Today I killed a fly

This morning I saw a large fly trying to escape my room here. As all the windows were locked and it would be a complex route to find a way out for a fly then I, without any real forethought, squashed it.

Then I started wondering about the possible consequences. Maybe this fly was going to mutate and create a race of superior flies which would destroy humankind and take over the world, in which case I had done a great thing.

But maybe it was going to fly into a car driving along the road and make the driver crash into a tree, but survive. And if it hadn't the car was about to get hit by a juggernaut at the junction wherein the driver, and his daughter in the back seat, would have been killed, and the daughter would have gone on to develop a cure for one of the great fatal diseases of our world. And now, by my killing that fly, she too would die and so not create that cure to save humanity.

Complex things, consequences.

We can't foresee the future — which is probably a good thing as otherwise most of us would probably just give up — but nor can politicians now whether the decisions they take are actually 'right' or 'wrong' in the long term. Some decisions may be great for the short-term but destroy us in the long run (like saving money on the space missions), and some seem really really wrong initially but turn out all right in the end.

Just wish we knew which a bit better …