Emergent Novelty

The man who is striving to solve a problem defined by existing knowledge and technique is not, however, just looking around.  He knows what he wants to achieve, and he designs his instruments and directs his thoughts accordingly.  Unanticipated novelty, the new discovery, can emerge only to the extent that his anticipations about nature and his instruments prove wrong.
—     Thomas S. Kuhn
From his book: “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions“
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On This Day In:
2020	A Steep Price Ahead
	Möbius
2019	Eureka!
2018	Learning About My Humanity
2017	Laugh Or Shake Your Head
2016	The Expected Cure
2015	Of Two Minds
2014	Pride And Remembrance
2013	Repeating Bad Memories
2012	No Sooner
2011	Just Cheesy!
	Are You Illin’?

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So, You Think You Know The Answer?

The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance – it is the illusion of knowledge.
—    Daniel J. Boorstin
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On This Day In:
2019	His Promises, OUR Hopes
2018	Where I Write
2017	At Last, An Honest Philosopher…
2016	Fake It ‘Til You Make It
2015	Hell Toupée
2014	Corrected And Amended
2013	Too Few
2012	Three Characters
2011	Universal Payment
2010	Privatizing the TSA? (An old – and long – post, but still relevant!!)

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Eureka!

We know, not by a direct and simple vision, not at a glance, but as it were, by piecemeal and accumulation … by going around an object, by comparison.
—    John Henry Newman
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On This Day In:
2018	Learning About My Humanity
2017	Laugh Or Shake Your Head
2016	The Expected Cure
2015	Of Two Minds
2014	Pride And Remembrance
2013	Repeating Bad Memories
2012	No Sooner
2011	Just Cheesy!
	Are You Illin’?

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What I Tell You Three Times Is True

But we all know in our hearts that mere repetition and decibel level is no way to truth.
Part of the controversy hinges on the difference between discovery and invention.  To me, science and math are ultimately about undiscovered continents: things that really do exist, although we might not yet know about them.  The example that I often use is trilobites in the Cambrian period, more than 500 million years ago.  Did trilobites know the value of pi?  I think not.  Did any living creature in the Cambrian know the value of pi?  No.  But did pi exist with the same value that we know of today?  Yes.
Truth is all around us.  We just have to look for it.  This task  —  is mankind’s most noble activity.  We give up on it at our peril.
—    Errol Morris
From his editorial:  “Why Donald Trump can’t kill the truth“
Which appeared in Time Magazine, dtd: 11 June 2018
[The title for this post is a quote from Lewis Carroll’s poem “The Hunting of the Snark“.  It also appears in the text of Morris’ opinion piece.    —    KMAB]
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On This Day In:
2017	And So On
2016	Kept
2015	Envy * 2
2014	Destiny For The Talented
2013	I Do Not Fear It
2012	Until Found
2011	Reducing Goods To Data
	The Fog Of Civilization Building

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