Tradition evokes feelings of security, trustworthiness, of staying on the right track, but it has also led to some of the world's greatest man-made disasters, fuelled the most incomprehensible conflicts and frequently ensured spectacular failures.
Tradition also has its pros and cons when it comes to Land Rover's good old box-shaped Defender series of "traditional" four-wheel drives.
There are only two kinds of people - those who love them and those who hate them. I love them but I have to admit that certain things about them are really beginning to irritate me as my outlook on life tends towards the Roman rather than the Spartan.
Evolution has had only a gradual effect on this vehicle. The headlights have moved out of the grille and on to the front fenders, it has grown bigger, more powerful and, yes, a lot more fuel-efficient.
Yet the traditional shape has its good points: the upright sides make it easy to judge its width in confined spaces. Not that the turning circle helps, but that's another issue.
The lack of protrusions such as wheel arches and sculpted door sills also helps to avoid bumps and scrapes and flat glass makes it cheaper to replace broken windows.
And the traditional look is rather pleasant. There's nothing that says "outdoors", "nature-lover" or "Irish Guards" quite so successfully as the traditional shape of the Land Rover Defender.
Such are the positives of tradition, Land Rover-style.
But tradition also brings a huge centre console that pushes the really basic front seats right out to the doors, putting the window sill right under your armpit.
That was a good idea in the old days because Land Rover door latches weren't very secure and you could always clamp the door under your arm while driving to keep it closed.
But Land Rover doors no longer swing open at the slightest provocation, which makes this feature obsolete. Now you can actually shut the window electrically (can you believe it?) at the press of a button on the fascia.
But that also means your right arm is trapped between your rib cage and some hard Land Rover aluminium, unless you place your rear end at an angle to the seat, and there's limited space for your left foot around the clutch pedal unless you are actually operating it.
GREAT DIESEL ENGINE
So you have to pull your knee up and, if you're any taller than my 1.75m, your left hand and left knee may make unwanted contact during left turns.
That's the downside of tradition: you have to be "Land Rover fit" - as opposed to rugby fit or tennis fit - to drive a long distance in one.
What is not traditional is the great diesel engine you can get with your Defender these days - and a somewhat clunky manual gearbox with a heavy-duty clutch action that can take all the granite and sandstone you can throw it at.
SURPRISING FUEL-EFFICIENCY
The stiff ladder chassis and much-improved coil-over shock absorbers help limit the damaging effect of the seats while allowing the Defender to climb obstacles as if there weren't a tarred road in the world.
All of which comes with surprising fuel-efficiency.
I used it to tow a heavily laden trailer on a recently flooded farm, following the road more from memory than visibility, and all it did was growl a bit more than usual over the difficult bits, its 360Nm available from low down to smooth the way.
On the road its 90kW was enough to cruise easily at the legal limit, up hill and down dale - and its fuel consumption over the whole trip from Cape Town to the farm in the Little Karoo averaged 12.7 litres/100km.
Little things like that make you fall in love with the old Defender all over again, even at R382 000 for the 2.4-litre turbodiesel station wagon.