Say, "Ahhhh!"

First visit to a new dentist. Brought a book to read (of course): Malcolm Gladwell's latest, What the Dog Saw and other adventures. As I'm sitting in the dentist's chair I'm reading about advancements in photography that allows more precision in everything from military bombing raids to detecting cancerous cells in breasts. The catch is that with more precision comes the need for more information: What part of the house is the terrorist in? Are these cells slow-growing or quick to metasticize? Seems more mastectomies are done now that don't need to be, as the cancers that are being detected are similar to those of the prostate--you'll probably die of something else long before it becomes a problem. Enter the dentist with some amazing state-of-the-art photography equipment (yes, here's the synchronicity...) that can see places inside my mouth that the X-rays can't. Sure enough. He found 3 areas that are going to cost me $1500. Now, if said areas had gone undetected, would I be so bad off? Is what I don't know really going to hurt me? Or should I wait until there's actually an obvious problem before I open my pocketbook? *Sigh* "Blessings" of the Age of Technology.