Dare to ask even the stupid questions may be too much to suggest. How interesting it can be on how powerful the world is when we allow it to control us so. Even in asking a question, we find ourselves hesitating to ask, giving power to the world as to whether we are deemed brilliant or stupid in asking.
One of my sons recently asked me if zero is a real number. Quite limited to what I inhale of the media world, I was silently grateful to be ahead of his question. I knew my son’s question was yet a philosophical one, to that which I named as so. This was because unknown to him, I coincidentally looked over what another of my son was watching one day and saw this very same thought-provoking snippet I knew he was leading me to discuss.
There was hardly any discussion. I was quite excited about the question as if it was a debate I had prepared to address. My son found himself listening to what I’m sure was surprising to him, perhaps, a rather well-rehearsed response. Unknown to him, I had already addressed this very question quietly within my own mind.
I told him that in life we can say we have nothing. That is why when suggesting to divide by zero (0), we are suggesting to divide something we don’t have. It’s like suggesting to sit at a table, and before we all eat, one says, “Let’s divide nothing and eat.” I’m going to safely assume here that the room would go silent. I would hope, too, that someone would dare say, “What? How are we to divide nothing?” The argument here is, then, zero is not a real number. I dare beg to differ.
How many would go to the bank tomorrow to argue that if to face misfortune of seeing a clear zero in their account balance, this would be nothing to fret, suggesting zero is not “real” and therefore, doesn’t actually exist? The bank would (I would presume) clarify by saying in more or less words (after some understandable silence to process whether the question is “real”), “Nope. That zero (0) is absolutely real. It states that in this account (clearly covering themselves in the professional realm), you show to have nothing.”
You can make that zero as significant as you’d like. 0, 0.0, 0.00 and so on. The quantitative and qualitative significance can, in this case, be seen as one. You have absolute zip-zero- nothing. That zero (or, zeroes) is absolutely REAL.
You add nothing from nothing, you get the same outcome as you started with. You subtract nothing from nothing- same outcome. You hope to multiply nothing by nothing to get something? Still, nothing is the outcome. That’s why when comedian, actor, and producer, Eddie Murphy, stated in Raw (my first ever watched stand up comedy rented on video that had me crying with happy tears as a teenager!), “Nothing from nothing leaves nothing!”, he was facetiously, but inadvertently teaching everyone a mathematical lesson. You can add that, subtract that, multiply that, and your result is as REAL as it numerically gets: 0 + 0 = 0; 0 – 0 = 0; 0 x 0 = 0.
Oh, but wait! How about 0 / 0 ? Undefined. That’s the mathematical way to not even theorize, but in its own lack of a better word, some mathematician was making a statement (perhaps at a dinner table), “You can’t divide something that doesn’t exist.” Or, was that syntactically ended with rather an exclamation point? Peter Pan may argue with this one, but as adults, we need not argue with Peter Panners.
I think whoever made up the word “undefined” was simply just tired of those trying to make it an argument or worth even discussing. That wise one must have just said, “Look. Let’s just leave it alone and we shall call it ‘undefined’”. Take note that the wise one also inserted “we” to psychologically suggest that the decision was a team process. Lol. Peace to the undefined solution.
Questions lead to answers, no matter if the solution lead to an undefined conclusion. Arriving to some understanding is much better than not understanding at all. There should be no fault to those who ask. It takes courage to question. Vulnerability is a strength within the innocence of the mind. To seek for an answer of an aching question inside is an exhaling release. The day we stop asking is the day we stop breathing.
If I had thought VHS (video home system for those of you who just went, What?) was the end all of how movies arrive to your home television with the use of a VCR (the video cassette recorder that also plays what has been recorded… VCP!), I’d be lost in this Disney, Netflix, Prime, Vudu, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera rapidly immersing world. (We’re truly still in great fondness of the DVD era, just to self admit). Asking simply seeks answers. The more you ask, eventually, the less you’ll have to question. Answers will have been found as long as you keep searching. However, and I mean, HOWEVER, there can be humor in the idiosyncrasies of thought when questioning.
In my years of teaching I still (with a meditative pause to take a breath) giggle come assessment day after days, if not weeks ahead, of having written or announcing an upcoming assessment to anticipate. Whether announced verbally on a daily basis until the day of or clearly indicating the day on the calendar, or upon going over the focus for the day of the assessment, the ever-so-unfailing utterance of a student in a class can be heard aloud, “We have a test today?” You just really have to smile and laugh because at that moment you feel minutely prophetic, thinking to yourself or hearing yourself saying quite assuredly (sometimes, per class), “I predicted someone would ask that question today.”
I have come to realize it is okay to have what others may think is a stupid question even if deemed so. I, for one, have asked many STUPID questions to listening ears. If I don’t know, it is my need to find out.
I kid you not, when a colleague of mine spoke of some incident involving sodomy, although a growing extensive vocabulary I had accumulated (merely because, as I had perhaps mentioned about my childhood past, that as my home offered my mom’s romance novels, a very old Bible in the King James Version, and a dictionary, the latter truly was my only reading choice- having (still) no desire to read romance novels nor could I find joy as a child immersing myself in the complexities of thou, thee, thy), shielded from darkness, I had yet to come across such side of the world where sodomy was a word I felt the need to understand. The moment came where I couldn’t just pretend to know and therefore, ask.
Innocently, without a second to pause, I curiously, probably not even with a blink, asked, on behalf of all to hear and witness, “What is sodomy?” Applause to my colleague for calmly (after I immediately followed-up as to why) responding back with a matter-of-fact response. In fact and in truth, I just had to look up that word (I’m okay with judgment here) again, only because upon hearing the meaning, I just realized I clouded it out of memory.
When, as a full-grown adult, already a wife and mother, admits to asking such a question (quite aloud), I self-reflectively point out that innocence doesn’t necessarily mean stupidity. I’m quite thankful of my naïveté, where certain words are rather not inundated in my head to desensitize me of such. Bleh.
I remind myself that asking is a feed to the hunger of the heart, mind, body, and spirit. Yes. As a mother, I know the difference between an innocent question versus where a child wittingly formulates a plea of mercy into a question such as, “When did you say I had to clean up my room?” Or, when a student asks a question aloud as they look around to see if anyone got their innuendo of something they would hope someone else caught onto and get a laugh out of. I’m thankfully to be ahead of some things. Still trying to embrace the adult world, I find best in understanding the young and innocent minds. Been there, done that-certified.
I have lived enough to understand that most of the time, when someone asks, “How was your day?” that person most often is waiting for you to ask them the very same question so they may share with you how their day is going. I have lived enough to understand that when someone asks, “What do you think?” they are optimally deciding what THEY truly believe; you are just sharing a perspective perhaps they haven’t come across yet as they work things out in their head. I have lived enough to understand that when a person says, “Can I talk to you for a minute?” it’s usually not a minute and ultimately, you have to decide right then and there if you have the time or energy to address what perhaps will be a LONG non-mathematical minute to talk, which usually means, listen.
I have lived enough to understand, but I haven’t lived long enough to learn all there is to know. While there are things I am happy to not (want to) understand in matter of protecting my heart, mind, body, and spirit, I cannot see myself stop questioning.
Being a mother and teacher has truly allowed me to have an exchange of curiosities. I see the innocent mind wanting answers. While it can take you to a level of frustration when you truly cannot arrive at an answer to the insatiable questioning of “Why?” and you’re only grown-up response is, “You’ll understand when you get older”, I get the need to ask.
Needing to find answers is an ache to find an image to a puzzle piece in your head. Those innumerable amount of puzzle pieces you have been working on since you embraced the world with curiosities. Making sense of the world is just like so. The solid colored pieces, though needed for completion, are rather those you care less to picture or know about, but the pieces that help to form the desired image- those you MUST collect, piece by piece! And, you keep going until you find all missing pieces.
I have told my own children, “Ask. The most you’ll get is a ‘No’, but that never hurt anyone. You just ask someone else.” The sad part of life is when we stop asking.
That puzzle in your head? While the world and its complexities may never be complete, is it not to be the try in the journey to get as close to solving the entire puzzle?
Hint: Start with the flat ends and corners first. Those help to frame the entire outside of the puzzle. The rest is just part of the image you are trying to put together along with the solid background that must exist so you can enjoy wholeness of what a desired image is versus what it is not.
If nothing did not exist, what would replace it?
