Hurry Hard!

For a number of years, there's been a strange phenomena in Death Valley, California.  Specifically, it's in a place called Racetrack Playa (I have all his albums.)

There are rocks that move. At night, when no one's around, they apparently stroll around, and the next day they're found in a different place, with a trail of dirt where they've moved. The desert is flat, so they aren't just rolling, and the surface is so dry the ground is cracked, and there are no footprints around them.

I read about this mystery a few years ago, and it stuck in my mind for a couple of reasons. First is that it's just so bizarre; I've never known any rocks to behave that way. But secondly, the writer of the article seemed giddy with the idea that the phenomena was perplexing scientists. Not on the joy of a challenging mystery, but a vindictive enjoyment of the idea that the scientists couldn't explain something.

It's an attitude I've seen many times: a resentment at science's attempted explanation of nature. No, not the anger people have when science's explanations don't match religious or political beliefs (though that is its own annoyance.) I'm talking about people getting frustrated with science for trying to explain things, rather than leave mysteries to be mysterious. 

This attitude usually comes with a misunderstanding of scientists' motivations. There's a belief that scientists are motivated by some anal-retentive need to eliminate the world's uncertainty and mystery. Hence people's joy at their perplexment when they fail.

But the truth is that scientists are not just comfortable with mystery, but thrive on it. After all, their job is all about facing mystery.  Where they differ from most of us is that:

• They don't believe a mystery must remain permanently unsolved in order for it to be meaningful to us
• They are confident that we won't run out of mysteries.  Probably because they've noticed that answers tend to lead to more questions.

Of course I'm writing this because scientists have the last laugh on this one: this week, they solved the mystery of the wandering rocks. It's because of a rare combination of ice and wind.  So with that solved, you'll have to find something else in the entirety of the universe and human experience to wonder at.