Endeavors to interpret only values outside the normal range are Sisyphean to
the point of recalling the tall tale of Baron Münchhausen's horse: the
horse was cut in two by the town gate as it closed; when the head of the horse
subsequently drank at the well, the water poured out of its severed middle onto
the ground. Similarly, much information from within the physiologic range (the
indispensable water in our analogy) is lost today, but may be usefully recycled
tomorrow.
(Illustration by Martin and Ruth Koser-Michaels from Münchhausen: Des
Freiherrn Wunderbare Reisen und Abenteuer, Droemersche Verlagsanstalt,
Munich, © 1952, facing p. 32. Reproduced with permission of the publisher.)
