What would the world look like if nobody ever made a mistake? Ian Osborne, Worcestershire<\/p>\n
Send new questions to nq@theguardian.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n Readers reply<\/p>\n Quite boring, to be honest. Sagarmatha1953<\/p>\n Presumably, the world would sound very different, since nobody would have felt the need to develop pitch-correction software such as Auto-Tune<\/a>. EddieChorepost<\/p>\n It wouldn\u2019t exist. Mistakes are almighty: you can\u2019t ever guarantee that the next moment will host no manifestation of a mistake. According to evolution theory, the diversity of life on Earth entirely emerges from copying mistakes of DNA polymerase. Boris Borcic<\/p>\n If you\u2019re going to count mutations as mistakes, we\u2019d have no evolution, so we\u2019d all be primordial goo. unclestinky<\/p>\n Suggesting that failing is a fail is a terrible perspective. It\u2019s a natural part of life and, yes, some fails will end badly, but there\u2019s no better way for establishing the best ways of doing things. Jon Wyatt<\/p>\n We\u2019d lose quite a few inventions where people made a mistake<\/a> and yet something useful came of it, such as Corn Flakes, Super Glue, dynamite, Post-it notes, Popsicles, penicillin, Teflon, X-rays, microwave ovens, vulcanised rubber and many more. Troy_McClure<\/p>\n It depends on how you define \u201cmistake\u201d. For instance, I think unleashing unregulated AI<\/a> is a huge mistake, but I know others who think it\u2019s marvellous. I think the Industrial Revolution was a gargantuan mistake, but perhaps most of humanity would disagree. poorprints<\/p>\n It would look infinitely utopier than it does now. If I\u2019m not mistaken, that is. ThereisnoOwl<\/p>\n Every football match would end 0-0. PeteTheBeat<\/p>\n We\u2019d still be living in the Garden of Eden, in affordable housing<\/a>. jno50<\/p>\n I remember being told as a youngster: \u201cA person who has never made a mistake has never made anything.\u201d d33pf1x<\/p>\n If there\u2019s a divine force in the universe that is looking over us (from a safe distance?) then it seems to me that we are allowed free will so that we can make mistakes and learn from them. Otherwise, we would be nothing but flawless machinery. Isn\u2019t the larger question whether we are capable of learning from our mistakes? Maybe it\u2019s time to work on improving our social and emotional regulation skills? Tech and better tools in the hands of the emotionally stunted isn\u2019t working out all that well. GrannieSal<\/p>\n A lot of potential answers depend on whether bad judgment counts as a mistake. There are countless examples of individuals, groups, entire countries and even civilisations choosing the wrong option. I expect a lot of wars, famines and recessions would have been avoided if better choices were made throughout history.<\/p>\n A world without mistakes would probably mean a world with barely any risk-taking. We\u2019d all be much more equal; the difference between the haves and have-nots would be smaller. What there would be to actually have, and all the options and opportunities available, might be much more limited, though. GhostieRidesAgain<\/p>\n Well, you can look at pharmaceutical companies or oil firms or even (my gosh) governments, but for individuals we might just have world peace. Think: no more speeding cars or drink-driving. The world would be very nice and we could dedicate ourselves to improvements. David Hollinger<\/p>\n Who judges a \u201cmistake\u201d? For instance, I think bombing Iran is a mistake<\/a>, some people think it\u2019s exactly the right thing to do. Selling Britain\u2019s water providers<\/a>? Ditto. And many other things. Essentially, there may be no such thing as a mistake, only a different viewpoint. Mind you, anything Maggie did or Donald does is a mistake. Voting for them, too. Innocent<\/p>\n Eventually, everyone makes a mistake. I\u2019m dreading it! BaronOchs<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What would the world look like if nobody ever made a mistake? Ian Osborne, Worcestershire Send new questions…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539666,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[96,59,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-539665","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-gb","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539665","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=539665"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539665\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}