Sometimes, what keeps us awake at night is not only the anticipation of work the next morning,
but also the unease of living in a world where order can collapse so easily.
From cyberattacks that paralyze entire industries to audacious thefts from world-famous museums,
we are reminded that temptation and wrongdoing are never far from human nature.
This reflection began on a sleepless night — and ended with a question as old as humanity itself.
When I have work the next day, I often find myself unable to fall asleep.
I wake up several times during the night, check the clock each time, and drift back into a light slumber.
Continuous sleep would be ideal, of course, but as long as the total adds up to more than six hours, I call it good enough.
It’s Monday—the start of a new week—and yet here I am, writing about my sleepy night. Hardly the most inspiring way to begin the day, but it’s the truth.
This week, however, seems destined to begin with trouble.
The online retailer Askul has reportedly fallen victim to a ransomware attack, causing major disruptions in its communications system.
The idea that the flow of office supplies across Japan could grind to a halt was something I never imagined possible.
And with Asahi Breweries still struggling to recover from its own system failure, one wonders whether Japanese companies are being deliberately targeted.
Meanwhile, news from Paris: jewels have been stolen from the Louvre Museum.
The thieves used a lift truck parked right next to the building—an audacious, almost cinematic act of defiance.
I can only sympathize with the many tourists who found themselves locked out of the museum that day.
Why is it, I wonder, that evildoers appear one after another, as if from an endless supply?
All humans harbor small traces of ill will, yet most of us never act on them.
We are supposed to have a moral brake called conscience—but there are people for whom that brake simply doesn’t work.
Perhaps it’s because the boundary of what counts as “wrong” differs from person to person that some eventually cross the line into crime.
Moses, in the Ten Commandments, warned us: “Thou shalt not steal.”
It must be that stealing holds a certain allure for the human mind.
The Japanese outlaw Ishikawa Goemon, before being executed, is said to have written:
“Even if the sands of the shore run out, the breed of thieves will never die.”
Is the urge to take what belongs to others an inborn part of human nature?
Or is the act of stealing itself one of humanity’s most fundamental impulses?
