Human brains evolved in a prehistoric world of day-to-day unpredictability and long-term stability. Today these same brains are thrust into an inverted world of day-to-day hyper-control and longer-term global volatility. We control room temperatures to the nearest degree and use Google Maps to route-plan to the nearest metre, yet face uncontrolled global warming and the looming shadow of Great Power warfare. The result is anxiety and a craving for yet more control. But, argues Brian Klaas, learning to relinquish some day-to-day control will help us to both recover the delights of serendipity and build societies less vulnerable to collapse.

In 2024, our worries have taken on a dystopian, existential tint. Democracies are dying. Nuclear powers are engaged in a bloody proxy war in Ukraine. Our life-sustaining climatic ecosystem is collapsing as wildfires rage and oceans feel like bath water. Not long ago, a mutant virus shut down the world, forever altering the lives of billions.

Yet as the world around us teeters on a cataclysmic precipice, some realms remain immune from doubt. No matter what happens in the US and Indian elections, or the war in Ukraine, or the looming climate catastrophe, we feel pretty certain that Amazon packages will continue to arrive as planned—and that, come October, Pumpkin Spice Lattes will return to the menu at our local temperature-controlled Starbucks.

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This inversion lies at the root of much unhappiness in the modern world: we suffocate in day-to-day hyper-control while feeling increasingly anxious about out-of-control longer-term change.

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