My daughter is terrific with people and usually emotional; I'm very good at machines and usually hardhearted; thus we sometimes consult with each other on problemsolving. Some times the solution is a warm hug, and sometimes it's detachment.
A cousin had knee surgery and drives a stickshift, and my daughter is helpful and drives an automatic. She posed the possible solution of swapping cars.
I answered that (1) the cousin had loaned her car to the daughter before, so there was a precedent, (2) there will be a cost for adding each other to their insurances as compared to the cousin getting a rental car, but (3) if the cousin's surgery was her right knee, then neither of the above matters and cousin should just chill out for another month because insurance will be invalid and the risk of crash is significant.
The daughter liked this logic, and I was glad to have contributed.
Sometimes logic works better than emotion. Some times.
- text © 2010 by Willy
P.S., but it's always function over form.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Logic Over Emotion
Thursday, November 26, 2009
It's In My Nature
A scorpion asks a frog for help crossing a river. Intimidated by the scorpion's prominent stinger, the frog demurs. "Don't be scared," the scorpion says. "If something happens to you, I'll drown." Moved by this logic, the frog puts the scorpion on his back and wades into the river. Halfway across, the scorpion stings the frog.
The dying frog croaks, "How could you? You know you'll drown!"
"It's in my nature," gasps the sinking scorpion.
This fable of The Scorpion and The Frog is also a lesson on misplaced trust, on the limits of logic, on not escaping the insuppressible nature of things, and more:
What was the incentive for the frog to even entertain help carry that scorpion? NONE! It was not just the scorpion's nature that's in question here but more so it is the frog's nature to blame. That frog should not have helped in such an event with a clear eventuality. Wasn't this the co-dependency on the frog's part that sank them both? YES!
It is what it is, I yam what I yam and that's all that I yam. THIS co-dependent frog must question everything. I must fight my nature and do just my own... cross the river solo, and not help the scorpions. Kindness has its limits, clearly, and so I have my demons to fight.
- text © 2009 by Willy