The World in a Grain: The Story of sand and how it transformed civilization

 

Permanence is a matter of perspective.

As a squishy human that is merely a bag of meat and liquid, I view anything that is harder than my own body as permanent. I subconciously evaluate things around me and identify whether I could be killed or damaged by it landing on me, if it is impossible to move by hand, or is arguably a large dense rocklike element. These perspectives influence the scale and breadth with which I interract with others, my mental stability, and how I move about the world with confidence.

I never gave much thought to the confidence and sense of reliability manifested by the percieved longevity of these objects. By proxy, I never gave much thought to Sand as an element or a composite requirement of construction of the same. It was just sand, something for childrens playgrounds, for cats to pee in, and someplace to visit on the coast that comes home in your shoes. Sand is little and light weight. It is the antithesis of permanence. It is the big sister of dust. And zygote of Mt Everest.

The World in a Grain by Vince Beiser opened my eyes. I always knew sand was a critical ingredient in physical buildings and roadways but never thought about it as a commodity. It serves a purpose in our food production, and communication, even speckling our language with critical phrasing, affirmations, and descriptions.

My personal interpretation of the concept was hugely flawed by my perception that we will never run out of sand. Instead it is finite, with the majority of sand strip mined or pulled from the ocean floor, it serves to be a resource that where several variety are actually killed for.

Sand as a sybiote of practically everything is ‘faux permanent’. It all has a social and physical shelf life of a hundred years or so before the product manufacturing breaks down, wears away, or is smashed by us and replaced with brand new.

Permanence is a false safety net.