Hindsight: The Promise and Peril of Looking Backward

Although the idea of hindsight is frequently associated with the biases, distortions, and outright lies of memory--as in the infamous "20-20" scenario or the conviction that one "knew it all along"--Mark Freeman maintains that this process of looking backward over the terrain of the past can also serve as a profound source of insight, understanding, and self-knowledge. Consider Tolstoy's harrowing tale of Ivan Ilych, revisiting his past on the eve of his death, only to realize that the life...