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It’s OK To Step On The Cracks
Why many of our “rules” should be discarded in favor of reality-based thinking
What does a child’s aversion to stepping on the cracks between paving-stones have to do with some people’s categorical hatred of Hawai’ian pizzas? Why does a mistaken notion about how infinitives work in the English language have much in common with a belief that homosexual acts are unnatural? And what similarity exists between the idea that words shouldn’t be compounded from roots derived from more than a single language family and the idea that people of different skin hues should never be permitted to intermarry?
The answer is simple: these are all beliefs that are entirely erroneous, silly, and often very unhelpful. They have no basis in empirical fact, nor in the vagaries of history, nor do they have any positive social utility.
Yet these unfounded beliefs and a great many more like them are held and fervently defended by an astonishingly large number of people. This is because we humans like to minimize cognitive load whenever possible and so we’re suckers for simple-minded “rules” that enable us to avoid attempting to perform the onerous task of thinking for ourselves.
As readers kind enough to glance at my articles from time to time will already know, our ancestors evolved under…
