What Are The Chances?

I do this gratuitously philosophical training module, which I might call 'What are the chances?' In it, I step the students through their lives in reverse, noting moments that would have led them somewhere other than NYC in this particular moment ... class, career path, etc. I then extend the exercise to their families, home towns, respective nations, the earth, solar system, etc., back to the Big Bang. (A bit like the scene from Our Town.) From all this we are able to do a rough calculation of how infinitely improbable it is that we find ourselves here and now. I show them a picture of a person standing on the tippy top of a pyramid to illustrate the point. But then I ask them again what the chances are that they are here. It's a trick question in that the answer given that they are here is 100%.

The sense from the ensuing conversation is that miraculously--god or no god--we are here against incredible odds and that means, in a sense we arise inevitably from an environment well suited to bear us up--a beautiful idea. And even if this weren't true, it can be significant if one student hears it and believes it. Because, then, they might take the chance in the next moment to do something truly weird but deeply true to their deepest natures, and from that something beautiful might arise.