What's it's made of U and ME

Today I spent the morning teaching my students about reasoning and assumptions. When you work logic problems first you have to ditch all assumptions in order to approach the project with an open mind. This lead to lots of discussions and many interesting ideas. Let me give you an example of a problem.

Jack and Jill lie dead on the floor surrounded by glass and water next to an open window. How did they die?

The students can ask yes or no questions to find the answer.

The answer is that Jack and Jill are goldfish and they died when the wind knocked their bowl over. We assume Jack and Jill are people. That is the problem.

Other problems deal with assumptions involving the word Cabin, gender, and people's stature. It is a neat little exercise. (We are studying a Sherlock Holmes mystery... This is the tie in.)

The point is the assumptions we make.

We assumed Jon Bennet's parents did it because they didn't answer questions fast enough and then they were investigated. We now assumed that Kerr did it because he confessed. We assume things all the time about people because of their race, gender, religion and other characteristics/preferences. We assume that beautiful people are more interesting, smarter and they all have dates on Saturday night. We assume that "ugly" people don't. We assume that because an actor plays a character we like that they themselves are people we would like, people we know or people we should be concerned with (personal life, political beliefs, religious beliefs, you name it). Further, we seem to assume we have the right to know all this. We assume that fat people eat too much and are lazy. We assume that tall people played basketball. We assume that financial success means happiness. We assume that a simple apology makes the problem go away.

My students assume that I won't really fail them and that the school won't really hold them back a year. They assume that I can't fail a whole class if they all don't turn in their homework. They assume that when I tell them there are consequences for their actions that I don't really mean it. They assume that when I ask the class to stop talking that I am not actually talking to them.

My life is full of assumptions. I assumed that simply calling my mother on her bad behavior and bad choices would make her stop and that if I loved her long enough and hard enough she would change. I assumed that if I just kept smiling, kept my head down and finished college and got a career that a husband and family would just drop right into my life. I assumed that I could never be so broken or hurt as to make the kind of bad judgment calls I made that awful Saturday night in July and that I could control the outcome. (Isn't it funny how arrogance and pride can look a lot like assumptions?) Further I assumed that just because I was sorry (and forgiven) that I would stop being bothered by it. I assumed that just because I ate less, and exercised more that this weight would just peel off easily in no time because I want it to.

Nothing is ever as simple as we assume. There is a reason that it's a bad idea.