Why Bats Shouldn’t Exist: The Limits of Knowledge, the Pitfalls of Prediction, and the Triumph of the Possible Over the Probable

Prediction is the sharpest tool the human animal has devised — the chisel with which we sculpted survival out of chance, the fulcrum by which we lifted civilization out of survival. Among the greatest gifts of the imagination, that crowning curio of consciousness, is our ability to alchemize hindsight into foresight, to chart the most probable course of the future by drawing on our experience of the past. And yet, like the tragic flaw of the Greek hero, our great strength is also our great vulne...