The key to understanding complicated things is to know what NOT to look at, and NOT to think, and NOT to bother with. This disregarding of irrelevant aspects (with respect to a given purpose) is the KEY to clear thinking and modeling, and is what separates the master from the novice. (This of course applies to writing as well. The master knows what NOT to write, while the novice will write too much which has no bearing on the story or the article).
So sometimes you consider the Earth flat (although you know better), and sometimes you consider that the time is fix (although you know from Einstein’s theory that it really isn’t). And sometimes you consider a resistor to yield a constant current when constant voltage is applied to it (although you know this is not true when a very high constant voltage is applied).
I cannot say much for the last part, as I am not sure by what nomenclature you mean “master” and “novice”. I am highly introverted; growth to me is a comparison with self, not with others, so labels such as novice or master do not really apply, as the whole scale shifts with my own learning patterns. I am my own novice and my own master.
That aside for now, the first part of this is precisely what I have been saying: No model is preferable to a simplified false model, except of course when it comes to the sort of basic functioning that operates beneath the intellectual layer anyway. At that point, of course, it could be argued that the simplified model the sub-intellectual self operates on is actually just an intellectual projection into a state that cannot support such reasoning in either direction. To put it into an example: It would be truth to say that when we walk the process of locomotion is articulated on a simulated or simplified set of models for all the terrain, atmospheric conditions, body weight & balance, and so forth. We can, from an intellectual standpoint, then retrospectively analyse our locomotion and conjecture that we are operating on a simplified model—but are we actually, or are we simply functioning in a state where no relevant model (simplified or comprehensively true) is applicable? I need not be aware of every molecule that I am treading upon to cross a hallway. Intellectually speaking: My concept of the hallway surface is a simplified model of the fibres that make up the carpet and the trillions of particles that make up those fibres. But this is an intellectual statement! If we try to intellectualise the act of locomotion, we will fail (just as rationally trying to lace your shoes is more difficult than doing it without thinking of it) It is a sub-intellectual activity; so to apply intellectual parameters to it is, in an amusing sense, very similar to when we ascribe human characteristics to robots, computer software, or our pets.
So your statement in knowing what not to think and when something is not applicable is precisely what I have been saying all along. The problem with the rest of your argument is that you come back after saying that and declare that the insertion of abstracted models into these areas of “not-ness” is useful and necessary.
I cannot think of any time offhand where I genuinely consider the earth to be flat. I am either not thinking of its shape at all (listening to music in a dark room), or consider myself to be standing on the highest point of a globe relative to myself. Perhaps I am unusual in that. Likewise, I don’t think I ever consider time to be “fixed” in the sense you mean, because when relatively does not concern me I do not fill in the gap with something untrue. Just because I cannot perceive or notice a truth does not mean that I then operate as though it is untrue. I have never seen a germ, myself, but I certainly do not fall back into a frame of mind where germs do not exist because of that.
I am not saying that I am “always right” of course. My life has been, and I fully expect, will always be a continual process of learning, and by learning, replacing incorrect, impractical, and unpredictable models with better ones.
I think we both agree on the concept that perception of reality is a model by which we can fathom it. This is undeniable for a rash of complicated reasons and philosophical musings. The only thing I take issue with is the assertion that it is desirable or necessary or especially, useful, to substitute these perceptual models with ones we know to be false, when the more completely understood model is not relevant. I must say, I have never done this either accidentally or on purpose, except perhaps in the realm of habit (which is highly sub-intellectual anyway). Ever since I truly knew the earth was a globe, I have always visualised it as such. When I look out a window I see my point of view on this globe. So not only is the concept of substituting that for a flat earth model just plain odd to me, I don’t understand why one would ever wish to do so! What advantage could there possibly be?
I wonder if this might be one of those qualities which forms a gradient of human psychology into discrete moulds. I have frequently come up at odds with individuals who genuinely prefer self-acknowledged inaccurate models because it gives them comfort—and in some extreme cases even become disturbed or frightened if you try to remind them of it. It seems to me a fundamental difference in yearning. There are those who are disturbed by inaccurate models, and those who conversely are disturbed by accurate models. I use this word carefully, for I don’t mean to say that either basic grouping avoids the other set of models, but instead prefers one set to the other set. It also, of course, has nothing to do with intelligence, and some people can have a varying percentage of personal issues in which they might yearn one way instead of the other.
As for myself, I consider myself an extremist in the yearning towards truth fashion, and have always sought absolute and unglorified or glamourised truth, and once an inaccuracy is discovered in my thinking, I feel a swell of joy in replacing it (forever) with a more accurate model. It is not only undesirable, but I genuinely feel it would be impossible for me to fall back to simplified or inaccurate models, even when the more accurate one is not necessary. The above example of gazing out of a window is a good case for who I am in this regard. There is no reason for me to realise I am viewing the zenith point relative to my position on a globe—but likewise there is no way for me to, without giggling at the notion, think I am on a flat surface. It has been that way my whole life, and in every aspect of my life.