We are talking about my father dying. He tells us where he keeps his financial information, in case that happens sometime soon. It will happen eventually, of course.

“How does the bank know when someone dies?” my sister asks.

“Well, they don’t.”

She is surprised. “What? They must know somehow. They must keep track…?”

But no. The responsibility falls on the next of kin of the deceased, not “they”.

“They” show up in a surprising number of places. “They” fill the fuzzy gaps in and at the edges of our conceptual models. Filling a conceptual gap with “they” is usually a mistake.

The first form of the “they” mistake is the positive, benevolent. It is believing that “they” will take care of it. That “they” are watching and that they will make sure everything is OK. That “they” keep track of important things like who’s alive or dead, and make sure all the relevant people are informed.

“They” is our parents, teachers, authority figures when we’re children. As a child it is sometimes true that “they” will take care of it, that they will make it all OK. They often do. But as an adult, “they” is a vaguery that doesn’t serve much useful purpose.

The second form of the “they” mistake is the negative, the sinister. A fellow at a party once was complaining about the government, as if “they” were a greedy, power-hungry bunch whose singular purpose was to oppress the rest of us (in Canada!) Perhaps he can be forgiven, as he was only a university student, but his model of the government was pretty fuzzy.

The negative form also shows up when it is suggested that something good might actually happen in society. Someone jumps in to assure us that “they” would never let that happen! The negative “they” are looming over us at all times, propagating the ills of the world and tirelessly fighting against the good.

It is easy to see that the positive and negative are mirror images of the same mistake. Search your mind – which fuzzy gaps is “they” filling? Strive instead to fill those gaps with greater knowledge and understanding.