The faces of those killed at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School
I do not have an answer.
Friends, and pundits argue about gun control.
A recent video is going viral from a student at Douglas High School in which every other word is the "F" word. I can appreciate that anger is part of the grieving process, and those students have every right to be angry; hurt and angry.
I went to school at a time when no one would think of bring a gun on school premises. If you had a beef with someone, you went behind the stadium bleachers and duked it out.
Christians lament the fact that we have taken prayer, and God out of school. They have a point. But in this era, God is no longer allowed or spoken of in most homes.
What I want to know, how is it that kids get access to expensive and high powered weapons? An AK-15 costs on average $650 to $1200. I have no idea how much the ammunition costs.
By law, in some states a person can buy a gun when they are 18 years old, but they cannot buy beer or liquor.
Are parents so caught up in their own lives that they are not paying attention to what their children are doing? We have gotten to the point that for most families, it takes two incomes to maintain a decent standard of living. This means little or no adult supervision.
Many children grow up in a one parent home, due to divorce, or parents that never marry. There may be friction between the responsible adults over money or supervision.
There is so much prurient violence in television shows, movies, and video games that leads to desensitization. Death has become meaningless.
Look at our inner cities. We come to expect that at least one gang-banger is getting killed on a nightly basis. This usually has to do with drugs. We don't see the fact that this was someone's child.
A White supremacy claims that the Douglas High School shooter was a member. Are the police going to look into these morons to corroborate that claim?
But the fact remains that 17 precious lives were snuffed out.
It is easy to point the finger at Congress, or the President of the United States, and the FBI, but what about clues this boy left behind. He was expelled for disruptive behavior, and the police were at his home 36 times.
I don't have an answer.
In 2005 I went to a concert to see Buddy and Julie Miller perform. Both are singers and songwriters. Buddy is a Nashville legend and a record producer.
Julie is a very sweet soul, and stopped the show to talk about a song she had written called Rachel.
Rachel Scott
Rachel Scott was the first one of the 13 children killed at Columbine High School in 1999. This precious child was gunned down and murdered after the two shooters asked her if she believed in God.
Julie read a book that Rachel's parents had written and was inspired to write about this sweet young lady, then wrote this song.
It is heartbreaking that. 19 years later the words of this song still ring true.
Seventeen years, how could we know?
And thirteen years to make a flower grow
Tears that fell from your eyes
Were the ones heaven cries
For the children left to walk alone
There is a life no one can take
There is a chain of love no one can break
In all the world there is
No life greater than this
My Mom used to cut chicken, chop eggs and spread mayo on the same cutting board with the same knife and no bleach, but we didn't seem to get food poisoning.
My Mom used to defrost hamburger on the counter and I used to eat it raw sometimes, too. Our school sandwiches were wrapped in wax paper in a brown paper bag, not in ice pack coolers, but I can't remember getting E.coli.
Almost all of us would
Have rather gone swimming in the lake instead of a pristine pool (talk about boring), no beach closures then.
The term cell phone would have conjured up a phone in a jail cell, and a pager was the school PA system.
We all took gym, not PE.. and risked permanent injury with a pair of high top Ked's (only worn in gym) instead of having cross-training athletic shoes with air cushion soles and built in light reflectors.
I can't recall any injuries but they must have happened because they tell us how much safer we are now.
Flunking gym was not an option... Even for stupid kids! I guess PE must be much harder than gym.
Speaking of school, we all said prayers and sang the national anthem, and staying in detention after school caught all sorts of negative attention.
We must have had horribly damaged psyches. What an archaic health system we had then. Remember school nurses? Ours wore a hat and everything.
I thought that I was supposed to accomplish something before I was allowed to be proud of myself.
I just can't recall how bored we were without computers, Play Station, Nintendo, X-box or 270 digital TV cable stations
Oh yeah... And where was the Benadryl and sterilization kit when I got that bee sting? I could have been killed!
We played 'king of the hill' on piles of gravel left on vacant construction sites, and when we got hurt, Mom pulled out the 48-cent bottle of Mercurochrome (kids liked it better because it didn't sting like iodine did) and then we got our butt spanked.
Now it's a trip to the emergency room, followed by a 10-day dose of a $99 bottle of antibiotics, and then Mom calls the attorney to sue the contractor for leaving a horribly vicious pile of gravel where it was such a threat.
She's needs a spanking!
We didn't act up at the neighbor's house either; because if we did we got our butt spanked there and then we got our butt spanked again when we got home.
I recall Donny Reynolds from next door coming over and doing his tricks on the front stoop, just before he fell off.
Little did his Mom know that she could have owned our house.
Instead, she picked him up and swatted him for being such a jerk. It was a neighborhood run amuck.
To top it off, not a single person I knew had ever been told that they were from a dysfunctional family.
How could we possibly have known that?
We needed to get into group therapy and anger management classes.
We were obviously so duped by so many societal ills, that we didn't even
notice that the entire country wasn't taking Prozac!
How did we ever survive?
LOVE TO ALL OF US WHO SHARED THIS ERA; AND TO ALL WHO DIDN'T, SORRY FOR WHAT YOU MISSED. I WOULDN'T TRADE IT FOR ANYTHING!
Q: Doctor, I’ve heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life. Is this true?
A: Your heart only good for so many beats, and that it…don’t waste on exercise. Everything wear out eventually. Speeding up heart not make you live longer; it like saying you extend life of car by driving faster. Want to live longer? Take nap.
Q: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables?
A: You must grasp logistical efficiency. What does cow eat? Hay and corn. And what are these? Vegetables. So steak is nothing more than efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system. Need grain? Eat chicken. Beef also good source of field grass (green leafy vegetable). And pork chop can give you 100% of recommended daily allowance of vegetable product.
Q: Should I reduce my alcohol intake?
A: No, not at all. Wine made from fruit. Brandy is distilled wine, that mean they take water out of fruity bit so you get even more of goodness that way. Beer also made of grain. Bottom up!
Q: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio?
A: Well, if you have body and you have fat, your ratio one to one. If you have two bodies, your ratio two to one, etc.
Q: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program?
A: Can’t think of single one, sorry. My philosophy is: No pain…good!
Q: Aren’t fried foods bad for you?
A: YOU NOT LISTENING! Food are fried these day in vegetable oil. In fact, they permeated by it. How could getting more vegetable be bad for you?!?
Q: Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle?
A: Definitely not! When you exercise muscle, it get bigger. You should only be doing sit-up if you want bigger stomach.
Q: Is chocolate bad for me?
A: Are you crazy?!? HEL-LO-O!! Cocoa bean! Another vegetable! It best feel-good food around!
Q: Is swimming good for your figure?
A: If swimming good for your figure, explain whale to me.
Q: Is getting in shape important for my lifestyle?
A: Hey! ‘Round’ a shape!
Well, I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets.
And remember: Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safelyin an attractive and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways – Chardonnay in one hand – chocolate in the other – body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming “WOO-HOO, what a ride!!”
As you are aware President Obama brilliantly had the United States Justice Department and Attorney General Loretta Lynch.send an order to all federally funded schools, institutions and government buildings yesterday which made it illegal for these institutions to deny access to the public restroom that any transgender person chooses to use regardless of whether they have a “winky” or a “hoo-hoo”. This order was not just confined to public restrooms, but included public locker rooms, changing rooms and shower facilities. The order further went on to state violation of this order would result in loss of federal funding that the organization receives.
I am not certain if this order defines how to differentiate transgender individuals from those people who just want to get a peek into the restroom that they are not used to visiting for curiosity sake or those with a prurient interest, but I believe this point is extremely important and would hope the law would define these parameters.
But law is law and we need to live with it, I guess. So as a public service I offer a Primer on the Use of Restrooms for those not in the know and are using one that you usually do not visit..
I consider myself to be an expert on use of the Men’s Room facilities as I have acquired nearly 65 years of experience. So for transgendered folks born with female equipment, may I make these suggestions.
1.Do not poop in the urinals. They are called urinals for this reason.
2.When picking out which urinal to use, the piddle to floor ratio is very important. In other words pick the urinal with the least amount of urine on the floor directly below or in front of it. It helps keep your shoes clean. As a word of explanation.
There are two reasons guys piddle in front of a urinal.
Number One. It should be mandatory that urinal have signs reading, "Stand Close. It's shorter than you think." Number Two. With the epidemic of obesity, many men have not seen their "manservant" since they were about three years old.
3.Since you are not endowed with the necessary equipment to stand and deliver, I am not certain how you are going to accomplish using the urinal. For now this will present a problem, but I am confident that modern science will come up with a solution. But remember this; do not drop your trousers to the floor to pee. Use the zippers fly and the slot in your under-roos to urinate.
There are two reasons for this method of relieving ones self: Number one; it is inappropriate to show your bare ass to those in the restroom.
Number two; your pants will probably soak up the pee on the floor that was left from the guy who used the facility before your visit.
4.Please know that the appropriate behavior is not to look to the right or to the left at other participants. Either stare straight forward at the wall or look down to make sure you are piddling into the urinal and not on the floor or on your own shoes..
5.Do not use toilet paper to clean yourself. TP will not flush in the urinal. The appropriate action is to shake off. Remember the old adage, “No matter how much you shake it and dance; a few drops still go down your pants.”
6.When using the toilet for number two, although this behavior is verboten in the Lady’s room, it is OK to make grunt noises in the Men’s room. 7.It is probably not a good idea to have painted toenails if you are wearing sandals or flip flops while sitting in the stall. This may cause the guy in the stall next to you to wonder if he is in the right restroom.
8. Men do not pass toilet paper to each other. So don’t ask.
The only time I have visited the Lady’s room was a few years back when I had a concussion and was waiting to be seen in the Emergency Room and was a little woozy. I sauntered into the Lady’s room inadvertently and my first thought was “where the hell are all the urinals?”
So for all the transgender folks born with a “winky” I hope the following helps.
1.There are no urinals in the "ladies" room. Pee in the toilet located in one of the stalls.
2.The appropriate style to urinate is to sit down on the toilet. No more standing, as this will upset the user in the next stall.
3.Learn the following phrase: “Honey, could you please pass some toilet paper under the stall.”
4.No more shaking, only wiping.
5.No grunting noises in the Lady’s room if you are having a difficult bowel movement. This behavior is inappropriate.
I hope this advice is helpful when you are visiting a different restroom than the one you are used to using. Or as I like to put it, “Boldly going where no man has gone before.”
Oh yes, before I forget; Please remember to flush.
Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are in a bar. Donald leans over, and with a smile on his face, says, “The media are really tearing you apart for that scandal.”
Hillary: “You mean my lying about Benghazi?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “You mean the massive voter fraud?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “You mean the military not getting their votes counted?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “Using my secret private server with classified material to hide my activities?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “The NSA monitoring our phone calls, emails and everything else?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “Using the Clinton Foundation as a cover for tax evasion, hiring cronies,
and taking bribes from foreign countries?
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “You mean the drones being operated in our own country without the
benefit of the law?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “Giving 123 Technologies $300 Million, and right afterward it declared
bankruptcy and was sold to the Chinese?”
Trump: “No, the other one.”
Hillary: “You mean arming the Muslim Brotherhood and hiring them in the White House?”
1 - I'd kill for a Nobel Peace Prize. 2 - Borrow money from pessimists -- they don't expect it back. 3 - Half the people you know are below average. 4 - 99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name. 5 - 82.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot. 6 - A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good. 7 - A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory. 8 - If you want the rainbow, you got to put up with the rain. 9 - All those who believe in psycho kinesis, raise my hand. 10 - The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese. 11 - I almost had a psychic girlfriend, ..... But she left me before we met. 12 - OK, so what's the speed of dark? 13 - How do you tell when you're out of invisible ink? 14 - If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something. 15 - Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm. 16 - When everything is coming your way, you're in the wrong lane. 17 - Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be lazy. 18 - Hard work pays off in the future; laziness pays off now. 19 - I intend to live forever ... So far, so good. 20 - If Barbie is so popular, why do you have to buy her friends? 21 - Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines. 22 - What happens if you get scared half to death twice? 23 - My mechanic told me, "I couldn't repair your brakes, so I made your horn louder." 24 - Why do psychics have to ask you for your name 25 - If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried. 26 - A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking. 27 - Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it. 28 - The hardness of the butter is proportional to the softness of the bread. 29 - To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research. 30 - The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard. 31 - The sooner you fall behind, the more time you'll have to catch up. 32 - The colder the x-ray table, the more of your body is required to be on it. 33 - Everyone has a photographic memory; some just don't have film. 34 - If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you. 35 - If your car could travel at the speed of light, would your headlights work?
He has done more than any other President before him. Here is a list of his impressive accomplishments:
1. First President to be photographed smoking a joint.
2. First President to apply for college aid as a foreign student, then deny he was a foreigner.
3. First President to have a social security number from a state he has never lived in.
4. First President to preside over a cut to the credit-rating of the United States.
5. First President to violate the War Powers Act.
6. First President to be held in contempt of court for illegally obstructing oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
7. First President to require all Americans to purchase a product from a third party.
8. First President to spend a trillion dollars on "shovel-ready" jobs when there was no such thing as "shovel-ready" jobs.
9. First President to abrogate bankruptcy law to turn over control of companies to his union supporters.
10. First President to by-pass Congress and implement the Dream Act through executive fiat.
11. First President to order a secret amnesty program that stopped the deportation of illegal immigrants across the U.S., including those with criminal convictions.
12. First President to demand a company hand-over $20 billion to one of his political appointees.
13. First President to tell a CEO of a major corporation (Chrysler) to resign.
14. First President to terminate America’s ability to put a man in space.
15. First President to cancel the National Day of Prayer and to say that America is no longer a Christian nation.
16. First President to have a law signed by an auto-pen without being present.
17. First President to arbitrarily declare an existing law unconstitutional and refuse to enforce it.
18. First President to threaten insurance companies if they publicly spoke out on the reasons for their rate increases.
19. First President to tell a major manufacturing company in which state it is allowed to locate a factory.
20. First President to file lawsuits against the states he swore an oath to protect (AZ, WI, OH, IN).
21. First President to withdraw an existing coal permit that had been properly issued years ago.
22. First President to actively try to bankrupt an American industry (coal).
23. First President to fire an inspector general of AmeriCorps for catching one of his friends in a corruption case.
24. First President to appoint 45 czars to replace elected officials in his office.
25. First President to surround himself with radical left wing anarchists.
26. First President to golf more than 150 separate times in his five years in office.
27. First President to hide his birth, medical, educational and travel records.
28. First President to win a Nobel Peace Prize for doing NOTHING to earn it.
29. First President to go on multiple "global apology tours" and concurrent "insult our friends" tours.
30. First President to go on over 17 lavish vacations, in addition to date nights and Wednesday evening White House parties for his friends paid for by the taxpayers.
31. First President to have personal servants (taxpayer funded) for his wife.
32. First President to keep a dog trainer on retainer for $102,000 a year at taxpayer expense.
33. First President to fly in a personal trainer from Chicago at least once a week at taxpayer expense.
34. First President to repeat the Quran and tell us the early morning call of the Azan (Islamic call to worship) is the most beautiful sound on earth.
35. First President to side with a foreign nation over one of the American 50 states (Mexico vs Arizona).
36. First President to tell the military men and women that they should pay for their own private insurance because they "volunteered to go to war and knew the consequences."
37. Then he was the First President to tell the members of the military that THEY were UNPATRIOTIC for balking at the last suggestion.
Now see, you thought he has not accomplished anything during the past eight years.
1.“It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.” 2.“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.” 3.“Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in.” 4.“Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.” 5.“When I was younger I could remember anything, whether it happened or not.” 6.“The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” 7.“If the world comes to an end, I want to be in Cincinnati. Everything comes there ten years later.” 8.“All generalizations are false, including this one.” 9.“Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.” 10.“Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.” 11.“Never put off ‘till tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow.” 12.“My books are like water; those of the great geniuses are wine. (Fortunately) everybody drinks water.” 13.“Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is because we are not the person involved.” 14.“Ah, well, I am a great and sublime fool. But then I am God’s fool, and all His work must be contemplated with respect.” 15.“Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.” 16.“Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.” 17.“There are many humorous things in the world; among them, the white man’s notion that he less savage than the other savages.” 18.“There has been only one Christian. They caught him and crucified him–early.” 19.“Concerning the difference between man and the jackass: some observers hold that there isn’t any. But this wrongs the jackass.” 20.“Total abstinence is so excellent a thing that it cannot be carried to too great an extent. In my passion for it I even carry it so far as to totally abstain from total abstinence itself.” 21.”Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.”
Before Willie Hugh Nelson became famous, he had to do what he could to earn a living. As a young singer in Fort Worth, he worked selling encyclopedias and vacuum cleaners door-to-door.
Some days, when his work took him downtown, he’d see a disabled man dragging himself along the sidewalk on his hands and knees, wearing kneepads made from old tires. The man would make it to Leonard’s Department Store, sit outside the big glass doors, and sell pencils to passersby from a customized leather vest. At Christmastime, he’d hawk ribbons and gift wrap, calling out, “Pretty paper!”
A few years later, after Willie had moved to Nashville, he was walking around his farm when he had a vivid memory of the street vendor. He picked up his guitar and composed a ballad, contrasting the holiday shoppers’ joy and mirth with the man’s apparent loneliness and misery: “In the midst of the laughter, he cries.” Willie says the song took him only twenty minutes.
“It was an easy song to write. The easy ones write themselves.” Soon after, “Pretty Paper” was recorded by Roy Orbison, and it’s been a holiday classic ever since.
Willie didn’t know it, but the man’s name was Frankie Brierton. Born with spinal meningitis, he learned early on to get around on his hands and knees; later he’d drive himself to the department store every day in a car he had outfitted with hand-operated controls.
His daughter Lillian Compte says he refused all offers of government assistance. “He didn’t want to depend on anybody. He wanted to be on his own and take care of his family.” Brierton sold pretty paper in downtown Fort Worth for years and died in 1973 having never heard Willie’s song.
His daughter says he was anything but lonely or miserable, though. “He was married seven times.”
I was walking down a hallway. I had just left a restaurant and only ordered coffee. This place must have been in a large mall that had either a hotel or a casino housed within it’s walls.
As I was making my way through the crowd when I nearly bumped in to this very thin nice looking man. He was wearing dress slacks with pleats and creases and a mulit-colored pastel sweater with a light blue shirt. His shoes were Italian loafers.
To my surprise he says my name and greats me. “Hey Marc, how ya’ doin’? You know we are playing here on stage tonight. You ought to come.”
I said that would be swell but I’m stretched for funds and don’t have any tickets.
He replies, “No problem man. Meet me at my room and I’ll have a couple of tickets for you. See ya’!”
He gives me directions to go down this hallway and this corridor and turn here and turn there and just come on in. "Let them know Bobby sent you."
So I do this and come to an open door. To my surprise I see one of my favorite singers with a rope around his neck, hanging from the ceiling. Whoa! I don’t know what to do. This is terrible. Here is this very famous short Italian guy hanging from the ceiling and I figure he offed himself. I've listened to his music since I was a kid. I am totally freaked out.
He opens his eyes and looks at me and says, “Well what are you waiting for? Get me down.”
'turns out it was only a “joke” to shake up his band member friends. I find a chair or a ladder, I don’t remember what, I have a knife and I get him down.
About that time two other guys and a few women come in and want to know what all the commotion is and who the hell are you and why are you hanging our lead singer; Don’t you know he is a star!? Our whole act revolves around him!
I explain that I ran into my friend Bobby and he said he would give me a couple of tickets to your show if I came to his room. I walked in the room and found him hanging himself.
About this time “the Star” starts acting all crazy like he is messed up on some medication. I mean he is getting sweaty and slobbering and convulsing and just generally scaring me.
The other guys say, “Oh he’s just being goofy. He’s a big teaser. Don’t pay him any mind.” Then they start asking me what I know about the town and where is a good place to eat.
I say I'm from around here and know some nice places if you want to go out. They are all hungry and ready so we walk a couple of blocks and are in front of this white building that houses a pretty good restaurant.
I go in and make some reservations since I know the girl at the desk. I motion to my friends to come along. My wife has joined me by now and this place has a separate room for us. The band comes in with their ladies. I do not know if they were wives or girlfriends. My wife chats with them while we are drinking coffee and waiting for food.
These guys are all Italian and from the New Jersey area, except for one guy. I’m having a conversation with him and he tells me he is from Macedonia. He just got back from there and says he was real hassled coming through the airport. The guy has a full black beard and a uni-brow. He is short and well-dressed like the rest of them.
I’m wondering where is my friend Bobby. They tell me, “Oh yeah, Bobby is sort of new and he is an outsider. We are not really friendly with him, but he is a pretty good bass player.” We all continue talking, drinking coffee and waiting for dinner. I’m asking them about their music. But I wake up and I never find out if I got my tickets or how the show went. I bet it was awesome.
A man walked into the ladies department and shyly walked up to the woman behind the counter and said,
'I'd like to buy a bra for my wife. '
' What type of bra?' asked the clerk.
'Type?' inquires the man, 'There's more than one type?'
' Look around,' said the saleslady, as she showed a sea of bras in every shape, size, color and material imaginable.
'Actually, even with all of this variety, there are really only four types of bras to choose from.'
Relieved, the man asked about the types.
The saleslady replied:
'There are the Catholic, Salvation Army, Presbyterian, and the Baptist types.
Which one would you prefer?'
Now totally befuddled, the man asked about the differences between them.
The Saleslady responded, 'It is all really quite simple.'
'The Catholic type supports the masses;
The Salvation Army type lifts the fallen;
The Presbyterian type keeps them staunch and upright;
and the Baptist type makes mountains out of molehills.'
Oh you may have wondered why A, B, C, D, DD , E, F, G, and H are the letters used
to define bra sizes?
Here is what those letters stand for,so listen up and be informed!
{A} Almost Boobs.
{B} Barely there.
{
{C} Can't Complain.
{D} Dang!
{DD} Double dang!
{E} Enormous!
{F} Fake.
{G} Get a Reduction.
{H} Help me, I've fallen
and I can't get up!
And I almost forgot about the German bra.
Holtzemfromfloppen!'
Excerpted from an article in Brain Picking written by Maria Popova. She wrote it, and I am sharing it for your edification.
In view of the fact that we are in the midst of the "Silly Season" aka presidential elections, I think it appropriate to post Carl Sagan's 9 Rules for Bull-shit busting and Baloney Detection.
In his book, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, he states, "Through their training, scientists are equipped with what Sagan calls a “baloney detection kit” — a set of cognitive tools and techniques that fortify the mind against penetration by falsehoods: The kit is brought out as a matter of course whenever new ideas are offered for consideration. If the new idea survives examination by the tools in our kit, we grant it warm, although tentative, acceptance. If you’re so inclined, if you don’t want to buy baloney even when it’s reassuring to do so, there are precautions that can be taken; there’s a tried-and-true, consumer-tested method."
Sagan goes stating, "The kit, isn’t merely a tool of science — rather, it contains invaluable tools of healthy skepticism that apply just as elegantly, and just as necessarily, to everyday life. By adopting the kit, we can all shield ourselves against clueless guile and deliberate manipulation."
Now that we are rapidly approaching the culmination of the election season and subsequent manipulation of the media's version of reality, I thought it might be worthwhile to present Dr. Sagan's method of detecting falsehoods, half-truths, and essential horse pucky that we are being fed from all sides.
So here are Sagan's rules for critical thinking in a world of deceit, baloney that can be utilized when evaluating candidates, religious leaders and pundits that would make P.T. Barnum proud.
1. Wherever possible there must be independent confirmation of the “facts.”
2. Encourage substantive debate on the evidence by knowledgeable proponents of all points of view.
3. Arguments from authority carry little weight — “authorities” have made mistakes in the past. They will do so again in the future. Perhaps a better way to say it is that in science there are no authorities; at most, there are experts.
4. Spin more than one hypothesis. If there’s something to be explained, think of all the different ways in which it could be explained. Then think of tests by which you might systematically disprove each of the alternatives. What survives, the hypothesis that resists disproof in this Darwinian selection among “multiple working hypotheses,” has a much better chance of being the right answer than if you had simply run with the first idea that caught your fancy.
5. Try not to get overly attached to a hypothesis just because it’s yours. It’s only a way station in the pursuit of knowledge. Ask yourself why you like the idea. Compare it fairly with the alternatives. See if you can find reasons for rejecting it. If you don’t, others will.
6. Quantify. If whatever it is you’re explaining has some measure, some numerical quantity attached to it, you’ll be much better able to discriminate among competing hypotheses. What is vague and qualitative is open to many explanations. Of course there are truths to be sought in the many qualitative issues we are obliged to confront, but finding them is more challenging. If there’s a chain of argument, every link in the chain must work (including the premise) — not just most of them.
7. Occam’s Razor. This convenient rule-of-thumb urges us when faced with two hypotheses that explain the data equally well to choose the simpler.
9. Always ask whether the hypothesis can be, at least in principle, falsified. Propositions that are untestable, unfalsifiable are not worth much. Consider the grand idea that our Universe and everything in it is just an elementary particle — an electron, say — in a much bigger Cosmos. But if we can never acquire information from outside our Universe, is not the idea incapable of disproof? You must be able to check assertions out. Inveterate skeptics must be given the chance to follow your reasoning, to duplicate your experiments and see if they get the same result.
Just as important as learning these helpful tools, however, is unlearning and avoiding the most common pitfalls of common sense. Reminding us of where society is most vulnerable to those, Sagan writes:
"In addition to teaching us what to do when evaluating a claim to knowledge, any good baloney detection kit must also teach us what not to do. It helps us recognize the most common and perilous fallacies of logic and rhetoric. Many good examples can be found in religion and politics, because their practitioners are so often obliged to justify two contradictory propositions."
He admonishes against the twenty most common and perilous ones — many rooted in our chronic discomfort with ambiguity — with examples of each in action:
ad hominem — Latin for “to the man,” attacking the arguer and not the argument (e.g., The Reverend Dr. Smith is a known Biblical fundamentalist, so her objections to evolution need not be taken seriously)
argument from authority (e.g., President Richard Nixon should be re-elected because he has a secret plan to end the war in Southeast Asia — but because it was secret, there was no way for the electorate to evaluate it on its merits; the argument amounted to trusting him because he was President: a mistake, as it turned out)
argument from adverse consequences (e.g., A God meting out punishment and reward must exist, because if He didn’t, society would be much more lawless and dangerous — perhaps even ungovernable. Or: The defendant in a widely publicized murder trial must be found guilty; otherwise, it will be an encouragement for other men to murder their wives)
appeal to ignorance — the claim that whatever has not been proved false must be true, and vice versa (e.g., There is no compelling evidence that UFOs are not visiting the Earth; therefore UFOs exist — and there is intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe. Or: There may be seventy kazillion other worlds, but not one is known to have the moral advancement of the Earth, so we’re still central to the Universe.) This impatience with ambiguity can be criticized in the phrase: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
special pleading, often to rescue a proposition in deep rhetorical trouble (e.g., How can a merciful God condemn future generations to torment because, against orders, one woman induced one man to eat an apple? Special plead: you don’t understand the subtle Doctrine of Free Will. Or: How can there be an equally godlike Father, Son, and Holy Ghost in the same Person? Special plead: You don’t understand the Divine Mystery of the Trinity. Or: How could God permit the followers of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam — each in their own way enjoined to heroic measures of loving kindness and compassion — to have perpetrated so much cruelty for so long? Special plead: You don’t understand Free Will again. And anyway, God moves in mysterious ways.)
begging the question, also called assuming the answer (e.g., We must institute the death penalty to discourage violent crime. But does the violent crime rate in fact fall when the death penalty is imposed? Or: The stock market fell yesterday because of a technical adjustment and profit-taking by investors — but is there any independent evidence for the causal role of “adjustment” and profit-taking; have we learned anything at all from this purported explanation?)
observational selection, also called the enumeration of favorable circumstances, or as the philosopher Francis Bacon described it, counting the hits and forgetting the misses (e.g., A state boasts of the Presidents it has produced, but is silent on its serial killers)
statistics of small numbers — a close relative of observational selection (e.g., “They say 1 out of every 5 people is Chinese. How is this possible? I know hundreds of people, and none of them is Chinese. Yours truly.” Or: “I’ve thrown three sevens in a row. Tonight I can’t lose.”)
misunderstanding of the nature of statistics (e.g., President Dwight Eisenhower expressing astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans have below average intelligence);
inconsistency (e.g., Prudently plan for the worst of which a potential military adversary is capable, but thriftily ignore scientific projections on environmental dangers because they’re not “proved.” Or: Attribute the declining life expectancy in the former Soviet Union to the failures of communism many years ago, but never attribute the high infant mortality rate in the United States (now highest of the major industrial nations) to the failures of capitalism. Or: Consider it reasonable for the Universe to continue to exist forever into the future, but judge absurd the possibility that it has infinite duration into the past);
non sequitur — Latin for “It doesn’t follow” (e.g., Our nation will prevail because God is great. But nearly every nation pretends this to be true; the German formulation was “Gott mit uns”). Often those falling into the non sequitur fallacy have simply failed to recognize alternative possibilities;
post hoc, ergo propter hoc — Latin for “It happened after, so it was caused by” (e.g., Jaime Cardinal Sin, Archbishop of Manila: “I know of … a 26-year-old who looks 60 because she takes [contraceptive] pills.” Or: Before women got the vote, there were no nuclear weapons)
meaningless question (e.g., What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object? But if there is such a thing as an irresistible force there can be no immovable objects, and vice versa)
meaningless question (e.g., What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object? But if there is such a thing as an irresistible force there can be no immovable objects, and vice versa)
excluded middle, or false dichotomy — considering only the two extremes in a continuum of intermediate possibilities (e.g., “Sure, take his side; my husband’s perfect; I’m always wrong.” Or: “Either you love your country or you hate it.” Or: “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem”)
short-term vs. long-term — a subset of the excluded middle, but so important I’ve pulled it out for special attention (e.g., We can’t afford programs to feed malnourished children and educate pre-school kids. We need to urgently deal with crime on the streets. Or: Why explore space or pursue fundamental science when we have so huge a budget deficit?);
slippery slope, related to excluded middle (e.g., If we allow abortion in the first weeks of pregnancy, it will be impossible to prevent the killing of a full-term infant. Or, conversely: If the state prohibits abortion even in the ninth month, it will soon be telling us what to do with our bodies around the time of conception); *NOTE: These are Sagan's thoughts, not mine as I believe abortion is wrong.
confusion of correlation and causation (e.g., A survey shows that more college graduates are homosexual than those with lesser education; therefore education makes people gay. Or: Andean earthquakes are correlated with closest approaches of the planet Uranus; therefore — despite the absence of any such correlation for the nearer, more massive planet Jupiter — the latter causes the former)
straw man — caricaturing a position to make it easier to attack (e.g., Scientists suppose that living things simply fell together by chance — a formulation that willfully ignores the central Darwinian insight, that Nature ratchets up by saving what works and discarding what doesn’t. Or — this is also a short-term/long-term fallacy — environmentalists care more for snail darters and spotted owls than they do for people)
suppressed evidence, or half-truths (e.g., An amazingly accurate and widely quoted “prophecy” of the assassination attempt on President Reagan is shown on television; but — an important detail — was it recorded before or after the event? Or: These government abuses demand revolution, even if you can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs. Yes, but is this likely to be a revolution in which far more people are killed than under the previous regime? What does the experience of other revolutions suggest? Are all revolutions against oppressive regimes desirable and in the interests of the people?)
weasel words (e.g., The separation of powers of the U.S. Constitution specifies that the United States may not conduct a war without a declaration by Congress. On the other hand, Presidents are given control of foreign policy and the conduct of wars, which are potentially powerful tools for getting themselves re-elected. Presidents of either political party may therefore be tempted to arrange wars while waving the flag and calling the wars something else — “police actions,” “armed incursions,” “protective reaction strikes,” “pacification,” “safeguarding American interests,” and a wide variety of “operations,” such as “Operation Just Cause.” Euphemisms for war are one of a broad class of reinventions of language for political purposes. Talleyrand said, “An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old names have become odious to the public”)
Sagan concludes with a necessary disclaimer:
"Like all tools, the baloney detection kit can be misused, applied out of context, or even employed as a rote alternative to thinking. But applied judiciously, it can make all the difference in the world — not least in evaluating our own arguments before we present them to others."
The old man sat in his gas station on a cold Christmas Eve. He hadn't been anywhere in years since his wife had passed away. It was just another day to him. He didn't hate Christmas, just couldn't find a reason to celebrate.
He was sitting there looking at the snow that had been falling for the last hour and wondering what it was all about when the door opened and a homeless man stepped through.
Instead of throwing the man out, Old George as he was known by his customers, told the man to come and sit by the heater and warm up.
"Thank you, but I don't mean to intrude," said the stranger. "I see you're busy, I'll just go." "Not without something hot in your belly." George said.
He turned and opened a wide mouth Thermos and handed it to the stranger. "It ain't much, but it's hot and tasty. Stew ... Made it myself. When you're done, there's coffee and it's fresh."
Just at that moment he heard the "ding" of the driveway bell. "Excuse me, be right back," George said. There in the driveway was an old '53 Chevy. Steam was rolling out of the front. The driver was panicked. "Mister can you help me!" said the driver, with a deep Spanish accent. "My wife is with child and my car is broken." George opened the hood. It was bad. The block looked cracked from the cold, the car was dead.
"You ain't going in this thing," George said as he turned away.
"But Mister, please help ..." The door of the office closed behind George as he went inside. He went to the office wall and got the keys to his old truck, and went back outside. He walked around the building, opened the garage, started the truck and drove it around to where the couple was waiting.
"Here, take my truck," he said. "She ain't the best thing you ever looked at, but she runs real good."
George helped put the woman in the truck and watched as it sped off into the night. He turned and walked back inside the office.
"Glad I gave 'em the truck, their tires were shot too. That 'ol truck has brand new ."
George thought he was talking to the stranger, but the man had gone. The Thermos was on the desk, empty, with a used coffee cup beside it. "Well, at least he got something in his belly," George thought.
George went back outside to see if the old Chevy would start. It cranked slowly, but it started. He pulled it into the garage where the truck had been. He thought he would tinker with it for something to do. Christmas Eve meant no customers. He discovered the block hadn't cracked, it was just the bottom hose on the radiator. "Well, shoot, I can fix this," he said to聽
himself. So he put a new one on.
"Those tires ain't gonna get 'em through the winter either." He took the snow treads off of his wife's old Lincoln. They were like new and he wasn't going to drive the car anyway.
As he was working, he heard shots being fired. He ran outside and beside a police car an officer lay on the cold ground. Bleeding from the left shoulder, the officer moaned, "Please help me."
George helped the officer inside as he remembered the training he had received in the Army as a medic. He knew the wound needed attention. "Pressure to stop the bleeding," he thought. The uniform company had been there that morning and had left clean shop towels. He used those and duct tape to bind the wound. "Hey, they say duct tape can fix anythin'," he said, trying to make the policeman feel at ease.
"Something for pain," George thought. All he had was the pills he used for his back. "These ought to work."
He put some water in a cup and gave the policeman the pills. "You hang in there, I'm going to get you an ambulance."
The phone was dead. "Maybe I can get one of your buddies on that there talk box out in your car." He went out only to find that a bullet had gone into the dashboard destroying the two way radio.
He went back in to find the policeman sitting up. "Thanks," said the officer. "You could have left me there. The guy that shot me is still in the area."
George sat down beside him, "I would never leave an injured man in the Army and I ain't gonna leave you."
George pulled back the bandage to check for bleeding. "Looks worse than what it is. Bullet passed right through 'ya. Good thing it missed the important stuff though. I think with time your gonna be right as rain."
George got up and poured a cup of coffee. "How do you take it?" he asked. "None for me," said the officer. "Oh, yer gonna drink this. Best in the city. Too bad I ain't got no donuts." The officer laughed and winced at the same time.
The front door of the office flew open. In burst a young man with a gun. "Give me all your cash! Do it now!" the young man yelled. His hand was shaking and George could tell that he had never done anything like this before.
"That's the guy that shot me!" exclaimed the officer.
"Son, why are you doing this?" asked George, "You need to put the cannon away. Somebody else might get hurt."
The young man was confused. "Shut up old man, or I'll shoot you, too. Now give me the cash!"
The cop was reaching for his gun.
"Put that thing away," George said to the cop, "we got one too many in here now."
He turned his attention to the young man. "Son, it's Christmas Eve. If you need money, well then, here. It ain't much but it's all I got. Now put that pea shooter away."
George pulled $150 out of his pocket and handed it to the young man, reaching for the barrel of the gun at the same time.
The young man released his grip on the gun, fell to his knees and began to cry. "I'm not very good at this am I? All I wanted was to buy something for my wife and son," he went on. "I've lost my job, my rent is due, my car got repossessed last week."
George handed the gun to the cop. "Son, we all get in a bit of squeeze now and then. The road gets hard sometimes, but we make it through the best we can."
He got the young man to his feet, and sat him down on a chair across from the cop. "Sometimes we do stupid things." George handed the young man a cup of coffee. "Bein' stupid is one of the things that makes us human. Comin' in here with a gun ain't the answer. Now sit there and get warm and we'll sort this thing out."
The young man had stopped crying. He looked over to the cop. "Sorry I shot you. It just went off. I'm sorry officer." "Shut up and drink your coffee " the cop said.
George could hear the sounds of sirens outside. A police car and an ambulance skidded to a halt. Two cops came through the door, guns drawn. "Chuck! You ok?" one of the cops asked the wounded officer.
"Not bad for a guy who took a bullet. How did you find me?"
"
GPS locator in the car. Best thing since sliced bread. Who did this?" the other cop asked as he approached the young man.
Chuck answered him, "I don't know. The guy ran off into the dark. Just dropped his gun and ran."
George and the young man both looked puzzled at each other.
"That guy work here?" the wounded cop continued. "Yep," George said, "just hired him this morning. Boy lost his job."
The paramedics came in and loaded Chuck onto the stretcher. The young man leaned over the wounded cop and whispered, "Why?"
Chuck just said, "Merry Christmas boy ... and you too, George, and thanks for everything."
"Well, looks like you got one doozy of a break there. That ought to solve some of your problems."
George went into the back room and came out with a box. He pulled out a ring box. "Here you go, something for the little woman. I don't think Martha would mind. She said it would come in handy some day."
The young man looked inside to see the biggest diamond ring he ever saw. "I can't take this," said the young man. "It means something to you."
"And now it means something to you," replied George. "I got my memories. That's all I need."
George reached into the box again. An airplane, a car and a truck appeared next. They were toys that the oil company had left for him to sell. "Here's something for that little man of yours."
The young man began to cry again as he handed back the $150 that the old man had handed him earlier.
"And what are you supposed to buy Christmas dinner with? You keep that too," George said.
"Now git home to your family."
The young man turned with tears streaming down his face. "I'll be here in the morning for work, if that job offer is still good."
"Nope. I'm closed Christmas day," George said. "See ya the day after."
George turned around to find that the stranger had returned. "Where'd you come from? I thought you left?"
"I have been here. I have always been here," said the stranger. "You say you don't celebrate Christmas. Why?"
"Well, after my wife passed away, I just couldn't see what all the bother was. Puttin' up a tree and all seemed a waste of a good pine tree. Bakin' cookies like I used to with Martha just wasn't the same by myself and besides I was gettin' a little chubby."
The stranger put his hand on George's shoulder. "But you do celebrate the holiday, George. You gave me food and drink and warmed me when I was cold and hungry. The woman with child will bear a son and he will become a great doctor.
The policeman you helped will go on to save 19 people from being killed by terrorists. The young man who tried to rob you will make you a rich man and not take any for himself. "That is the spirit of the season and you keep it as good as any man."
George was taken aback by all this stranger had said.
"And how do you know all this?" asked the old man.
"Trust me, George. I have the inside track on this sort of thing. And when your days are done you will be with Martha again."
The stranger moved toward the door. "If you will excuse me, George, I have to go now. I have to go home where there is a big celebration planned."
George watched as the old leather jacket and the torn pants that the stranger was wearing turned into a white robe. A golden light began to fill the room.
"You see, George ... it's My birthday. Merry Christmas."
George fell to his knees and replied, "Happy Birthday, Lord Jesus"
Merry Christmas!!
