Why Do We Keep Opening the Fridge When We Already Know What's Inside? The refrigerator has not changed in the last seven minutes. We know this. We open it anyway. At some point in the evening, usually when there is absolutely no reason to be in the kitchen, I find myself standing in front of the refrigerator. The door opens. The light comes on. I stare. There is leftover rice. Half a cucumber. A container whose contents I have apparently decided are now part of the furniture. Some sauce. Cheese. Perhaps a fruit that has been sitting there long enough to acquire a personality. Nothing looks particularly exciting. I close the door. Three minutes later, I open it again. This time, I inspect the shelves from a different angle, as though the refrigerator has been quietly restocking itself behind my back. It hasn’t. Yet there is something deeply convincing about the possibility that this time might be different. That is the strange part. We rarely open the fridge because we genuinely b...