You’ve probably heard the joke about the two hikers facing an angry bear. One changes into his running shoes, telling his confused friend: ‘I don’t need to outrun the bear, I just need to outrun you.’
The gag captures the importance of differentiating between the relative and the absolute. Knowing that a tree is taller than the other trees in the forest doesn’t tell you how tall that tree is – or how big the forest is.
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