Thought experiments

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One of our greatest attributes as human beings is the ability to imagine and then make concrete changes to our status quo as a result of the profound insights that come to us due to that unique ability.

I fully grant you that not all of those changes that any of us have brought into this world with the use of our imagination have been for the greater good.

In other words, “Just because we can doesn’t necessarily mean that we should.”

However, it is simply to rejuvenate that wonderful ability of ours that I present to you these rather fun thought experiments. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.

If you have at least one child, imagine if you will the very day before you & your partner decided to begin trying for your first child. (If you don’t have a child or more of your own, merely assume that you have one.) Now imagine if you will that on that very day, you come across your first child at the age he / she is at present with a group of other children of about the same age. Would you pick up on that child’s resemblance to you or to your partner?

Imagine if you will that you happened to grow up without having seen any pictures of yourself as an infant. Now imagine that at your present age, you come across an infant who looks exactly like you did when you were one. Would you be able to tell the resemblance?

A good mimicry artist can have us bursting at the seams with laughter; especially if the person being imitated has been in the news lately; especially for the wrong reasons. However, imagine if you will that you happen to witness the imitation first and then later come across the person who was being mimicked. Would you then be amused (at all…?) by the mimicry or by the mannerisms of the actual person?