How open is your mind?

I hear a lot of talk about open-mindedness. People pride themselves quite often on just how open their minds are, as though this is a great mental accomplishment and places their thought processes above those of the lesser minds who would close themselves off to the great possibilities of this universe. There are so many incredible possibilities out there that the poor, close-minded person can't grasp or even accept as possibilities, and they're left out of all the fun in which their open-minded friends and family get to participate. Such a sad life is that of the close-minded person.

But let's examine for a moment what it really means to be open or close-minded, and the realities of each. I'm going to provide you with a simple thought experiment to see just how close-minded you are:

Sitting on my coffee table is a shoebox. Quite ordinary and plain, stripped of the price tags and such once adorning it, with the logo of some store brand shoe company. I point to the box and inform you that there is, in fact, a small rhinoceros in the box.

You're snickering. Why? Don't you have an open mind? Anything is possible, and who are you to decide that there can't be a small rhinoceros in that shoebox? The universe is full of possibilities. Don't you owe it to yourself to be open to this one and not miss out?

That's better. I see you've come to your senses and remembered how open your mind is. Now that that's corrected, why don't you open the box and take a look at the rhinoceros. They're really quite adorable at such a miniature scale.

What's that? The box is empty? Oh, dear. Well, give it a minute and then open it up again. I'm sure it will be there this time, and it really is just too cute to miss out on.

What do you mean "that's ridiculous?" Keep an open mind. Just because it wasn't there a moment ago is no evidence that it won't be there now. Remember: anything is possible.

I see your hesitation, but clearly you realize your dedication to open-mindedness must be preserved, and you open the box again only to find it empty.

How strange. I assure you it must be there. Why don't you give it a few more minutes and then open it up again?

What? You refuse? You say there's clearly no small rhinoceros in that shoebox and there's never going to be? Tsk, tsk. You're so close-minded.

There's a progression between leaving your mind open to possibilities and finally closing it and moving it on. Somewhere between the two you have to cross a line where you decide that continuing to stay open to a possibility is simply irrational and absurd. For different people this line exists in different places. Some might have drawn that line with my first suggestion of a small rhino in a shoebox, rendering internally all the reasons this defies logic and reason, and refusing to so much as open the box. Another person might simply have taken the extra step of realizing there's no harm in opening the box beyond being laughed at if I were merely playing a joke on them. Some even more rational people might run through the possible ways in which I might be using wordplay or omitting facts, suspecting I mean a toy rhino, or a drawing of a rhino, and opening the box to see such an object.

However I daresay that nearly all rational people, whether or not they pride themselves on open-mindedness, would close their minds to the rhino-in-the-box scenario upon opening it and confirming the lack of said rhino. It takes a very... special person to remain so dedicated to their open-mindedness that they would ignore this clear resolution to the question and continue down my path of assertions that it will reappear at any moment. And even the most extreme example I give in my scenario still gives up at some point and determines the rhino is a no-show, no matter how adorable I assure you it is.

Now the other end of the scale that I mentioned has a person refusing to so much as open the box. I would tend to agree that such a person would fit the definition of "close-minded" relatively well, as well as fuddy-duddy and a bore, as well as someone I'm rather confident I've never met. But the next step, the person who's willing to open the box under the assumption that there's a trick to be played, or a circumstance that he or she had not considered, seems to me quite open-minded indeed. This person recognizes the absurdity of the claim, but also recognizes their lack of clear knowledge of all of the circumstances surrounding the situation and is willing to entertain the possibility that their assumption, no matter how well-founded it is, could be wrong. Once the box is opened and their initial assumption is confirmed, though, they move on and waste no more time on the subject.

The point I'm trying to make here is that along the scale from closed-to-open minds, the people being accused of being close-minded are rarely actually so, while the people who pride themselves on being open-minded are never as open-minded as they claim to be. There's always a line that will change one from the other if you just search hard enough for it.

When it comes to scientific endeavors, the so-called close-minded use these exact same tactics. They'll take a claim and test it. Oh, sure, the tests for most absurd claims are far, far more complex than merely peeking into a box, but the base principle is the same. They take the claim and they pass it through all the possible tests. Depending on the complexity or importance of the test, there may be far more interest, far more rigorous tests, and far more people involved. But the idea remains the same that it's carefully tested. Sometimes these close-minded scientists get a surprise and find that there's something to this that they might not initially have assumed was there. Other times the tests continually disprove the claim.

But this is where the so-called open minds step in and cry foul. This is where claims are made that those damned close-minded scientists merely don't want to see the truth. They're ignoring the possibilities that are out there and are just covering their ears and humming, while the enlightened folks with their open minds can see what's really going on. And no amount of scientific testing, research, facts, figures, statistics, and proof will change the mind of that open-minded person. That's right, the open-minded will not be moved, because they know the truth, and their wide-open minds will not be changed no matter what you close-minded researchers learned about the subject. Huh... strange how similar being incredibly open-minded is to being extremely close-minded when viewed from the other side, isn't it?

There's a phrase, recently popular thanks to Tim Minchin (although he'll readily admit it's not his): "If you open your mind too much your brain will fall out." It's funny, and while not literally true, it says a lot that comes close. When one opens their minds to all possibilities, and leaves it as wide open as possible, never narrowing the opening, never closing it for certain ideas that have played out their feasibility, never recognizing when something absurd has been sufficiently disproven, one loses all abilities to settle on any of reality. One loses the ability to look at something and recognize when it's real, when it's true, when it's solid, when it can be believed, trusted, accepted, and relied upon. Everything becomes possible, and anything can be true and untrue, and you can't settle down and move on. You get stuck and can no longer see the forest for the trees, the trees for the forest, or whether or not such things really exist.

Open-mindedness is wonderful, and it's something that those of us who have been accused of not having it actually cherish. The ability and willingness to look at any possibility, examine it with as little bias as possible, test it, and reach a conclusion based on logic, reason, research, and the work of others gives us the ability to not only open our minds, but expand them with an endless array of facts and truths that turn us on to all of the very real possibilities of this world. But we must never close our minds off to the possibility that reality is just that, and some things aren't possible, some things don't happen, any dream we have isn't the same as reality, and believing something against all evidence doesn't make us open-minded, but close-minded to the only reality we have, and the endless possibilities it provides us if we just focus on them and stop blurring them with fantasy.