How being less wrong is actually right

Our earth is not exactly a sphere
photo: NASA

I was teaching a class on critical thinking yesterday and the discussion afterwards was great.  As I was driving home though, I started to think about the basic problem of figuring out what is true and what is false: which is the point of critical thinking after all. And I think this is what trips up a lot of people. Most people just want to know what is true and what isn’t. And they get frustrated when scientists say – we figured it out this time, only to learn a few years later, that they really hadn’t gotten it right at all.

And this reminded me of an essay by Isaac Asimov titled “The Relativity of Wrong.”  You see, a scientific mindset is actually just judging theories as right or wrong on a sliding scale.  The question a scientist is asking isn’t, are we absolutely right?  The question they are asking is, are we less wrong then we were before?

The example Asimov gives is how our knowledge of the earth has evolved as we have learned more and more.  At first people thought the earth was flat – and even though they were wrong, it didn’t really impact anyone because for all intents and purposes, it is, from a single person living on the surface of the earth’s perspective.  Then we realized it was a sphere (which isn’t entirely correct either but it is clearly less wrong than the previous view).  Then people realized they got the size of the earth wrong and it is actually bigger than they had originally thought. Again, this is still wrong, but not as wrong as they had been before.  And now we know that technically the earth isn’t even a sphere – it apparently has some bulges in the middle. So again, no scientist would say we have it figured out now for sure, all they are doing is making our understanding of the planet we live on less wrong which makes us more right than we were before.

Why does this matter? Well, because, when it comes to solving problems it is important to accept that your knowledge is never going to be perfect and that you need to figure out a solution to your problem anyway.  At some point, you need to act and do the best you can.  To quote Thoreau “The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think is right.”

Getting Rid of Clutter

Image: Bill Longshaw / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

My friend Cranky Humanist asked for tips and tricks on how to get her disobedient brain to give up it's clutter inducing attachment to sentimental objects.  I said - just throw them away, your brain will get over it. She said yeah - but misbehaving brains can be really persuasive.  And they can.

But once you get in the habit of letting things go, you realize how liberating it is to get rid of stuff. The fear we all have is that you will lose or forget something that is important to you when you get rid of stuff. It's an unfounded fear. If something is important to you, you will remember it with or without the object that represents the memory. Plus, if you are being honest with yourself, it's not like you ever go through your piles of junk and clutter anyway except when you get in cleaning mode, so it's not like you are going to remember to find it to trigger the memory in the first place except by accident.

Look - at the end of the day - it's just stuff. You don't need stuff for your memories and letting go of your excess stuff is incredibly liberating.  And if you are afraid that you might need it at some point in the future, well, then if and when that happens, go out and buy another one.  Then you will have the pleasure of using something new that reminds you of thing you gave away. So double plus good.

Anyway - with all this discussing of getting rid of clutter, I was reminded of one of my favorite stories by a group called Celestial Navigations.  Try not to be bothered by the fact they are scientologists - it's still a cool story called - The Valley and it's about getting rid of stuff and every time I am tempted to hang on to something for sentimental reasons, I think about this song and remind myself, I will be OK if I let it go.. Enjoy.

Life Isn’t Fair

My son was diagnosed with childhood absence seizures yesterday. This has several implications for him, one of them being that he is going to have to take medicine every day for several years, and possibly for the rest of his life.  He is really pretty upset about it.  Not the seizures, because he isn’t even aware they happen. But like any 6 year old, he REALLY doesn’t like the idea of taking medicine and at the moment, that’s what he’s most upset about.

And, he’s in a bit of a state of grief about it. He’s trying to deny he has a problem. He’s trying to find another way around having to take the medicine. He’s trying to bargain.  He wishes I hadn’t taken him to see the doctor. None of these strategies are going to work. As his mom, I know, this is just one of those things he is going to have to accept.

Which brings me to today’s topic.  Life isn’t fair.  I agree with my son. Ideally, he and I and his father shouldn’t have to deal with this. But we do.  And the sooner he and we accept that reality, the sooner we can start coping with it.  Is the coping going to be easy? No; of course not. But we don’t have a choice. This isn’t something that can be just wished away or ignored. 

Accepting reality, as unpleasant as it can sometimes be, is important if you are going to cope with anything successfully.

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Image: graur razvan ionut / FreeDigitalPhotos.net