Daddy: Ok, I’ll sleep with you for a looong five minutes, how 'bout that.
Kaden: Ok.
Daddy: Kades, do you think there can be a short five minutes and a long five minutes?
Kaden: Well, maybe in those other places around the world that have different times.
Daddy: You mean different time zones?
Kaden: Yeah, I think so.
Daddy: So you mean, maybe somewhere else in the world, five minutes is really six minutes long?
Kaden: Maybe.
Daddy: Do you think time is longer on the Moon?
Kaden: [laughs] Daddy, there aren’t any people on the Moon.
Daddy: [laughs] Oh, right, what was I thinking?
[Kaden thinks a bit]
Kaden: … actually, I think you can have time even if there’s no people.
Cassidy: Five minutes is five minutes. It can’t be different. Sometimes time can feel like it’s taking longer, but it always takes the same amount of time.
Your kids are very bright. Children are naturally better at philosophy than most adults. Often, they are better at drawing, composing simple songs and telling certain kinds of stories. It’s mysterious but obvious. Philosophy is an art.
I told them I could make a piece of paper with only one side. They doubted me. So I showed them. I cut out of strip of paper, colored one side purple, the other side green, and then made a mobius strip out of it. I showed them that if you keep following the strip on the purple side, you eventually get to the green side, and then back to the purple side.
You should ask them in the universe has an end. If they say no, then ask them how we could ever know if its just over the horizon from our point of view. If they say yes, then ask them whats on the other side of the border of the universe.
I successfully taught my daughter the synthetic/analytic distinction. I said to her:
“You know, Cassidy, there are some thing that people will tell you that you have to go out and check to see if it’s true, then there are things people will tell you that you can figure out if it’s true or not in your head. So for example, if I told you that I had eggs for breakfast this morning, can you figure out if that’s true in your head or do you have to go out and check?”
“Go out and check.”
“And if I told you that 6 times 4 is 24, could you figure out if that’s true in your head or do you have to go out and check?”
Yes, but you could have also told her that it’s okay to go out and check thereby teaching her the scientific method. Some things which we think are true in our heads are not necessarily so.
Sometimes we are right and sometimes we are wrong.
It’s brilliant. I certainly couldn’t write like that.
I think every parent ought to home school their children a little bit, don’t you?
When philosophy grows up, it becomes a new discipline. Math began as philosophy, science began as philosophy, religion (AFAIC) began as philosophy. But the spout keeps dripping more.