Resolution

On deciding.

Resolution is the method of settling a systemic challenge. We begin with the full diagram. The pieces below are the same ones it already holds.

The squared corners are the starting dualities. Chaos and Order are a main pair in complex systems, and both create challenges. Chaos does not imply wrongness; order does not imply rightness. A riot and a freeze can both be unlivable. The same is true of every element that follows: none of them is a moral verdict on its own.

The other challenge duality is friction and conflict. They are easy to collapse. Here, friction is structural — a load that does not sit, a form that will not file, a joint that binds. Conflict is behavioral — members at odds. Both are present in a real challenge, and they concatenate with chaos and order:

Unused capacity in a disordered process is potential. A locked joint, a settled procedure, is stability. Conflict without a shape is suffering. Conflict that has found a shape — a verdict, a treaty, a scored piece — is satisfaction. Each pairing pulls for priority. Dismissing one to keep another is not a resolution. The work is to hold them in a proportion the situation can actually bear. No fixed ratio fits every challenge.

Temperance is potential with a stable support: exploring without losing the foundations. Sacrifice is the choice of a present suffering for a future satisfaction: this season’s pruning for the next harvest. In short:

• Temperance: forward-facing, dynamic regulation.
• Sacrifice: temporally-aware, delayed gratification.

Their combination is viability. Interests, priorities, and desires have to be reconciled with what the world will actually carry. That is an understanding of what this context can bear. A tempered and sacrificial stance is how a challenge is lived through rather than merely named.

A symbolic version of the same diagram, and a table of references:

The two versions are the same structure in two representation types. Many of the symbols nod to two philosophical traditions: pi (π), epsilon (ε), and tau (τ) toward Greek; long s (ſ), tailed z (Ʒ), and eszett (ẞ) toward German — the long s and tailed z being the orthographical origins of the eszett.