I always think about when I was taught about taste and the human tongue back in grade school, they had these diagrams about zones on the tongue corresponding to sweet, sour, bitter, etc. like a “taste map”. I’m not sure how many generations were taught about it but turns out it just isn’t true at all. So, not like it’s important but you got a lot of misinformed folks out there in regards to taste lol
That always confused me as a child, since it was super easy to just test it for yourself. Turned out salt tasted salty regardless of where on your tongue it was, the same for the rest of the flavors.
Most school science is oversimplification by design. It’s part of the learning process. Yo first learn colors, then when you are ready can learn about wavelengths, color spaces, biology of the eye, color psicology and many many other knowledge fields.
Even when you get into the anatomy of the eye you get “false” information, like the “perfect” cones that only percibe one color, or the misconception that every color is equal. More advanced education gives you more context and nuances.
In the taste and tongue case can be useful to explain that senses are the product of discrete sensors. That you don’t taste with your tongue but with specialized little taste buds. The different concentrations are mostly real, so the tongue map is a first step, even being so so far from the objetive and complex truth.
The problem is people that think they only need whatever high school education they got to be experts in pandemics, gender, biological sex, business, economics, history, politics and everything else.
Take note that I’m not only talking about a formal education. You can really learn a lot (most things? Maybe everything?) by yourself. But you have to be critical with your sources. You have to know how to learn. You have to understand how little you know about everything and how much you still have to learn.
Most “do your own research” people in the internet do not do actual research, don’t know how to do research and I don believe they know what research is.
I always think about when I was taught about taste and the human tongue back in grade school, they had these diagrams about zones on the tongue corresponding to sweet, sour, bitter, etc. like a “taste map”. I’m not sure how many generations were taught about it but turns out it just isn’t true at all. So, not like it’s important but you got a lot of misinformed folks out there in regards to taste lol
That always confused me as a child, since it was super easy to just test it for yourself. Turned out salt tasted salty regardless of where on your tongue it was, the same for the rest of the flavors.
Yup I remember thinking to myself at the time that I must be tasting incorrectly or somehow my tongue is different from everyone else lol.
I wonder why they teach it too. Why teach misleading information that has no benefit but give people a wrong impression on how taste works
Most school science is oversimplification by design. It’s part of the learning process. Yo first learn colors, then when you are ready can learn about wavelengths, color spaces, biology of the eye, color psicology and many many other knowledge fields.
Even when you get into the anatomy of the eye you get “false” information, like the “perfect” cones that only percibe one color, or the misconception that every color is equal. More advanced education gives you more context and nuances.
In the taste and tongue case can be useful to explain that senses are the product of discrete sensors. That you don’t taste with your tongue but with specialized little taste buds. The different concentrations are mostly real, so the tongue map is a first step, even being so so far from the objetive and complex truth.
The problem is people that think they only need whatever high school education they got to be experts in pandemics, gender, biological sex, business, economics, history, politics and everything else.
Take note that I’m not only talking about a formal education. You can really learn a lot (most things? Maybe everything?) by yourself. But you have to be critical with your sources. You have to know how to learn. You have to understand how little you know about everything and how much you still have to learn.
Most “do your own research” people in the internet do not do actual research, don’t know how to do research and I don believe they know what research is.
For anyone interested https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taste#Functional_structure