This reinforces something I was thinking yesterday…
Ben Franklin had a young friend (maybe a nephew) who was torn by the decision whether or not to marry a particular woman, and Franklin (ever the pragmatist) advised him to make lists of the factors favoring each side of the argument (as far as I know, he was the model of all such lists). Franklin believed that this was the only sensible way to make such a decision, i.e. calmly, rationally, dispassionately (what I call “Vulcan courtship”).
The author of the book where I read this story followed it by saying that he had himself once made one such list. But when a comparison of the pros and cons showed him that the RATIONAL thing to do was not to marry her, he found himself wishing so strongly that the numbers had fallen the other way that he figured marrying her MUST be the right thing to do. The argument (which the book developed far more fully) was that very often our “guts” are simply smarter than our brains, and a snap decision is as likely to guide us properly as a “reasoned” one (if not moreso). Or, as Hamlet says,And praised be rashness for it, let us know,Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,When our deep plots do pall.
This reinforces something I was thinking yesterday…
Ben Franklin had a young friend (maybe a nephew) who was torn by the decision whether or not to marry a particular woman, and Franklin (ever the pragmatist) advised him to make lists of the factors favoring each side of the argument (as far as I know, he was the model of all such lists). Franklin believed that this was the only sensible way to make such a decision, i.e. calmly, rationally, dispassionately (what I call “Vulcan courtship”).
The author of the book where I read this story followed it by saying that he had himself once made one such list. But when a comparison of the pros and cons showed him that the RATIONAL thing to do was not to marry her, he found himself wishing so strongly that the numbers had fallen the other way that he figured marrying her MUST be the right thing to do. The argument (which the book developed far more fully) was that very often our “guts” are simply smarter than our brains, and a snap decision is as likely to guide us properly as a “reasoned” one (if not moreso). Or, as Hamlet says,And praised be rashness for it, let us know,Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,When our deep plots do pall.