Introductory Questions

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, but how does it end?

Have you ever asked someone, "Are we there yet?" If so, whom were you asking - and where were you going? Did you ever get there?​

Have you ever gotten there, then decided it wasn't worth it in the end?

"And now, the end is near," croons Frank Sinatra. Bot how doe we know when we're getting to an ending - or to a point of no return?​

In 2003, millions of people gathered at theaters to watch the final Lord of the Rings movie. They watched it for a long time: three and a half hours. Many complained they kept thinking the movie was about to end, only to have it keep going; by most counts, the movie had five separate endings. Today, if you were streaming it at home, you'd easily be able to check how much longer you had to go. Does it make a difference to your experience of a work to know how close you are to the end of it?

How about in the real world? Does knowing something in your live - say, the school year, or a friendship - is about to end change how it feels or what it means to you?

Has an ending ever taken you by surprise? If so, what kind of ending was it?

When you're working on a group project, how do you keep track of progress?

It's not the destination, it's the journey," is a phrase often misattributed to the American writer Ralph Waldo Emerson. But is it ever just the destination?

Sometimes, not getting there - or anywhere - can be beautiful too. Are there places that were neither where you started nor where you were going, but were worthwhile destinations in their own right?

"I just can't wait to be king," complains Simba. He is not quite one thing, not quite another. Not everyone is the heir to the throne, but we do all spend time as teenagers, no longer children but not yet adults. Are there advantages to life in the in-between? Would it be better if we transitioned more quickly from childhood to adulthood?

Are there lessons we can learn from technologies that once seemed about to arrive—nuclear-powered cars, food pills, 3D televisions, and many more—but haven’t yet?

Do you keep a to-do list, or is it something you haven’t gotten around to? How much of your to-do list do you usually end up doing?

The truth is that sometimes we’ll never get there at all. Most videogames are left unfinished; nearly half of those who start university don’t get a degree. What do you think causes people to commit to things that they don’t complete—and are modern technologies making it easier or harder for us to get things done?

The question of whether we’re there yet is asked in other fields, too, such as business and economics. Is a product ready to be launched? Have we reached the point of diminishing returns? Do these questions ever apply in everyday life as well?

Here, the answers are probably yes and we’re getting there. So—let’s get started.