Millions of people are experiencing financial,
emotional and physical hardship under lockdown, whereas many are not. And, while
sympathetic to the plight of the former, I am fortunate (to the point of
feeling guilty) to be among the latter. Mind you, not everything at Wonderman
Towers is tickety-boo: I have just spent several uncomfortable days in the
throes of neck pain, a condition that takes the edge off pleasurable pursuits and
emphasises the pertinence of the saying “pain in the neck” when describing a persistent,
low-level nuisance. A visit to the physiotherapist was out of the question, so I
resorted to my copy of Andrew Ferguson’s Back and Neck Pain: A Complete Plan
for Self-Diagnosis and Treatment. Self-reliance is once more the order of
the day and I now have the problem under control. The neck pain, it turns out, was
a symptom of muscular turbulence elsewhere in the torso. Everything is connected.
And I mean everything – though, when
you look at subjects in isolation, this fact can be obscured by specialisation.
Consider the British Library’s Sound Archive, which contains millions of items
that must be digitised if they are to be saved from decay or technological obsolescence.
Why bother? Because sound recordings are a recent but precious connection to human
history and, in some cases, Earth’s biosphere. One such recording is that of a
now extinct Hawaiian songbird last heard in 1987 singing for its mate who died
the previous year. In light of this, it is unsurprising that the curator refused
the shameless request of a hunter who asked for a copy of the mating call of an
African big-game species so that he could use it to lure others of its kind.
Other, dedicated specialists operate under the radar of everyday busyness, e.g.
the British Dragonfly Society, complete with a network of County Recorders,
whose aim is to support research into and aid conservation of dragonflies and
their habitats. They know that you can’t do one without the other!
The Gaia Theorem has come to haunt
me. Everything I consider now seems linked to, caused by or affected by
something else, no matter how apparently remote. The migration of newscasters
and commentators from TV studios to home studios, many hastily improvised, led
me to muse on whether there would be a consequence, as in future homes being
built with provision for home working as standard. Something like this,
apparently, happened in 1950s America, when TV ownership exploded. Stay-at-home
housewives were the norm and they wanted to watch TV while working in the kitchen,
but the sets were too big and expensive to install, except in the lounge. So, enterprising
builders adapted their designs and open-plan living was born.
Of course, American homes are bigger
than most but, for those who have the luxury of a home office and the time to
cogitate within it, lockdown is an opportunity to consider how we can learn to
manage the whole complex business of cause and effect. Covid-19 is in-your-face
proof that everything is connected. The worldwide pandemic mocks the isolationist,
nationalist and protectionist nonsense of populist demagogues. Yes, their strict
border controls might hinder the spread of viruses, but they would also impede the
international co-operation that is necessary to tackle and rectify the causes
of this and other worldwide problems. The scientific research for a vaccine is
international and access to the product must be universal if it is to be fully effective.
The PPE that is made abroad is required everywhere. China’s economy depends on
the health and prosperity of its customers – aka the rest of the world. America’s
population depends on China to supply that which it no longer manufactures... and
so on. I think it’s time for the Gaia Theorem to graduate with honours.
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