Lost & Found: Reflections on Grief, Gratitude, and Happiness

by Kathryn Schulz

Whatever you think about the supra-human organization of the cosmos, we ourselves organize it all the time, and the ability to do so is one of the most distinctive features of the human mind. It is why we can look at a night sky full of stars and see a bear and a cross and a warrior with his sword, and it is why we can recognize the influence of Oedipus Rex on Hamlet, and it is why we know that ostriches are distantly related to dinosaurs. More generally, it is how we wrest order from confusion, transforming life’s boundless list into something more like a story, full of structure, information, and meaning. Granted, this ability is not without drawbacks; it is also why we leap to conclusions and why we are so susceptible to conspiracy theories. Still, it is almost impossible to overstate how emotionally, ethically, and intellectually impaired we would be if we could not perceive connections among seemingly dissimilar things.