Critical Thinking
06 April 2021 | St Petersburg
Tuesday 6 April 2021
According to Scientific American the average human brain contains around two and a half million gigabytes of memory. That's over thirty nine billion times greater than was carried on the Apollo moon missions and about half what's needed to remember the liter of milk one was suppose to pick up at the market on the way home. Experts suggest writing reminders, but we need a reminder to remember to read the reminder and then a reminder for that. It's a never-ending process that rapidly spirals into a situation too complicated to remember, so the best tactic is to assume we'll forget and plan accordingly. If it's really important, immediately drop everything else and do it now. If not ignore it. Of course some things are essential, but can't be done right away. What does one do? Used to know, but have now forgotten. What did people do before Google?
Post office has now asserted that Sailpod will be delivered today before 1815. 1815? Why not an even hour like 1800 or 1900? Alternatively why not 1823 or 1759? Who decided to make it 1815 and how? Mail is usually delivered to The Moorings, friend's condominium address, before early afternoon, so expect to meander that way after coffee to pick it up... if it's there. By the way, except for 2017 and 2018 when it had deficits of only 2.7 and 3.9 billion dollars respectively, the USPS has lost between 5 billion and 15.9 billion every year since 2012, 9.2 in 2020. Proposed solution is to increase stamp price and slow delivery, i.e. offer higher cost and poorer service. OK! that usually works.
Inertia is that property of matter described by Newton's three laws. It's characteristics are determined by mass and energy. If not familiar one may look it up on, you guessed, Google. A similar property effects mental processes that induce work. To confuse metaphors a bit, it's like a lead bowling ball in one's head (assume it doesn't displace those 2.5 petabytes of memory). It's so much easier to sit here and type out this twaddle than scrub the deck or remove and replace hatch seals, but once moving to then work through dinner and frustrate balance of crew who get grumpy when hungry. The lesson here is to keep brain cells active and apply energy where and when appropriate (as if that's going to happen). Another, only peripherally related lesson that seems to have been mislaid and has over the past several years been increasingly flouted is that reason ultimately takes precedence over emotion, reality over desire, objective over subjective. Be warned, good intentions very often create results that suck.
Jack & Jan