Making the reasoning real

In his words

Why would a kav of sesame seeds be different from a kav of wheat? He goes to the vegetable aisle: You ever see the price of garlic? 7:59 A little garlic costs a lot, and so do tiny sesame seeds. Bother matters only when the thing is at the bottom of the totem pole of importance: would you bother looking for it? 9:38 (a lost diamond, yes; a lost penny, leave it for the kids).

When the class asks what if the owner was poor, he explains the rule of majority: in a situation when you don't know, you go after what most people do 13:27.

Worked example from a class

Westwood, Nov 16, 2011: garlic against apples (7:51), the diamond and the penny (9:27), and the poor-owner question (12:32). The same habit appears with Gittin: a mailman delivering a gas bill doesn't have to testify that it's valid (45:21).

Hear him teach it

481 moments found so far in 416 transcribed classes; more appear as transcription continues. Tap one to play from that moment.

1. Westwood · Beginner class, Nov 16, 2011 · 9:38“We said that if you'd be missing one diamond in your house, and you have a big house, would you bother looking for it?”Uses the diamond vs penny analogy (and garlic vs apples) to show that value overrides bother.
2. Westwood · Beginner class, Nov 21, 2011 · 23:51“But let's say you have a pound of feathers. And let's say you have a pound of lead.”He uses an analogy to show why a kav of large fruit holds fewer items and less value.
3. Westwood · Beginner class, Nov 28, 2011 · 50:55“The reason why you have to return lost object is because there is a pasuk that says you have to return lost objects.”Shows the logic of why the Torah can permit keeping an object with a siman: the duty to return comes from the pasuk, not from human feeling.
4. Westwood · Beginner class, Nov 30, 2011 · 17:40“The basic rule is like this. The Torah says, this is based on the wording of the Possuk, of returning lost objects”He explains the logic behind zuto shel yam (an object lost to everyone, not just its owner) and tests it with examples such as a bird or a helicopter.
5. Westwood · Advanced class, Dec 9, 2011 · 48:26“If two people came to bastin, one says you owe me a hundred dollars and one says you don't owe me a hundred dollars.”A concrete money case shows why the simple reading, where every loser gets lashes, cannot be right.
6. Westwood · Beginner class, Dec 12, 2011 · 9:36“The reason why the person gives up hope is a natural phenomenon.”Giving up hope on an item without a siman is a natural fact, not something caused by the Mishnah.
7. Westwood · Beginner class, Dec 14, 2011 · 27:09“Because everybody buys eggs in a carton of twelve. There never would be a siman, right?”Uses an everyday egg-carton analogy to show that a common feature cannot serve as a siman.
8. Westwood · Beginner class, Dec 21, 2011 · 27:19“In other words, what I would call it is, it's an overkill.”Explains the logic of saying a principle in the harder case so that it applies all the more in the simple case.
9. Westwood · Beginner class, Dec 28, 2011 · 49:53“Let's say that the field is in Washington, D.C.”Makes the faraway-poor reasoning concrete to show potential yiush.
10. Westwood · Beginner class, Jan 2, 2012 · 10:02“But old men, they have their sticks and they are poking around like this.”Makes the definition of namoshos real: slow old men with sticks clear the field like a vacuum cleaner.