April 1
The mind is at first like a blank sheet; everything written on it came through experience. So ask of every idea where it comes from before you build a judgement on it. What you take to be innate was often merely written early on.
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (freely rendered)
Beads in the Stream
The mind is at first like a blank sheet; everything written on it came through experience. So ask of every idea where it comes from before you build a judgement on it. What you take to be innate was often merely written early on.
When Wangari Maathai fetched water for her mother as a child, she would linger a long time at the stream. Glass beads seemed to lie in the water. She wanted to make herself a necklace from them. But as soon as she reached for them, they were gone.
Weeks later the place was teeming with black tadpoles. She tried to catch those too. They were slippery and got away. Then they disappeared, and there were frogs.
Only when she studied biology did Maathai understand that her beads had been frogspawn and that the three apparitions belonged together. When she returned home after her studies, the stream had dried up.
