I was listening to Sheligh Rogers interview Canadian singer-songwriter Sam Roberts on CBC several days ago. Roberts was talking about his new album Chemical City which comments on the environment of cities where pollution is present in the air, water, sounds, and the sights. And I suppose that the problems of having a livelihood tied to such “chemical cities” necessitated that Roberts and his band escape to an out-of-the-way town in Australia to decompress and allow the creative process of recording an album to flow.

When I heard this, I couldn’t help but think how ironic it is that humans, creatures of nature, have created so many places that are so unnatural and devoid of nature. Large parts of modern cities and their periphery are composed of needless, soulless filler that is just plain ugly. The paradox is that even the worst of these places foster a high degree of positive things like artistic, cultural, and intellectual diversity (the things that expand the mind and liberate the soul).

People like Sam Roberts, Dan, and myself come from backgrounds that have given us access to the afore mentioned things that have given us perspectives that result in questioning the world around us. However, in some ways we are just conforming to a fashion.

Through the idea of the Searching for Dragons project and the massive undertaking it entails, Dan is really just another voice in the choir. Modern urbanites of the West seem to be constantly coming to grips with our place in nature and where technology and media are steering us. Such questions have transcended centuries.

Roberts song “The Gate” says that the city has no heart but lots of light. This echoes the band America’s statement in “Horse With No Name” that “under the city lies a heart made of ground but the humans will give no love.” Why, in the forty odd years of human “progress” between the release of these two songs, has nothing changed? So many artists talking about the same thing: how there is something lacking – intangible but distinct – in the modern urban environment. Are they simply broken records, or rather records playing for deaf ears?

Questioning the status quo of anything (society, economy, or environment) shouldn’t be a privilege of people who live near, have access to, or are educated in the city; nor should it be something reserved for a certain economic or cultural elite. Yet this seems to be how our world works most of the time. Moreover, there’s a minute set of people whose questions are even given a passing consideration on such issues. Why is that?

I believe that part of the answer lies in humanity’s quest for stability: the more questions about our world that are given heed or considered, the more instable our world becomes. Hence, almost everyone is reluctant to accept the implications of even the possibility of inconvenient ideas like peak oil, global warming, or the foundations of the North American economy being based on unsustainable consumption. For many of us modern-day humans, our ideal of comfort incorporates a mindset that sees most change, adversity, and difference as bad if it means a large shift from what is “normal”. But consider this: when have change, adversity, and difference not been a part of life on Earth? Never.

Why can’t we move beyond the desire for life to be a set of static conditions, to the quest for the capability to thrive in an ever changing world? Imagine if, when the first person to perceive the possible negative repercussions of an industrial practice didn’t have to fight against fear and scorn to have their idea heard. Rather, imagine that their idea was met with a general open curiosity and eagerness to explore such implications and meet the challenges they present. Imagine!

To do this, though, would require a complete change in our understanding of the world. Uncertainty, instability, and chaos though endemic and common, are not only scary but also present us with hurdles to our hedonistic enjoyment of the moment; yet hurdles like the security of our great-great-grand children’s future are things that we should be forced to consider.

We need to change the way we think and, more importantly, the way we teach our children to think about the nature of a world in constant flux and confront its challenges. When we can do this, then we will start to see the end of the chemical cities Roberts laments.