> Hi,
>
> Marie Foster <mfos@ieway.com> wrote:
> > It is the unknown that grows. The known only gets smaller.
>
> What? Surly you got it backwards by mistake. The known is getting bigger,
> and getting bigger ever faster even! The unknown, of course, is
> *infinite*, and so I'm not sure it even make sense to say that it's
> "getting smaller" or "is growing". How much is infinity plus 2?
>
> ERiC
It is true that only finitely many things are known and infinitely
many things are unknown. On the other hand, every time some
new truth is discovered, it immediately suggests many new questions.
If we restrict ourselves to questions that we understand, then it
seems to me that the unknown is growing much faster than the
known.
This is true for the whole of human knowledge and for
an individual--at least it is true for me. At 18, I thought I knew
a great deal. By the time I had a BS, I began to see that there
was a lot out there that I didn't know. After the PhD (I hope
no one is foolish enough to be impressed by that....), I realized
that I don't know diddley squat compared to the real geniuses.
At least now I understand some of the Big Questions.
So for me, the unknown has increased much faster than the
known. Maybe that's what Marie was getting at.
--Bill Haloupek haloupekb@uwstout.edu http://www.mscs.uwstout.edu/~billh/home.html My employer doesn't share my opinions, my webpage is under construction, and my life is based on a true story. Will solve math problems for food.