Responsibility Resides in Imagination, Not Results
When I think about the phrase "the responsibility of knowledge and choice," a question arises.
Do talented individuals and researchers need to take responsibility for how what they create is "used"?
Intuitively, I feel that "one cannot bear that much."
In fact, once knowledge and technology are released into the world, they pass into the hands of various people and are used for different purposes.
It is not realistic for one person to take responsibility for all of that.
However, at the same time, one cannot simply say, "It has nothing to do with me because I only created it."
Between these two points, a sense of unease remains.
This feeling becomes a bit clearer when I compare it to the position of a basketball coach.
A coach can teach skills to players.
They can take responsibility for what they teach and how they teach it.
However, they cannot control whether that player will succeed in a game.
What decisions are made in which situations and what results are produced are ultimately up to the player themselves.
Even so, the coach cannot be said to be completely unrelated.
Because what is taught definitely remains within the player and continues to have an influence somewhere.
You cannot control it.
But you are influencing it.
Therefore, you bear a certain degree of responsibility.
This structure applies directly to explorers and researchers as well.
For example, Erin from "The Beast Player" chooses to "know" out of pure curiosity.
Her stance of trying to be sincere toward the life and phenomena before her is very straightforward.
However, that knowledge is eventually incorporated into the state and power.
Even if it is not the form she herself desired, she cannot remain outside of that influence.
The same is true for Jiro Horikoshi in "The Wind Rises."
He simply wishes to build beautiful airplanes and exercises his talent.
However, those achievements become linked to war.
Even if his motives were pure, it cannot be denied that he bears a part of the result.
What they have in common is a single structure.
Knowing, creating, teaching.
One can take responsibility for the starting point of those things.
However, one cannot completely control how they are used or what results they produce.
Even so, as long as one exists as an "influence" between those things, one cannot be completely unrelated.
Then, what exactly is responsibility in this case?
It is not about taking responsibility for the results.
That is far too heavy.
On the other hand, it is not about being indifferent either.
That somehow lacks sincerity.
How should we put into words what lies between those two?
I believe it is the "responsibility to imagine."
How can my knowledge and technology be used?
How far can I envision not only the desirable ways it might be used, but also the undesirable possibilities?
And if, within that imagination, a clearly dangerous direction is visible, then at least having some kind of attitude toward it.
Whether to distance oneself, try to stop it, or sound an alarm.
Not abandoning that choice.
The structure of "someone will do it anyway" certainly exists.
Looking at history, that cannot be denied.
However, I think that precisely because we know that structure, we need to ask ourselves "what will I do anyway?" instead of just resigning ourselves to it.
In basketball, you cannot control whether a shot goes in.
However, you decide for yourself in what situation you chose that shot.
There is responsibility for whether that choice was appropriate.
Responsibility resides in the quality of the choice, not the result.
In the same way, don't knowledge and talent also gain meaning not from the results themselves, but from the "imagination" and "choice" that precede them?
We cannot take responsibility for the entire future.
But I think we must never let go of the attempt to imagine that future.
And standing upon that imagination, to keep choosing what one will do.
I believe that is the just-right weight of the "responsibility of knowledge and choice."