Conversation with Emily #1290

This afternoon Emily and I were talking about basketball for some reason.  And soon we were talking about the rules for some reason (I forgot why).

Me: What would you do if you were a ref in a pro game?

Emily: I don't know.  Just run up and down the court doing this (mimics hand gesture refs use to count time... see ref at the right hand corner in the video below if you don't know what I'm referring to).

Me (very curious what her explanation will be): Why do refs to that?

Emily: To make sure the person with the ball is dribbling it.  When the guy with the ball is dribbling, the ref moves his hand.  When he stops dribbling or passes, the ref stops moving his arm.

Me: What?  Why would they do that?

Emily: So they can keep track if he's supposed to be dribbling or not.  To count if he's traveling.  He's fake dribbling.

This is actually a logical explanation... if the ref was five.  I am going to make a bigger effort to get Emily's explanations as to why refs are doing other things in sports.  She was a softball ump once.  That in and of itself is a funny story now that more than a decade has passed and the parents who wanted to "kill the ump" have had a chance to cool off. Emily also played softball in high school, so she has those rules covered.  But I am really curious to see what she has to say about referee behaviors in football and basketball.

Examples like this, where we come to goofy but logical conclusions are rare in adulthood and it is the closest we can get to seeing the world as kids.  You have a little bit of information about something and you have to tie it into your world knowledge.  Just like Charlotte thinks I drink black water, the Mississippi River runs down our sidewalk, and Suze is on every airplane on earth, there are still times when we can make similar crazy ass conclusions, like refs making like the Crown Prince of Baseball mimicking the players while they play.  I'm sure we all have this sweet spot of some enough information to make inferences about something, but not enough to make them accurately.

I just seredipitously happened to stumble across Emily's area: refs and sports.  But it is awesome when Emily does it because she has this was of presenting her theory as if it's God's truth.