Theory of relativity

Winter -- or more accurately, temperatures that we in Boston are used to feeling this time of year -- blew into town today. It's currently 32 degrees with lows tonight in the lower 20s. It feels so much colder, however, and that can be attributed somewhat to the moderate breezes coming in from the northwest (wind chill: 20), but also the mild November and December (both the warmest ever in Boston) appear to make one much less tolerant of a little chill in the air.

It's all relative. A high of 50 feels nice after a cold spell, but when the mercury drops down to 50 from the mid-80s on a late summer day it makes me shiver.

Many facets of life are the same. The Catholic Church and the political right rail against relativism, but in my examination of life and the universe, it is the only conclusion I can come to. All factors are dependent on other factors and so on. Even good and evil are not carved in stone.

For example, picture this scene: a man is about to shoot a woman. Who is right and who is wrong? Immediately it appears that the man is commiting an evil act and is wrong and must be stopped. But what if we pull the camera back and the woman is about to kill a child? Now the tables are turned and the man appears in the right while the woman is evil. Add more information: the woman is insane, perhaps. Now the whole scene takes on a shade of gray.

Even simpler: A man steals. Stealing is wrong, correct? He is stealing from a store owned by a single mom who is trying to pay her mortgage. That's terrible, no? The man should go to jail! Further inspection reveals an adjustment to the initial premise: A man steals to feed his starving children. Now where do we stand? Paying mortgage vs. feeding kids. It's all relative.

Most of our day to day troubles fall in the gray-shaded spaces between absolutes. Too often the absolutists just want us to accept their definitions of what is right and what is wrong. Their interpretations are no better than mine, and in fact I find them to be much worse. To quote Henry David Thoreau: "The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right."

Right on.