COVID 19 and the value of wondering
By Eric Johnson
May 2020 | The News & Observer
The modern world, for all its wonders, operates on thin margins. We make a virtue of it.
Minimal staffing, lean manufacturing, just-in-time supply chains — all brilliant forms of efficiency. In the normal course of things, squeezing the fat out of society produces savings and convenience. But it also leaves precious little room for coping with abnormal things, like global pandemics or economic lockdowns.
Relentless efficiency is the reason we have very little “surge capacity” in hospitals, the reason it’s so hard ramp up production of masks or toilet paper, the reason we’re facing meat shortages when a handful of processing plants go offline. There was no slack in the system, no looking beyond the horizon of this month’s sales projections or this quarter’s stock performance.
I note all of this to draw a contrast with universities, those deeply inefficient enterprises. Research universities pay people to hang around for years — decades, even! — thinking and tinkering on subjects that may have absolutely no practical value. Or maybe, just maybe, subjects that will turn out to be a matter of life and death.
Over the past few months, public officials have leaned on formerly sleepy university research to make decisions affecting the health and livelihoods of millions. The University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation has become a household name for its sober epidemiology. University labs across the world are accelerating the race for COVID treatments and vaccines, including here in North Carolina. Lawmakers just invested $85M to quicken work already being done in universities across the state to slow the pandemic.
Those are just the obvious examples. All kinds of formerly obscure knowledge can suddenly become vital in a crisis. What happens to student health and learning after a long absence from school? How does online interaction affect the ability of lawmakers and civic officials to compromise? How exactly do air particles behave in enclosed spaces like offices or grocery store aisles?
You only get quick answers to those questions if you’ve patiently built up the capacity to study them — if you’ve kept some slack in the system. I interviewed a UNC sociologist last month who studies the way gig workers feel about their jobs. It’s the kind of research that might’ve been easy to dismiss in the carefree days of February. Now the question of whether “essential workers” feel supported is key to keeping the economy moving.
I listened to another Carolina-sponsored discussion last week about restaurant culture — what people want from a nice night out. It’s hard to imagine a subject that would’ve sounded more decadent and unnecessary four months ago, but now there are millions of small business owners, farmers, chefs and suppliers whose livelihoods depend on the answer.
Preserving room for those inefficient questions, those uncertain lines of inquiry, is not a flaw in the university model. It’s the whole point. You can’t churn out new virologists or behavioral economists in a pinch; you need to keep them around before things get dicey.
Humans, individually and civilizationally, are not very good at knowing what we need. Before our lives were upended in the hundred-odd days between New Years and Easter, we had grown rather complacent about predicting the future. Algorithms, analytics, big data — all promised a world of fewer surprises, a world of ever-greater efficiency. The future, alas, does not respect trend lines.
We’d be wise to keep a little space for wondering and investigating, for the slow-burning questions that are excessive today but quite possibly essential tomorrow.
Community columnist Eric Johnson works for the College Board and UNC’s College of Arts & Sciences.
Originally published on the op-ed page of the News & Observer:
https://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/article242720996.html