoid of what it is supposed to do. It is oriented at its supposed conclusion rather than to become our safety net.

This shows us another way progress blows forward: what we have built for good purposes becomes instruments.  We live with the oughts without knowing why; thus, action turns into inaction. Yet, we cannot object as we already knew this would happen. Pages of academic work that can fill up libraries discuss what you experienced were preventable and you should not complain if you are struck with a calamity. This is the world of reason where there remain only disasters and precautions. Imagine the last time you had an accident; it must have been very controllable. Regardless of an accident or unfortunate incident, you could have prevented it if you thought a bit more about it. Imagine the apocalyptical scenarios put forward about certain developments: AI and biotechnology. Would you claim responsibility if a rogue AI caused a chain of events leading to our extinction? Or does the product of vaccine research meant to save us all leak into nature and wipe us all? Well, we should, but we shouldn't.  That is why tragedy dies with the idea of progress. But tragedies themselves remain, retrofitted as irresponsibility. The Enlightenment was about accepting adulthood and taking responsibilities, but what is adulthood if freedom is an uncertain concept?

A clever social thinker might come here and save the day by making the distinction between agency and structure, long-term and short-term. We would maybe be saved by their ingenuity. These are valuable concepts indeed for conducting social science, after all. The same person would argue that while structures do exist, they change over time by adopting our freely made decisions. They'd say that it is not a determinate path: "You can change the course of progress if you are willing to accommodate everyone and return it to its true purpose. But I must inform you that your life will be too short to witness that." While I hope they are correct, I must remind them that this lofty dream doesn't save the current pains or the despair against the storm clouds rapidly approaching.  While we approach certain questions analytically and see an eventual expected good, what to make of it for here and now?

I write with the hope that humanity will not be blown away from the progress but nourished by it. I want to believe in the idea of progress; we all do. I cling to those two words of human wisdom, "Wait and Hope," for the progress to settle in and for us to make this ideal stand for its original purpose. Yet, what are words when there are no results, and what are thoughts when they do not elevate this world? Only actions to turn this gale into a breeze can ensure a future free of all misery for everyone. Thus, whereof one cannot act, thereof, one must not speak and be silent.