44. Teaching A Child To See

I was thinking about how best to explain to a child that every idea has errors and can be wrong. The goal is a sort of "defense against the dark arts" lesson for when ideas try to restrict the growth of knowledge in their minds. How would you explain this idea? This is how I would explain it to a child.

I would take one of those drawings that when turned around looks completely different - an optical illusion. First, I would show it to them and ask them what they see. Then I would turn it around and ask what they see now. I would then ask whether they were right the first or second time. I would point out that yes you correctly saw the picture as this shape the first time but you didn't see it from the other way around so you were right but something was missing. What you saw the second time was also right when we turned it around. All that changed was how you looked at it. Most things in life are like that. It may look one way to us but there are other ways to look at it that we don't know. So we can never be sure we see everything. 

I then could expand on this idea of being unable to see things in every way and explain what an opportunity to change how we see things is, like this. 

Should you do your homework or chores? Yes? Maybe? But it is not fun. Your parents may be forcing you to do it which makes it worse. So what can you do about it? Well, we just learned we can see things in many different ways just now. We could look at the picture this way or that way if we wanted. You too can choose how you look at homework and chores. Maybe you don't like it. Maybe you think there are better and more fun things to do. You could be correct. What if you tried to look at it differently though? I'm not going to tell you how to look at it. You come up with as many ways as you want and pick the best one for you. The point is to see things in many ways before deciding how to feel about it.