thinking, new "Einsteins"

     When people give me a glimpse into how they think I make a note of it. Most of my notes are about errors in thinking. For instance, I have been told that if you say a thing a thousand times, it's true. I have also been told that if more people believe one thing than another, then that thing is true. No room for epistemological doubt.  That means how do you (or we) know that? And, could it be false?  For example, if you say that 2+2=5 a thousand times, does it?  No, of course not. If more people believe that 2+2=5 than believe that 2+2=7, does 2+2=5?  No, of course not. 2+2+4, an absolute truth, if you will, demonstrable through the classic logical argument by definition (as in what is 2? what is 4? what is plus?).
     The same people who expound the above theories of "truth" have been taught to repeat that "all truth is relative"--meaning that there is no such thing as truth, really. Some of them are convinced that Einstein "proved" this--yes, with the theory of relativity. One of the canards that makes part of this set is that Einstein also proved that the shortest distance between two points is not a straight line. If you hear a rumbling, it may be Einstein rolling over in his grave. The "proof" that the shortest distance between two points is not a straight line is said to be that Einstein posited that light may bend, or curve, to go around a large object, such as a planet. The proponents of this theory refuse to see that this has nothing to do with the shortest distance between two points--which is still a straight line. If they would stop spouting pseudo-erudition for a living instant and think--that going around something is not a straight line; that Einstein, and physics, have not redefined "straight line" as the path that light takes, or may take; that the definition of "shortest distance" is not "the path that light takes"; that none of this has anything to do with "the shortest distance between two points is a straight line"--they might take a first step on the road to reality.

Suggestion--Find out where some of this is learned. I believe it is what is passing for remedial education in our prison system.

something stupid

You may be saying stupid things if you are using any of these--

I (we) just naturally assumed
This can't be right
I (we) cannot have made a mistake; I (we) cannot be wrong
I mean; but I meant
There must (has to) be  a
I heard; she (he, they, it) said
I read that into; interpreted that as
Surely you don't think
I can hardly believe
This doesn't make sense to me

whose baby?

      More than one person has insisted to me that a baby can have more than one father. Many people know that this is not possible, no matter how promiscuous the behavior of the baby's parents. No matter how many men a woman has sex with, only one of them is the father of any child she may conceive.
     This may be a way of making more "friends" for the mother and her baby, or it may be the prelude to an attempt at fraud or con artistry. But surely some of it is mere ignorance. 


Suggestion--better sex education.

can history be outdated?

     Someone once asked me if an old history book was outdated. In other words, shouldn't I get a newer history book? My answer was no--but it's not as obvious as I hoped it might be. Any book or document ( paper of any kind) "becomes" history if it gets old enough, of course. A very old diary, newspaper, bill of sale, letter, advertisement---they are all "history".  So an old history book "becomes" history in the same way.  If it contains data like population statistics they will be outdated as current information--but they are still history. History doesn't change much, anyway, even though it is often re-written for style and content. I think the history books we used when I was in school forty years ago did a better job including blacks and women than some of the newer books do. So in the case of using the book in a classroom, and not just for adult scholars, there is no substitute for reading the book with the ideas in mind you hope to see expressed in it. Up to the minute statistics are readily available on the internet. We no longer need the books to be as "current" as we once did for the purpose of statistics on population or economics, for instance.

Suggestion--If the students' books seem out of date to them, an interesting assignment might be to have students update some of the material, using the internet and library.


Suggestion--

paradise lost

     An item on the list, for many people, of what makes a utopia ( a perfect society or world), is surprising to me. It is "imagine a world in which no one had to work". I cannot imagine such a world. We could already have a world with twenty-hour (or maybe ten-hour) work weeks. But no work is not possible. Machines could never do it--we would literally have to return to slavery--no work for some, and a lot of work for others. This is not my idea of a utopia.
      You can hear this idea, or read it, as part of the groovy "counterculture" of the 1960's. I heard it again the other night--it was in a PBS special about Haight-Ashbury.--a quote from a "hippie".
     The philosophical underpinning of this is from the Bible. Adam and Eve did not have to work when they were in paradise.  When they were exiled from paradise, Adam had to earn his living, and Eve had to suffer in childbirth. An entire set of people is still raising children to believe that work is a punishment for sin--and that as long as they do no work they are, in fact, in paradise.

Suggestion--find out more about what other people believe--it may be important to you.

who are you?

        Who are you? Are you what you do? What you say? What you think or believe?  A famous philosopher once said " To do is to be"--or, you are what you do. "What do you do?" was a standard phrase when getting to know a new acquaintance.  It meant "what do you do for a living?"  Of course we are a bit more than what we do--we are all the things we could, or might, do, given world enough and time. We are not simply our past, but also our present and in some way our future--our plans, hopes and aspirations.
      To other people, however, we can't really be much more than what we do. Other people know that everyone has plans, hopes, and aspirations, but they only know the plans of people who have shared their ideas with them. To your best friend or your brother you may be a lot of different beliefs and plans and ideas--to a stranger you are your school, work, legal or medical records.

Suggestion--you may refuse to define yourself by your behavior--but remember that to other people, you are what you do (or have done).

the new gambling math

     Have you ever wondered why someone you know continues to gamble even though he or she seems to lose consistently? You might ask your friend about his or her math. Or accounting system. I have been told by a gambler that she won a couple of hundred dollars--this after losing several hundred. To her, only the winnings "count". The rest is gone with the wind. So while I figured that she lost about $400, she had it figured out that she won $200. Gamblers think this way about gambling all the time. Other people who repeatedly make life decisions that others would call self-destructive or self-defeating do the same--they only count the wins.

Suggestion--I'll ask you. Has anyone succeeded in persuading losing a losing gambler that he or she has, in fact, lost?