To Trust or not to trust...

Karl-Henrik Robert was back in the classroom today with the master's class, and I sat in for the first hour or so. The topic was social sustainability -- an interesting topic to discuss in a sustainability program that is housed in a mechanical engineering department. Never-the-less, it struck me how relevant the social sustainability conversation is. Actually... nevermind 'relevant' - try PARAMOUNT.

I was just browsing some news articles... the first that caught my attention was Would you like a helicopter or minisub to go with that megayacht?. Interesting. Next... The Arctic's alarming sea change. Talk about things that make you go hmmmm... I guess maybe if I had the money and the arctic was opening up, I'd buy a yacht, too. Certainly a better investment than ocean front property... but does it strike anyone else as a bit ironic to see these two articles together? Especially if you read the article about the yachts - excuse me, megayachts - in which they talk about having GREEN megayachts. Maybe when the start running on algae (not too far-fetched!) and being remade of the Titanic (a bit more far-fetched) or other recycled stuff... maybe then the Green label will be ok. Diffuse glass in order to run the AC less? I don't think so.

In tying this back to the topic at hand... the third article that grabbed my attention: Meanwhile: Fill'er up with trust. During the lecture, Kalle was talking about the need for trust and how he is thinking more and more that it is all about trust. If we do some diagramming of the world to show some causal relationships... I think we might find that there are lots of gaps where we ought to see big, bold arrows with "TRUST" on the label.

So. How can we increase the level of trust in the world? Seems to me that the wealth gap between rich and poor can't be growing if we are going to increase trust. So much for those megayachts...

Along similar lines, I was having a conversation with myself in the kitchen the other day about my previous post on religion. I think some - perhaps many - would argue that compassion is a good thing that comes from their religious faith -- that belief in a particular religion increases our compassion for others. Fair enough -- that is consistent with my experience with christianity and consistent with my limited knowledge of several other faith traditions.

But why is compassion important? We take pride in having compassion when we help those who are less fortunate than ourselves... but why is it compassion that moves us to act? Would not it be far better if it was *common sense* that motivated us? Instead of saying "I'm going to donate to my favorite charity because I see that there are people in need and I have compassion for those people" wouldn't it be better if we all stepped back and said "I have all that I need; these other people don't. So I am going to give all of my excess so that we all can live."

What's the difference, you ask?

The difference is that when I give out of compassion, giving something small is enough to satisfy my feeling of obligation. As long as I give away a small fishing boat, it's okay for me to have a megayacht.

When I give out of common sense, it isn't to satisfy my feeling of obligation. Rather, it is because I realize -- consciously -- that my having a megayacht isn't helping very many people satisfy their basic needs. I can't stop giving after just a small fishing boat because I realize that there is still a gargantuan difference between what I have and what the other has. I might even realize that I don't need to take so much to begin with... because I just end up giving it away.

I'm only afraid that in this day and age, doing that very thing would diminish trust... people would be very suspicious about what I was up to..