A guy wrote to me yesterday and gave me the Civil War enlistment dates for my great-grandfather. Now I already have them, and from multiple sources. I even have a photocopy of his military record that I ordered from the national archives. I didn't need this information at all, but what was my reply to him?
"May I please have the citation for the enlistment records you found?" Just as if it was all new to me.
Why? Why would I ask for that?! Why would I appear to not know what I already know? Because there must be no assumptions. Because it might be a source I don't know about, and the source might have even more information.
He wrote me back and yeah, it was a source I already had. So just like the other ninety-seven percent of the time, it went nowhere. But I still have to ask! There is that other three-percent. If I want the most complete picture, I still have to ask.
Many years ago, I had a friend who owned a store that sold audio and video equipment. Mostly televisions. We were sitting at his desk in the showroom talking, and a couple walked in, and he greeted them with a friendly and audible wave; They made a trip around his store, not liking anything they saw, they started out the store door and he gave them another friendly audible wave.
I said, "I don't know how you can handle that? Customer after customer, walking in and walking out without buying anything." He said, "It is like this. According to my data, every tenth customer that walks through that door makes a purchase. You interpret that as ninety-percent rejections. I choose to see each customer as ten-percent of a sale, even if they don't make a purchase."
Seeing the whole complete picture means incorporating the apparent "dead-ends" into the method, not just dismissing them.
Copyright © 2022 by Kevin W. Walker
