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The other day, my two and half year old asked what being "alive" meant. My wife went off on a tear about breathing and stuff which confused it even more. I expl
by Sai_ 4y ago
The other day, my two and half year old asked what being "alive" meant. My wife went off on a tear about breathing and stuff which confused it even more. I explained that being alive meant that you could have more birthdays.
His eyes widened and was able to answer questions about whether the chair was alive or not. He said not because we have never celebrated a chair's birthday.
Takewaway - when communicating, you can either be technically correct or correctly understood, seldom both.
- efficientsticks 4y agoThat’s a very engaging explanation. I’d recommend Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio as a similarly engaging way to introduce life and death early on. Perhaps a couple more analogies would be helpful for how animals and trees can be alive too.
- Sai_ 4y agoMy guy absolutely loves Pinocchio (the kid version we have for him i.e.). He has a few favorite books and Pinocchio is on that shortlist.
- actionfromafar 4y agoThe birthday explanation opens up the door to induction, too.
- nullcipher 4y agoI know this is a ELI2 but what about that stray dog? Nobody celebrated its birthday.
- Sai_ 4y agoYes, this explanation didn't help him identify dogs as living. I asked him our neighbor's dog was alive and he said no - but I blame that on my neighbors not celebrating their pet's birthdays...those monsters!
- ncphil 4y agoNothing stops anyone from celebrating a stray (or neighboring) dog's birthday. The difference between a dog and a chair in that context is the dog will wag its tail in an expression of happiness if given a birthday treat. The chair won't. So being able to experience happiness may be an indicator of life. Just watch some young squirrels running and jumping over each other this Spring. That's life.
- otabdeveloper4 4y agoWell, we celebrate birthdays of dead people all the time... This abstraction is quite leaky.