First Chapter: The Relative Unimportance of It All by Tony Setley

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The Relative Unimportance of It All: and Why Everything Matters Anyway begins with an unsettling observation: given enough time, nearly everything human beings consider important will disappear. Fame fades, accomplishments are forgotten, institutions collapse, and even the most influential people eventually become little more than names—or vanish from memory altogether. Rather than resisting that reality with promises of legacy or permanence, the book takes it seriously. It argues that the mistake of nihilism is not recognizing that everything is temporary, but assuming that something must last forever in order to have mattered while it existed.

From there, the book shifts the question of meaning away from historical importance and toward lived experience. Every human being encounters life from within a present moment, whether emperor or laborer, celebrity or stranger. That equality of experience becomes the foundation for an ethic of “attentive goodness”: taking seriously the reality of the people and circumstances directly before us. The argument is applied to ordinary life, family, work, pleasure, suffering, loss, ambition, and attention. It does not claim that every action has equal consequences or that every moral choice is equivalent; rather, it distinguishes between the equal reality of persons and the very real differences in need, responsibility, harm, and consequence.

Ultimately, the book embraces the paradox contained in its title: from the perspective of vast stretches of time, very little about our lives may be important, and yet that does not make the lives being lived now meaningless. We do not need to become historically significant before the present deserves our attention. We can love, work, create, strive, enjoy, grieve, and act with goodness precisely because these experiences are real while they occur.

The Relative Unimportance of It All: And Why Everything Matters Anyway is available at Amazon.

╰┈➤Book Details

✦ Title: The Relative Unimportance of It All: And Why Everything Matters Anyway
✦ Author: Tony Setley
✦ Genre: Philosophy
✦ Sub-genre: Contemporary Philosophy
✦ Language: English
✦ Pages: Paperback 250, Digital 151
✦ Paperback ISBN: 979-8192127988
✦ Publisher: Independent
✦ Publication Date: August 11, 2026
✦ Price: Hardcover $19.86, Paperback $12.42, Kindle $4.99, Audiobook FREE with Membership Trial, Kindle FREE with Kindle Unlimited

First Chapter:

Name Ten Roman Emperors

Almost everyone begins confidently. Augustus appears almost immediately, followed by Nero and Marcus Aurelius. Julius Caesar is usually offered, though he was never emperor in the technical sense. After that, uncertainty begins. Claudius may appear. Constantine if one has a passing familiarity with Christianity. Caligula because of his reputation. Then the list falters. Names become guesses. Confidence gives way to silence. The exercise is not meant to expose ignorance. It exposes expectation. We expect history to preserve greatness. We assume that extraordinary achievement naturally produces extraordinary remembrance. Yet the Roman Empire endured for nearly fifteen centuries if one includes its eastern continuation. During that time, well over one hundred people held the imperial office. Many commanded armies larger than modern nations possess. Some transformed law, commerce, architecture, religion, and warfare. They determined the lives of millions. Most are forgotten. Not by specialists. Historians rightly devote careers to studying Antoninus Pius, Aurelian, Septimius Severus, Diocletian, and dozens of others whose names rarely appear in ordinary conversation. Forgotten instead by the very civilization they helped create. The world continues to benefit from decisions made by people whose names it no longer recalls. This should unsettle us. Not because memory is fragile, but because our ambitions often depend upon it. We tell ourselves that significance is measured by endurance. We dream of leaving a mark, making a difference, building a legacy. Entire industries have emerged around these aspirations. Universities promise impact. Corporations promise influence. Social media promises visibility. Even charitable causes are often described in terms of “changing the world.” It is difficult to object to such ambitions. The desire to contribute is admirable. The problem begins when contribution quietly becomes a requirement for a life well lived. The Roman emperors remind us that history is a poor accountant. It remembers selectively, inconsistently, and often for reasons having little to do with merit. Nero is remembered not because he governed wisely but because catastrophe and cruelty are memorable. Marcus Aurelius survives because philosophy outlived his empire. Countless competent rulers disappeared simply because nothing dramatic occurred during their reigns. History does not preserve the best. It preserves what later generations find useful. This is an uncomfortable realization because we have mistaken remembrance for significance. We assume that what survives must have mattered more than what did not. Yet this is plainly false. A mother whose name is lost may have shaped generations more profoundly than an emperor remembered in every textbook. A physician who quietly prevented suffering in a small town may have altered more lives than a celebrated politician. A schoolteacher may have done more for civilization than a conqueror. 5 The difficulty is that none of these comparisons can be measured. We therefore retreat to what can be measured instead. Fame. Influence. Audience. Power. The mistake is understandable. Quantities offer certainty where qualities refuse it. It is easier to count followers than friendships, easier to calculate wealth than wisdom, easier to rank careers than character. Numbers give the comforting appearance of objectivity. Importance becomes a scoreboard. Once we have accepted this way of thinking, life naturally becomes competitive. We begin asking questions that would have seemed strange to earlier generations. How successful am I? How influential? How much impact am I making? Am I reaching my potential? The questions are not inherently foolish. They become dangerous only when they become the primary measure of existence. For then we are forced into an impossible contest. There have been perhaps one hundred and seventy Roman emperors, depending upon how disputed reigns and co-emperors are counted. Most educated people cannot name ten. What, then, are the odds that history is waiting patiently for us? The answer is not discouraging. It is liberating. If remembrance is so improbable, then perhaps it should never have been our measure of significance. Perhaps we have burdened ourselves with a standard that almost no human being has ever satisfied. We have demanded from ordinary lives the sort of historical permanence that even emperors failed to achieve. The consequences are profound. Once legacy becomes life’s measure, the present is transformed into an investment portfolio. Conversations become networking opportunities. Friendships become connections. Leisure must justify itself through productivity. Education becomes credentialing. Even acts of generosity are sometimes evaluated by their measurable impact rather than their immediate reality. Everything becomes a means toward a future verdict. Yet that verdict is never rendered by us. It belongs to time. Time is an impartial judge, but a poor philosopher. It is excellent at reducing distinctions and hopeless at explaining whether those distinctions deserved to exist in the first place. It can tell us that Rome has fallen. It cannot tell us whether a Roman father reading to his daughter one quiet evening mattered less than an emperor issuing a decree in the Forum. We have asked time to answer a question beyond its competence. 6 Time can determine what remains. It cannot determine what was real. This distinction will guide the remainder of this book. Before we ask what deserves our attention, we must first abandon the assumption that endurance is the measure of significance. The emperors have already answered that question for us. They ruled the greatest empire of their age, and still they disappeared into obscurity. If history could not preserve them, it will not preserve us. The mistake is believing that this settles the matter.

The Rev. Tony Setley is a Lutheran pastor, author, chaplain, football coach, and public philosopher. His professional ministry has included congregational, military, campus, and federal law-enforcement chaplaincy. He holds degrees from Lebanon Valley College and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg. He is currently pursuing a Doctor of Ministry degree with a focus on preparing chaplains to help those dealing with moral injury. His writing explores the intersection of philosophy, theology, and ordinary human experience. He lives in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, with his wife and son.

Tony’s latest book is The Relative Unimportance of It All: And Why Everything Matters Anyway.

Connect with him on social media at:

╰┈➤ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TonySetley

╰┈➤ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tonysetley/

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