ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines what some of the better questions are, to show how these better questions occur in other new and developing branches of science, and to show how the processes elucidated by those questions link up with the tasks of lifespan development during midlife. It discusses the potentially unique contributions of everyday cognitive studies. The chapter attempts to examine some "new" sciences as to ways they address the themes that appear in everyday cognitive research. It focuses on: new physics and quantum theory, especially concerning the nature of reality; the new biology, especially theories of cooperative evolution and brain development; new mathematics, especially chaos theory; and new cognitive sciences. In the rapidly changing everyday cognitive situation, one agent can have real and far-reaching power to influence change and cognitive meaning. The computerized version is a series of problems that yields both "postformal" and "cognitive style" scores useful for estimating cognitive complexity of teachers, trainers, and therapists.
