Every time we think we've reached an understanding of how the world works, sooner or later we're proved wrong. And yet every time, we act as though we're right.
Do we learn more easily (if at all) from past experience, or from new information?
Past experience is always: you thought you were right, but you were wrong.
New information is always: this fits the facts as we (think we) know them.
I think we're F-worded. I'd put that more clearly, but as a friend once told me and I remembered, I'm "ridiculously squeamish about odd things".
There's a glacier, apparently, that's melting faster than we were all confidently predicting.
The other evening, I turned on the radio to hear a man's voice say that he had learned never to reject anything out of hand. They were discussing astrology, and he went on to suggest that maybe the movements of the planets and our destinies are both influenced by some third factor as yet unknown.
He wasn't defending astrology, but leaving open a possibility. I like that attitude.
Do we learn more easily (if at all) from past experience, or from new information?
Past experience is always: you thought you were right, but you were wrong.
New information is always: this fits the facts as we (think we) know them.
I think we're F-worded. I'd put that more clearly, but as a friend once told me and I remembered, I'm "ridiculously squeamish about odd things".
There's a glacier, apparently, that's melting faster than we were all confidently predicting.
The other evening, I turned on the radio to hear a man's voice say that he had learned never to reject anything out of hand. They were discussing astrology, and he went on to suggest that maybe the movements of the planets and our destinies are both influenced by some third factor as yet unknown.
He wasn't defending astrology, but leaving open a possibility. I like that attitude.