When Information Arrives

Vic Ward
5 min readAug 17, 2020
Photo by CDC on Unsplash

We form patterns as the information arrives. Once established these patterns have a life of their own. They link to other information and patterns link up with other patterns.

What does the sequence of information arrival have to do with anything?

In this article I’ll concentrate on the problem of when we become aware of new bits of information. How we form patterns from the information available until new information arrives that doesn’t fit. How we could rethink our previous assumptions about its meaning, it’s pattern.

When we become aware of new information previous information already has set a possible pattern as our guide to usefulness of new information.

Even authorities we have learned to trust don’t get us the information we need in the order we need.

Imagine you have a medical procedure coming up soon. Two days.

You need a CORID 19 test and was assigned a time to arrive for the test. It seemed too close to the assigned procedure. But, you go.

After you finished the test, they give you a paper that said, “It will be 3 or 4 days for the results to come back.”

On the morning of the procedure you call the surgeon’s clinic. You don’t have CORVID 19. You assumed they would call to inform you. They didn’t. If you hadn’t…

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Vic Ward
Vic Ward

Written by Vic Ward

Help people apply creativity, start new small businesses, use mobile devices, collaborate, understand the coming recession and keep up with the future of work.