Theoretical physicists can do almost anything, or so I tell anyone who is prepared to listen. With their highly developed analytical skills and problem-solving abilities, the world is their oyster.

Still, most prefer to remain within their profession, quietly exploring the secrets of the universe and leaving the grubby "real world" business of law, politics, economics and human behaviour to others.

While understandable, it's unfortunate. There is so much irrationality, arbitrariness and wanton displays of human frailty in the world that we'd all be better off if a few more physicists waded into the fray to provide a dose of analytical rigour.

I decided to involve myself as a volunteer with two types of complicated social interaction to see if I might better understand it and perhaps even make a meaningful contribution.

And so I find myself as director of the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony and the coach of my eight-year-old son's baseball team.

It has not been an easy journey, and the conclusions of my experiment are decidedly mixed. To my surprise, the concept of teamwork -- collaborative participation towards a common goal -- is not a universally held or widely understood notion.

While it might be tempting to blame that on the inexperience of the players, it is curious that so many lack an instinctive understanding of mutual participation and respect. It includes a disregard for the wishes of their peers, a stubborn refusal to countenance other approaches, a palpable lack of confidence in many of their teammates, a desire to cancel team meetings when they cannot attend and a fundamental inability to recognize when the game they are playing has been lost.

Defiance by a minority of participants is problematic. It forces the majority to either somehow cater to their irrationality or expose disharmony in the team, thereby giving the opposition a significant competitive advantage.

While it is true that the sports world has witnessed several notable examples of successful teams with public disharmony on display (the New York Yankees under George Steinbrenner are repeat offenders), it is nonetheless the exception rather than the rule.

Most organizations with a consistent record of success demonstrate an outward display, if not an actual occurrence, of harmony.

Disharmony is not just bad for public perception and confidence: it is almost always matched with falling morale and internal disenchantment that leads to low productivity.

Unity of purpose isn't just team spirit and having fun -- it is almost always a necessary requirement to success.

I would never claim that my paltry experiences are sufficiently broad to enable me to conclude something fundamental about the human condition, but I can say I have seen enough evidence of surprisingly disappointing behaviour to give me serious pause about my previously held beliefs.

It could be that this is unduly premature. Baseball season has just begun and the kids on our team all seem quite hard-working and dedicated to a common cause.

Perhaps this strange phenomenon I've discovered is limited to people over the age of 10.

Or perhaps there are deeper issues at play.