To interact with the social world the way others do, we need to learn the mechanisms behind social interactions to a level that others don’t. This urge to know why a social behaviour works before we can properly use it (manners, aggression, group identity, coercion, lying) carries over to physical things and systems in the real world (electricity, trains, cooking, cats, jobs, cars)
We need not understand the entire scope of the thing or concept (though we often do), but understanding the boundaries of the thing, where the walls of the box are, helps us understand the limits of our expectations for it. We know it can’t leave the box. When we encounter something brand new, a behaviour, situation, environment or task, we feel fear, because at that moment, the box has infinite size, and only by learning about it can we make the box smaller and more manageable.
To interact with the social world the way others do, we need to learn the mechanisms behind social interactions to a level that others don’t. This urge to know why a social behaviour works before we can properly use it (manners, aggression, group identity, coercion, lying) carries over to physical things and systems in the real world (electricity, trains, cooking, cats, jobs, cars)
We need not understand the entire scope of the thing or concept (though we often do), but understanding the boundaries of the thing, where the walls of the box are, helps us understand the limits of our expectations for it. We know it can’t leave the box. When we encounter something brand new, a behaviour, situation, environment or task, we feel fear, because at that moment, the box has infinite size, and only by learning about it can we make the box smaller and more manageable.