Advent: A Look Towards a Hopeful Future

 HS #65 2020.12.10

 

Advent

 

 

Last summer, returning to the Au Train beach from a Lake Superior kayaking venture, I came upon a wrestling camp in progress. A gung-ho military-styled coach was training a couple dozen junior high youth as their parents looked on from a distance. Having explained the necessity of being in top shape, he paired them with instructions for one to carry his partner on his back for 60 yards down the beach, then trade places for the return trip. As the coach exhorted and cajoled, all returned sweating and heaving, except one slightly built wrestler who was straining under the weight of his partner.

 

All could see the pain on the young face as he labored to keep his balance in the loose sand and grappled to keep the load from slipping off his back. It was clear that he was not going to make it. After a gallant effort, he approached the coach standing 20 yards from the finish line and prepared to drop his teammate onto the sand.  

 

But the coach would have none of it.  Seemingly blind to the pain of the faltering lad, he refused to let him stop, instead pointing to the finish line and bullying him onward. 

 

With no option but forward, tears of rage mixed with salt and sand covered his agonized face. I watched in anger, wondering if any parent would step forward to stop the emotional and physical abuse. Twice he hesitated, but somehow was able to command his wavering legs to take another step - then another - two more yards to go - then collapsed on the finish line to the cheers of his fellow wrestlers and the relieved parents. 

 

That young man will never be the same. I am sure of it. Heck, it was life changing for me just witnessing it. My contempt for the bully coach turned to profound respect as I saw what he had just given that boy - gave him a lesson that went far beyond wrestling or physical endeavor. 

 

I never met the coach, but I suspect that Holland has a statue in honor of a kindred spirit. Recently I read “With this Inheritance” written by Sara Michel and illustrated by Del Michel. It gives the account of Albertus Van Raalte leading the original group of one hundred Hollanders to Western Michigan. Jailed and fined in the Netherlands for disobeying laws regulating worship, Van Raalte met tough times head-on. Learning English while on the ship, he served as minister, translator, counselor, encourager, explorer, builder, teacher, host, and entrepreneur to the colony. He led them in hewing out a new settlement in a wilderness so thick with trees that corn and potatoes were planted between tree roots, the 70 foot windmill they constructed would not turn due to blocked wind, and new arrivers carried axes to mark trees when fetching their cows in order to find their way back home. 

 

He had no coach to encourage him as he encouraged others in the midst of hunger, illness and death. Instead, his motivation was “this inheritance from God’s hand and desire to attain God’s end.” 

 

Both of these individuals point us to Advent. They envisioned a future event with fervent hope, whether it was 20 yards away or “God’s nursery for eternity.” This is a tough hope rooted in truth and requiring action and sacrifice as opposed to wishful thinking rooted in passivity and cynicism.

 

It forms a stark contrast to those whose false beliefs align with what they wish to be true: dying COVID patients denying the reality of the pandemic, those who claim the recent election was fraudulent despite firsthand testimony and judgements to the contrary, and those certain that global warming is a hoax, avoiding “an inconvenient truth” thus keeping their present lifestyle with no guilt. As a former student of mine has noted, “the mind justifies what the heart desires.” 

 

Al Franken caught the contrast between easy belief and tough hope: “Some love America like a toddler loves their mommy - it can do no wrong. Others love America like a parent loves their teenager - they know it can do better.”

 

This year, even in the darkness of the presently increasing COVID death rate, we have opportunity to exercise tough hope – to celebrate Advent as we look forward with justified assurance to the end of the reign of the coronavirus with a vaccine provided by the arduous labor of scientists. It is an Advent built on grit, tenacity and truth. 

Boron Rods

 HS #64 2020.11.12

 

Boron Rods

 

I remember it vividly. My 6^th grade science class was watching a film that explained nuclear reactions – a reaction caused when a neutron smashes into a uranium-235 nucleus releasing three more neutrons and a bit of energy. The resulting exponential growth in the number of neutrons results in a nuclear explosion. 

 

To demonstrate it, the floor of an entire room was covered with mousetraps – each with a ping pong ball perched on it. When a single ball was tossed into the room, it sprang a trap releasing another ball, and those two landed on two more traps which released their balls. Almost instantly the air was filled with flying ping pong balls. This is what destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 

 

In order to explain exponential growth to my math classes, I use the great-grandpa example. Suppose you have two ancestors who 200 years ago each deposited $10 in a bank at 6% annual interest. The first included directions that each year the interest be removed and collected in a jar, while the other directed that the interest stay in the bank to earn additional interest.

 

The first account grows at a constant rate of 60 cents each year, so after five years there is $13.00 and after 200 years a total of $130. What about the second? At the end of the first year, you have $10 times 1.06  = $10.60. A 60¢ increase. Second year: $10.60 times 1.06 = $11.24. A 64¢ increase.  Then a 67¢ increase. Then 71¢. After five years, you have $13.38 – 38¢ more than the first. How much after 200 years? A whopping $1,151,259.04 

 

Unlike linear growth which increases at a constant rate, exponential growth happens whenever the amount of change is not constant but instead grows proportional to the amount present.  Whether a bank account, a nuclear bomb, zebra mussels, or small pox which decimated continents, the result is the same: unconstrained explosive growth. 

 

So how then do we harness nuclear energy to safely produce electricity? Boron rods are positioned in the reactor chamber to absorb enough of the particles to keep the chain reaction from going wild. If pushed in all the way, the reaction stops. If pulled out, the reaction turns into an explosion. Simple. 

 

When the Manhatten Project under the bleachers at the University of Chicago tested the first nuclear reaction, Enrico Fermi and company had done all the calculations on slide rules to assure that things would go as planned. But so great was the consequence of a miscalculation that a physicist stood ready with an ax to drop control rods into the reactor if needed. They also considered positioning a suicide squad of three young physicists on the ceiling with containers of cadmium-sulfate (neutron-absorbing) solution. 

 

By absorbing just enough of the neutrons, they achieved an exponential rate of 1.0006 (equivalent to a tiny interest rate of 0.06%), but that was enough to convince them that the theory of Einstein and Bohr really worked. Had they not put the control rods back in place, within 90 minutes the one-half watt of power would have multiplied to a million kilowatts – vaporizing them and melting the room. 

 

What do the boron rods do? By absorbing neutrons, they lower the exponential rate to a number less than 1. In the same way that 1.0006 multiplied by itself enough times will increase without bound, so also a number less than 1, say 0.9995 multiplied by itself repeatedly will head to zero. Lower the average number of released neutrons to less than 1, and the reaction dies down – similar to a bouncing ball coming to rest. 

Do you see where this is going? Our present coronavirus is a biological explosion. Social distancing and masks for all of us and isolation for those who test positive are our only effective “boron rods.” Without them, the virus will explode through the human population. If we wear them and responsibly distance and isolate ourselves, the multiplier rate will be less than 1, and the number of people with the virus will head to 0 – as it has done in China. 

 

Unfortunately, as with out-of-tune singers in a choir, even though most are responsible, a few  people can have a big negative effect, thus raising the multiplier above 1.  If 99% of cars are low-exhaust, but 1% are heavy polluters, the air is bad. The key is for EVERYONE to be responsible. Nothing else will do it. The math is simple.

This I Believe

 HS #63 2020.10.8

 

This I Believe

 

Recently a reader asked me to provide my underlying beliefs. He was referring to political beliefs, but I agree with G.K. Chesterton, “The most practical and important thing about a person is his view of the universe.” The philosopher Wittgenstein claimed that we all have core beliefs. These form the stationary hinge around which our other beliefs can then move. For twenty-five years, teaching senior seminars at Hope College, I challenged students to identify and reflect critically on their core beliefs. After all, none other than Socrates observed that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” So in the remaining space I give an overview of my beliefs, and challenge readers to do the same. 

 

My father liked to say, “All Indians walk in single file – at least the one I saw did.” That humorous line captures two important points: We learn by making generalizations from what we experience. However, those generalizations may be wrong.  If a growling dog bites me, I should stay away from growling dogs. However, I shouldn’t avoid ALL dogs. So making correct generalizations from our experiences is important. 

 

First, I learn about the universe by experiencing it directly via my five senses. I gain wonder and awe from sunsets over Lake Michigan. I learned multiplication by playing with blocks. I learned about forces from teeter totters and merry-go-rounds and bicycles. I discover what makes people happy and angry by interacting with friends and siblings. 

 

I also experience the universe directly through an internal sense. Immanuel Kant said, “Two things fill the mind with admiration and awe: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.” I agree. Even though I lose out on the fun of spending the money, something inside (possibly God’s imprint) compels me that I should return a lost wallet to its owner. As the physicist-priest John Polkinghorne said, “I know, as certainly as I know anything, that love is better than hate.” 

 

Finally, as the above paragraphs suggest, I learn about the universe through the testimony of others. Indeed, most that I know has come that way. I have experienced sixty years of history, but I know thousands of years of it. Via my eyes I see specks of light in the night sky, but via the testimony of others, I know that some of those specks are huge fusion furnaces like our sun and others are swirling swarms of billions of suns. All of this from the testimony of others – historians, biographers, scientists. 

 

But this is where things get tricky. I have learned from experience that the testimony of others is unreliable. Some are mistaken or deceitful, while others, including myself, are easily fooled. I recently learned via NPR that I have been sorting plastic in vain. Recycling numbers was a gimmick to get Americans to use more plastic – guilt free. I bought in. That is, unless I am being sold a false story by NPR. How do I know? 

 

Religious claims are especially problematic.   There may be intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. However, if anyone claimed they were abducted by extra-terrestrials, I would doubt the veracity.  Similarly, although a personal God or spiritual dimension may exist, I doubt those who claim to have personal information or experience with it. Just too many varied and contrary claims amongst the 4000 religions.  Obviously, most – possibly all - are mistaken.

 

Personally, I put scientists high on my “trustworthy” list. Why? Not because they are better than the rest of us, but because they are engaged in a career where gaining truth is the primary objective and is robustly and critically sought. I am presently peer-reviewing a mathematics article for a journal. Before it’s printed, several mathematicians will scour it for mistakes. Any major scientific finding is reviewed by hundreds. There’s a plumb for anyone who finds flaws in another’s discovery. Additionally, others repeat the experiments. 

 

Recently I watched Francis Collins (physicist, physician, director of Human Genome Project, NIH Director, founder of BioLogos, and author of “The Language of God”) receive the Templeton Prize which is given to a person who “harnesses the power of the sciences to explore the deepest questions of the universe and humankind’s place and purpose within it.” 

 

An atheist who became a Christian at age 27 after being challenged by one of his patients to examine his own world view, Collins is presently searching for a coronavirus antidote, warning about human-caused global warming, and advocating for truth and harmony. That’s an examined life worth living.  

White Privilege

 HS #62 2020.9.10

 

White Privilege 

 

Every so often I have an “ah-ha” moment when blinders are seemingly removed from my eyes. Yet, I hesitate to make that claim because, like the blind man healed by Jesus, I am perhaps still not seeing clearly, but unlike the blindman, not realizing it. 

 

Be that as it may, I recently heard that in Saginaw Valley there is a monument commemorating its first white person - a Jesuit missionary priest in 1675. 

 

I instantly had two thoughts: “Cool! That’s a tidbit of history one wouldn’t know if not for the monument. It prods one to imagine the Valley back then.” The other was, “What hubris! Why do whites think that the first white is an occasion for celebration and note? Reflecting a bit more, I realized that if I saw a monument for “the first black in Michigan” I would likely think to myself, “There’s more of that political correctness stuff - someone trying to make a point.” 

 

Only at such times do I realize the deep extent of white privilege in my own thinking – even after having been sensitized by the death of George Floyd and the many yard signs in Holland proclaiming “Black Lives Matter.” 

 

I was recently in a conversation with someone who asked the purpose of those signs. His question, “What are they meant to accomplish? How am I to act differently after having seen one?” Good questions. Yet my “ah-ha” moment shows exactly their purpose. They hopefully help show me – and other whites – that, like it or not, admit it or not, I am part of the problem. 

 

Ironically, although affluent white Americans are likely among the most traveled in the world, this extensive exposure to other cultures may serve to increase our sense of pride and entitlement rather than increase our appreciation for other peoples and cultures.  I remember visiting the cliff dwellings in Mesa Verde, Colorado and being told by a Native American guide how well constructed these 800-year-old structures were. We climbed ladders to get a closer look at the clay rooms. Then it occurred to me that they were about the age of the great cathedrals of Europe. “Why are you so proud of this?”, I thought. 

 

I also remember visiting villages in Ecuador with simply constructed homes and children running around and about. While others commented how small and close-together they were, I found myself envious of the tight community they allowed. What a contrast to our life style where we stay secluded in air-conditioned homes, locked doors, and put up “No Trespassing” and “Private Beach” signs. How bizarre, when you think of it – this European idea that we can own a piece of the 4.5-billion-year-old earth. Like a flea owning the elephant. 

 Native Americans saw things differently – they viewed the earth as owning them.

 

But didn’t Europeans control much of the globe? Doesn’t that give them cause for pride? “Guns, Germs, and Steel” by Jared Diamond provides an answer. Much of it was accidental. Smallpox and other European diseases wiped out 95% of the Native American population, as they did indigenous peoples on other continents.  Some is “personality.” In the 15^th and 16^th century China began exploring for trade while Europeans explored to conquer. 

 

The point is, we whites look around, see the world through our value system, and can’t help but think that we’re rather special. “If you’re not Dutch, you’re not much” is meant to be a joke, but, as Proverbs 26:19 points out, jokes often contain a germ of one’s true thought. 

 

So what can be done? Do we destroy the monument in Saginaw? Recently a John Wayne exhibit was closed upon discovering Wayne was a white supremacist – at least as indicated by things he said. Wayne, like all of us, was a person of his own time.  Do we censor him forever because he didn’t have the opportunity for the “ah ha” moments we have had?  What happens when we uncover 30-year-old comments or actions by our leaders and heros? Can we progress individually and as a society while still allowing for mistakes of the past? Isn’t intolerance for past actions a close relative of intolerance for other ethnicities? Aren’t both built on pride in one’s present position?  

 

Wisdom is needed, and wisdom, as shown by Solomon and Daniel (the two Biblical characters described as being wise) involves creative thinking and imagination. Someone in Saginaw Valley suggested leaving the monument and erecting another for Native Americans. That’s a clever start. 

 

A Recent Wedding Reflection: A Three-fold cord

 HS #61 2020.8.13

 

A Recent Wedding Reflection: A Three-fold cord

 

My favorite book of the Bible is Ecclesiastes. This Book of Wisdom asks tough questions about life and doesn’t give tidy answers. Like any good piece of art, such as the enigmatic smile of Mona Lisa, it has a mysterious, unexplained element.

 

The author begins one portion: “Two are better than one, for if one falls, the other will lift up. If two lie together, they are warm. And though a single person might be overcome in a fight, two will endure.”  But then comes the mystery in the last sentence, “A threefold cord is not quickly broken.” What’s the point of ending this passage with a THREE-FOLD cord? How does it apply? 

 

Exploring the mathematics, the author is correct. Two strands wound around each other can be pulled apart. That is why our DNA is a twisted DOUBLE helix – two strands that can be separated when needed. 

 

However, an interesting topological situation happens when a third cord is included. This third cord – interwoven with the other two – forms an elegant braid in which all three strands stay bound together. 

 

What does that have to do with marriage? Isn’t the love between two people enough? Is something else needed? Does something else add richness and strength to the relationship just as a third cord adds beauty and strength to a braided rope? 

 

This is the mystery. The author doesn’t tell us what he had in mind – maybe nothing. Perhaps, like good art, he intentionally left it to us to contemplate. However, the rest of Ecclesiastes gives some hints. 

 

The author is skeptical of some things. For example, he writes, “Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down to the earth.” In other words, he has no special reason to believe in an afterlife. However, there is a noteworthy exhortation further on: “Remember thy Creator.”

 

The philosopher Simone Weil agrees. She wrote, “I am quite sure there is a God in the sense that I am sure my love is no illusion. I am quite sure there is no God in the sense that I am sure there is nothing which resembles whatever I conceive when I say that word.”  Fascinating.  So she is claiming that God is ultimately the cause – the source – of love, but who exactly this God is, is a mystery. Kind of like the enigmatic God who described himself to Moses as merely “I am that I am.”

 

 Just perhaps the Psalmist is right when he says, “The young lion roars – seeking its prey from God.” Just perhaps there is a personal God who is ultimately behind even the food of a strong self-sufficient young lion. Did Romeo kill himself because he thought Juliet was dead? Or was it because Shakespeare wanted him to? Similarly, is there an Author behind the good lives that you two have had and who is smiling right now as you join together? In case there is, how might you “Remember thy Creator” in your new home? How might God, however mysterious or known be a third strand? 

 

But in fairness, Ecclesiastes seems focused not so much on God, but on how to live a fulfilled life.  The author quickly dispenses with some things: wealth, possessions, accomplishments, pleasure.  It’s not clear that the author himself even finds the answer. Great philosophers through the centuries have wrestled with trying to answer this question.

 

In the 20^th century the psychologist Maslow may have succeeded.  He formed a pyramid of human needs – like the food pyramid. The base includes food, shelter and security, then higher up love, belonging, respect and finally self-actualization – essentially becoming the most you can be. 

 

But later in life, Maslow realized that there was yet a higher level. He wrote, “The self only finds its full actualization in giving itself to some goal outside oneself, in altruism and spirituality.” The poet Mary Oliver expressed the same challenge, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” 

 

What a moment! You are coming here as two individuals – you will be leaving as one couple. Marriage is a semi permeable membrane – it goes in just one direction.  Just one wild and precious life and you both are ready here and now to commit that life to each other.

 

Well and good for the present. But later, as you reflect and plan a rich, purposeful new life together, ask yourselves “What will be the third strand?”

 

 

 

Rights versus Responsibilities

HS #60 2020.7.9

Rights versus Responsibilities

Before the coronavirus ever met our shores, I suspected that the U.S. would be hit especially hard by this modern plague.  Back to that later. 

As a college professor, I have long noticed a moral transformation that can happen when a young person leaves home for college. I explain it using two concentric circles – a smaller one inside a larger one. 

Having lived with parents who made the rules and set the boundaries, eighteen-year-olds are practiced at living within the larger circle of “what they are allowed to do.” Moral thought is focused on staying within the circle, perhaps getting as close to the boundary as possible without crossing it.  How late can they stay out? What can they consume? What are the (perhaps unspoken) rules concerning physical/romantic relationships? They had little choice in the matter. Afterall, those making the rules were living under the same roof and often the source of transportation and finances.  

Then they leave home for college.  Yes, there are still college rules needed for living in community, and sometimes a roommate can be more demanding than parents. But largely, they have greatly increased liberty to make their own choices. Along with choosing their own bedtimes (or more likely having no regular bedtime), eating when and what they want, and hanging out with whomever they find interesting, college students also have opportunity to jettison – or at least loosen – former moral prescriptions. So the outer circle increases in size as they enjoy exercising their newly gained liberty. 

But, ideally, even as the outer circle enlarges and perhaps fades, the inner circle will become their new focus. Call it the “college challenge.”

While the outer circle is defined by “What CAN I do?” the inner circle is defined by “What SHOULD I do?” and even “What is the best thing to do?” While one is motivated to stay in the outer circle for extrinsic reasons – to stay out of trouble, the motivation to aim for the inner circle is intrinsic: How can I become a better person?  What is the right, the caring, the loving, the courageous, even the sacrificial thing to do?

A good college experience will encourage students to ask these questions and find worthy answers. The encouragement should come via classes which raise questions about living justly in a world of limited resources, caring for body and spirit, and living with compassion and empathy.  The encouragement may be modeled by speakers who challenge students to look beyond themselves and see themselves as part of a larger community. 

Perhaps most significantly, transformation will come from meeting and becoming friends with those who have different lifestyles and values and disparate life experiences. I remember a lunch conversation with a basketball player from Davenport University’s varsity team.  He was grateful that DU required only a few “general ed” classes. I challenged him that perhaps such classes are needed to help students gain a broader view of the world. He immediately responded that a friend from the team came from one of Grand Rapid’s wealthiest families, while another came effectively from off the street. Thus, his friends and teammates were enlarging and challenging his worldview. I yielded my point – impressed. 

Although focusing on the inner circle has the advantage of advancing moral maturity and ethical excellence, we in America live in a culture which encourages us to concentrate on the prominent outer circle.  “RIGHTS” are boldly emblazoned in the Constitution. Thus, it’s easy for Americans to focus on what we have the liberty to do rather than what we ought to do. While other countries may emphasize living in community, shared sacrifice, and being a responsible member of society, the prominent focus for many of us is “What are my rights? What CAN I do?” We are encouraged, for example, to claim the right to “keep your money in your own pocket,” while those from other countries cheerfully pay higher taxes – understanding it’s for the common good. 

This mentality also explains why presently many proudly proclaim their right not to wear masks and eschew recommendations for social distancing. Recently, concerning large political rallies,  the Vice President of the United States, the person given the responsibility for forming a national COVID-19 strategy, boldly stated, “We have the right to freedom of speech, and the right to peaceably assemble.”  

Indeed we do. But those rights are hurting us just now. Although we may have no leader to encourage us, let’s take the “college challenge” and focus on the inner circle. 

A Tale of Two Cities

HS #59 2020.6.11

A Tale of Two Cities

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity . . . “

These lines of Charles Dickens ring true.  Did anyone else, upon hearing of the arrest of the other three Minneapolis police officers, have the acerbic thought that hopefully now we can leave this bad news behind and get back to the corona virus? 

Of course, that’s just the problem. We shouldn’t leave “this bad news” behind us.        

Since I’m quoting great literature, here’s Yeats: “Things fall apart; The centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.  The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” Regular readers of my column may recognize the phrase, “Things fall apart.” It is the title of the award-winning book by African author Chinua Achebe that was the focus of last month’s column.  

 “The best lack all conviction.” This phrase reveals the commonality between the two trials in which we currently find ourselves. 

What makes the corona virus so destructive? Ironically, it is the very fact that it is not so destructive. A person can carry this virus for days before the symptoms begin to emerge. Moreover, a large portion of our population gets no symptoms at all, yet can readily pass it on.  That is, instead of having just two distinct populations of the healthy and the symptomatic, there is a third group – the enablers - which is part of the problem even though they don’t appear to be. Indeed, it is those comfortable ones in the middle which pose the real threat. 

Martin Luther King had a similar thought.  In his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, King penned, “The Negro’s great stumbling block is not the KKK, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice – who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice – who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a ‘more convenient season.’”  

As with corona, the dangerous ones are those invisible in the middle – the lukewarm. It’s not the “worst filled with passionate intensity” who are the real problem. The “Derek Chauvins” of this world will always exist. It’s that “the best lack all conviction.”

When I read George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” in high school, my teacher asked who was responsible for the evil that happened. The quick easy answer was Napoleon, the tyrant pig. But through Socratic questioning, our teacher pulled the true answer from us. It was perhaps Boxer, the Horse. Boxer represented the silent masses who passively allowed the evil to go unchallenged.

King gave another famous address – here in Michigan – at Grosse Point High School, in the affluent 92%-white suburb of Detroit. The title of his speech was “The Other America” which he began by explaining that “this country has this kind of dualism, this schizophrenia, so every city ends up being two cities rather than one.”

 Continuing, he spoke of “our cities going up in flames.” While condemning riots, he challenged the white audience that “a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity.”

Will it be different this time? Do the best still lack all conviction? There are signs of hope. We are getting glimpses of the best of times. Tens of thousands – blacks and whites together –  marching in peaceful protest and solidarity. Thousands more – blacks and whites together –  cleaning up the destruction of the vandals and looters. White police officers kneeling in solidarity with protesters. Many trying to empathize (while acknowledging the impossibility) with blacks – black men especially – who felt their faces ground into the pavement, felt their  throats pressed shut, felt their life slowly ebb. Can we embrace the words, “We are one nation, and their pain is our pain, their dreams are our dreams, we share one nation, one home and one glorious destiny.” Is this dream impossible? Dare we hope? Dare we continue the fight? Don Quixote gives answer, “To change the world, my friend, Sancho, is not madness nor utopia. It’s justice.”