Two of my daughters were talking about someone - "boyfriend" was the key word that got my attention... In the midst of the discussion my oldest said, "what do you expect? PNC."
I googled PNC with my real-time-daughter-translation-system (aka my wife) and found out it is an acronym for "People Never Change."
Interesting. Change what? Their character? Their basic human nature? To what extent are we able to change ourselves, to change others... to change societies?
Thomas Sowell argued that there are two broad competing visions that tend to shape our views in this area. Based on my reading, I think what he calls "vision" might be what we refer to in MBM as a "mental model." On one side is the "constrained vision": Human nature is what it is - it's not changing. PNC. On the other side is the "unconstrained vision": Human nature is malleable, perfectable.
Which end of the spectrum do you tend towards? Whatever the extremes or blend, it will have a big impact how you interact with the world. Sowell wrote, "we all have visions [mental models]- they are silent shapers of our thoughts." He also wrote, "we will do almost anything for our visions [mental models], except think about them."
His book, A Conflict of Visions, is an effort to get us to think about them. It is on the Principle Sources reading list for MBM.
Here is an interview with Thomas Sowell where he talks about his book.
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