If you’ve ever lived in a coastal town, you’ve no doubt taken part in a tribal ritual passed down from our forebearers from time immemorial: the driftwood bonfire. Every few years an especially large store will come along, and the next morning the shoreline is festooned with driftwood, sprawled in piles like the remains of some arboreal crime scene.
Toward dusk, the inhabitants of the area will, of one accord, wind out of their modern caves, and gather on the sand. Driftwood is gathered and arranged into pyres. A match is lit. We sit, much like our primate ancestors, and drive back the darkness with the magic Prometheus gave us, while reflections of the flames dance brightly in our eyes.
For a moment, there are no iPhones. Twitter doesn’t exist. All of the problems faced by our species can be solved with a flint knife and perhaps a few marshmallows for toasting. Then, as the fire collapses into embers, we brush off the sand, travel back to our caves, and for a moment, however brief, we wonder if we might have been better if our ten-thousand-times-great grandparents had never left the beach.