Why Do People Throws Rocks Into Water?
I saw a little girl on the beach throwing rocks into the ocean. She looked back at her parents for approval, while they cheered her on, telling her what a good job she was doing. This seemingly pointless endeavor was the cause of much joy and amusement. It reminds me of the view of art that art is useless, to take away its unduly emphasis on its utility. Roger Scruton makes a point that if in creating (in something like architecture) you put a things utility first with no regard to its aesthetic worth, it will become useless, because no one wants any part in something that is so ugly. When something is beautiful, then people want to participate in that beauty. Throwing rocks into the water seems to be like one of those things that is completely pointless and has have no utility, but because there is something beautiful about it, we want to do it anyways. It's a gratifying paradox.
That children do this more than adults I think clues us into some of the aspects of throwing rocks into water. There is a certain innocence to it. It creates disturbance, but it isn't destructive. It's disorderly, but simple. A child participates in nature, and there is no guilt to it. And children and generally innocent. Perhaps there is an evolutionary explanation as well. Land animals dip their paws into water to see if it is safe. Or if it has more to do with the throwing of the object than the actual water, maybe it has to do with man's general projectile activities from stone skipping to primitive spear chucking to missile launching (and maybe why games like Angry Birds are so popular).
I think the most interesting way to think of it is religiously, and we're religious animals, so of course this has a religious explanation. Ancient pagans used to throw coins into fountains because they considered drinkable water a gift from the gods. But that's too narrow of a consideration of water. I think our first premise should be the generally agreed upon belief that the ocean represents some kind of mystical eternity. As I walk around my city, I cannot see past a few blocks before a building obstructs my view of the horizon. My knowledge of where I'm going and what awaits me is clear. This isn't true of the ocean, and it isn't true of eternity. We often ask what lies beyond the horizon, yet we see the horizon best on the ocean. And not only do we not know what lies beyond the horizon, but we don't even know what lies 10 feet under most of the time! Unless you've seen Jaws recently, it's a very tranquil mystery.
This is reflected in our literature. When ancients explored the sea (even if it was just because they got kinda lost), we got Homer's Odyssey. This sense of adventure is why I decided to learn to sail. Also think of the popular Pirates of the Caribbean movies and Stevenson's Treasure Island. You can't adventure into what you already know, only the unknown and mysterious. The more precise religious nature is hinted at in stories like Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, when we learn of the Headless Horseman's inability to cross running water. Or when in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings when Ring Wraiths also hesitate greatly to cross running water. Or in Lewis' Voyage of the Dawn Treader (another sailing setting), Reepicheep crosses over the wave into Aslan's Kingdom. Examples are boundless. So basically, we're talking about baptism. I trust my readers that I don't have to go through all the water symbolism found in the Bible.
The second point to be made is that men are from land. We are land animals. We're bipedal, and we don't have fins or gills. In one of my favorite films, Gravity, Sandra Bullock's character, after a disastrous voyage in space, finally lands on Earth. And not just anywhere, but on a beach (or some kind of wetland). After surviving a nightmarish disaster, she takes a moment and grabs the wet dirt, and stands up. She's finally back home. From the dust we are made, and to the dust we shall return.
But we love the beach (beach property is expensive!). The beach is where our corporeal and physical reality meet the eternal reality, even if only metaphorically. A child throwing rocks into the ocean then is just her baptizing and sanctifying the world to God.
That children do this more than adults I think clues us into some of the aspects of throwing rocks into water. There is a certain innocence to it. It creates disturbance, but it isn't destructive. It's disorderly, but simple. A child participates in nature, and there is no guilt to it. And children and generally innocent. Perhaps there is an evolutionary explanation as well. Land animals dip their paws into water to see if it is safe. Or if it has more to do with the throwing of the object than the actual water, maybe it has to do with man's general projectile activities from stone skipping to primitive spear chucking to missile launching (and maybe why games like Angry Birds are so popular).
I think the most interesting way to think of it is religiously, and we're religious animals, so of course this has a religious explanation. Ancient pagans used to throw coins into fountains because they considered drinkable water a gift from the gods. But that's too narrow of a consideration of water. I think our first premise should be the generally agreed upon belief that the ocean represents some kind of mystical eternity. As I walk around my city, I cannot see past a few blocks before a building obstructs my view of the horizon. My knowledge of where I'm going and what awaits me is clear. This isn't true of the ocean, and it isn't true of eternity. We often ask what lies beyond the horizon, yet we see the horizon best on the ocean. And not only do we not know what lies beyond the horizon, but we don't even know what lies 10 feet under most of the time! Unless you've seen Jaws recently, it's a very tranquil mystery.
This is reflected in our literature. When ancients explored the sea (even if it was just because they got kinda lost), we got Homer's Odyssey. This sense of adventure is why I decided to learn to sail. Also think of the popular Pirates of the Caribbean movies and Stevenson's Treasure Island. You can't adventure into what you already know, only the unknown and mysterious. The more precise religious nature is hinted at in stories like Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, when we learn of the Headless Horseman's inability to cross running water. Or when in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings when Ring Wraiths also hesitate greatly to cross running water. Or in Lewis' Voyage of the Dawn Treader (another sailing setting), Reepicheep crosses over the wave into Aslan's Kingdom. Examples are boundless. So basically, we're talking about baptism. I trust my readers that I don't have to go through all the water symbolism found in the Bible.
The second point to be made is that men are from land. We are land animals. We're bipedal, and we don't have fins or gills. In one of my favorite films, Gravity, Sandra Bullock's character, after a disastrous voyage in space, finally lands on Earth. And not just anywhere, but on a beach (or some kind of wetland). After surviving a nightmarish disaster, she takes a moment and grabs the wet dirt, and stands up. She's finally back home. From the dust we are made, and to the dust we shall return.
But we love the beach (beach property is expensive!). The beach is where our corporeal and physical reality meet the eternal reality, even if only metaphorically. A child throwing rocks into the ocean then is just her baptizing and sanctifying the world to God.
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