Right Question

There was a sci-fi story by the only sci-fi writer I can countenance (Robert Sheckley (OK, Connie Willis rocks)) in which a super advanced civilization drops off a robot on Earth to answer all our questions for us. It didn't work though. The problem was that people were too ignorant to ask the correct questions. For example, say someone asked "Where does the phlogiston go when you burn things?," there would be no answer, because the question has no meaning. The poor robot would mutter the correct question under its breath and then answer THAT question.

Several people have asked me "Can you sell your house today for more than you paid for it?" Wrong question. It disregards all the costs of home owning, including (especially including) interest payments. While I owned the house, I paid $45,000 in interest. This doesn't seem to mean much to people, I guess because the word "interest" doesn't sound alarming. If you replace the word "interest" with "pornography", it sounds more serious though so please do that mentally if it helps.

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