Scientific Vs Ad Hoc Techniques

We deal with this at work everyday but yesterday I encountered this situation at home. Aadi’s new sport is to sweep the house with a broom – ours looks like a wide brush with a long handle. He has been at it since this weekend and now starting to gain some proficiency. Yesterday, I saw him trying hard to sweep away a small piece of potato chip on the floor. I was amazed to see him apply a very scientific approach to this mundane task. He first squatted down and closely examined the chip and assessed he did not want to eat it (for once!). He then placed it precisely aligned (to what only he knows). I saw him fiddling with it for some time until he was satisfied. He then stood up and very deliberately starting moving his broom back and forth to sweep it away. Needless to say he missed it every time. So he squatted down again moved the chip half an inch to get closer to where he thought his broom with make contact, got up readjusted his stance and started doing sweeping motion again. I could almost see the ‘design of experiments’ unfolding in his little brain. He missed again, tried again after the third attempt managed to sweep is off. He was thrilled! He looked around to see if anyone noticed his triumph and was very pleased to see me watching.

I was so excited, I called Suvo to show him what was going on. I found the piece of chip, which had moved no more that 2 feet away and showed it to Aadi. Aadi was surprised and somewhat upset to see it! He tried to scold it for some time showing his displeasure at the impertinence the piece of chip showed in reappearing again after he had taken such pains to sweep it the first time. Nevertheless, he attempted to sweep it away again but this time got frustrated pretty soon and gave up. That’s when the master (rather mistress) of ‘ad hoc’ cleaning appeared – Maple! She was watching the show from sidelines and as soon as she found this opening, she swept in and licked the cheeky potato chip up. Mission accomplished!