The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing!

"We cherish the illusion of being in control of events. But in every decision, however trivial, the seeds of a thousand futures are sown. In an instant a world of hope shatters, even as life continues with insolent normalcy around you. In another instant infinite possibilities may flower. Joy and grief are inextricably intertwined.  An ancient Roman philosopher once wryly observed, the most unhappy sort of unfortunate man is one who has been happy.

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The world – or at least that part of it made up of human interactions and human institutions – is far too complex to be comprehended in a holistic way by the human mind. It is an intricate, chaotic and dynamic system characterized by so many feedback loops that its behaviour becomes more and more unpredictable. Ironically, our general answer to unpredictability is to develop ever more complexity: new technologies, new institutions, more regulation and more information.

To teach, to write, even to speak, is necessarily to simplify. We cannot opt out of the world. To deal with it we, consciously or unconsciously, resort to mental frameworks that simplify reality in order to enable us to comprehend it. The purpose of a university education, indeed all education, is to enrich our stock of these mental frameworks, the better to navigate the treacherous waters of life.

But we should not forget that these mental frameworks are only human artefacts. They are ideologies; social and political constructs that inevitably distort the reality they try to comprehend, or at best capture only a tiny and ephemeral sliver of it. But it is seductively easy to confound our ideas and opinions with ‘facts’. The highly educated, highly intelligent and highly successful are the most prone to this type of error.

We can truly know something only after it has happened. But if we can only know backwards, we must live forwards. Herein lies the essential fragility of human endeavour wherein the best laid plans are constantly ambushed by chance. We always know less than we believe we do. And our actions; the very effort to understand, changes the behaviours we try to understand and influence. Self-deception is an intrinsic part of human nature. So the odds are usually in favour of chance."

read this some time ago but i didn't feel much. it was only tonight upon some re-reading that i took particular note of these extracts. pretty on point with how i feel about alot of things now - general life outlook, religion, people! interesting that he argues AGAINST the hedgehog, because i was doing abit of reading about isaiah berlin from this book i'm just starting on by dworkin called "justice for hedgehogs" who's clearly on the side of the hedgehog. i thought the point of the quote was to argue about a cohesive value system with a unifying theme vs  a fragmented disconnected one. but i may be wrong!