Drop a fork on the floor and watch the world change: you, me and climate change

Most of us have heard of the butterfly effect.

Otherwise known as ‘sensitive dependence on initial condition’, the butterfly effect is the theory that disturbance by the wings of a single butterfly is enough to change the weather patterns throughout the world.  In other words, change anything and you change everything.

The fact is, however, most of us don’t believe it.  Take the fight against climate change, for example.  How many times have we been told that we can make a difference – by apparently simple acts, such as turning down our central heating by 1 degree, recycling our waste or leaving our cars at home.

Our icebergs are melting, but still most of us find it hard to make the link between the fate of human history and our seemingly mundane, day-to-day existence.

And it’s the same with so many of today’s most pressing global issues.  Faced with the hugeness of the challenge, we are paralyzed by a crisis of insignificance.  We get tired, stop trying and look to global superstars such as Bono and Sting to make poverty history and ensure the rainforests stick around for a little longer. 

They tell us, ‘together we can make a difference’.  We tell them, ‘we don’t believe it’.

But how do you think the butterfly feels? 

A bit like my youngest daughter perhaps, as she watched an unlikely series of events unfold before her last night sitting outside on the terrace of a local restaurant.

It all began with an innocent act: she dropped her fork on the floor. 

Within minutes, however, her world had changed.

You see, a man happened to be passing by and saw the fork fall to the floor.  No one else in the crowd noticed.   They simply went about their business and paid no attention to our family meal.

He looked a little worse for wear, but I appreciated his offer to get a new one from inside the restaurant.  It was a simple act of kindness on a busy, late summer’s evening.

It would have been a normal evening, except that the waiter happened to see the man take the fork and give it to my daughter.  Perhaps distracted by the appearance of this passer-by, he was clearly very upset and within seconds we were all watching a loud and somewhat physical argument unfold at the end of our table.   

And that would have been the end of it, except that the cook of the restaurant happened to come out of his kitchen at just the same moment.  And he just happened to have a 2-foot knife in his hand!  So when the cook started chasing the man down the street with his knife, we decided it was time to leave.

My daughter dropped her fork on the floor and began a train of events that left a man running for his life for a simple act of kindness.

Sometimes our world is hard of understand. That much is true.  But let’s not forget that we are all connected and only when we start changing the simplest things will the world change.

As far as how it will change, though, your guess is as good as mine.