#202 - How Easy Is It To Lie?

• Article: - I Fooled Millions Into Thinking Chocolate Helps Weight Loss. Here's How. - io9 Gizmodo - John Bohannon - May 27, 2015 

  • • Backup Document:  I Fooled Millions Into Thinking Chocolate Helps Weight Loss. Here's How. - io9 Gizmodo - John Bohannon - May 27, 2015 

• Study: Chocolate with high Cocoa content as a weight-loss accelerator - Johannes Bohannon, Diana Koch, Peter Homm, Alexander Driehaus - Institute of Diet and Health - Poststr. 37. 55126 Mainz, GERMANY

#203 - Three Men Make a Tiger

“Nothing travels faster than the speed of light, with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.”-Douglas Adams

Three Men Make a Tiger is a Chinese proverb. It is a parable that warns the reader that we have a tendency to accept absurd things as true if we are told it by enough people. This story is from a text called Zhan Guo Ce from somewhere between the 5th and 3rd century BCE. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_men_make_a_tiger 

Before he left on a trip to the state of Zhao, Pang Cong asked the King of Wei whether he would hypothetically believe in one civilian's report that a tiger was roaming the markets in the capital city, to which the King replied no. Pang Cong asked what the King thought if two people reported the same thing, and the King said he would begin to wonder. Pang Cong then asked, "what if three people all claimed to have seen a tiger?" The King replied that he would believe in it. Pang Cong reminded the King that the notion of a live tiger in a crowded market was absurd, yet when repeated by numerous people, it seemed real. Since Pang Cong, as a high-ranking official, had more than three opponents and critics, he was in fact urging the King to pay no attention to those who would spread rumors about him (Pang Cong) while he was away. "I understand," the King replied, and Pang Cong left for Zhao. Yet, slanderous talk took place. When Pang Cong returned to Wei, the King indeed stopped seeing him. 

If We Hear Something From More Than One Place, Does That Make It True?

• Argumentum ad populum - Most of the people you know says X is true (appeal to the people)

• Argumentum ad nauseum - Some people think X is true, Others think Y is true. No conclusion has been made but everyone is sick of talking about it now. People have been talking about this often enough that everyone has heard of the argument.

The Speed of Repeating Is Faster Than the Speed of Verification

• Video: CMCMath 2016 Opening Keynote - Practice Problems - Excerpt 36m43s to 42m2s - Dan Meyer - December 4, 2016 

One of the problems of human nature, amplified by the internet and social media, is that we will often share things before verifying them. We will engage in hearsay. We will explore “he said she said” scenarios. We will spread rumors that we have heard.

The share button in social media is a click, it is a moment, it is an emotional impulse.

Verification is time consuming, and difficult, and way more annoying. Requires many clicks, and critical thinking.

#204 - The Science of Sounding Scientific

There are many many people who are weak in their understanding of science, but it seems that there are significant amounts of people that recognize the authority of a scientific voice. Speaking in a measured way with lots of longer words of Latin origin and nonexistent words with Latin roots and structure. Mixing in some chemical or elemental sounding words is always a nice touch.

In the world of fictional storytelling, this is common. In science fiction scripts, they need to sound technical, but also be talking about technology that is beyond what we currently possess. Done excessively this is called technobabble.

• • • Video: Best of Technobabble in 'Star Trek: Discovery' - io9 - Nov 16, 2017

It is also common for our minds to process technobabble as sounding good enough while not understanding any of it. People are proud and reluctant to admit when a subject is beyond them. Those people will fake understanding.

• • • Video: Bilateral Kelilactrals - Excerpt from Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 6 Episode 7 "Rascals" - Aired October 30, 1992 

This pattern of script design and speaking works everywhere. This works on people in the real world. People will not understand it, but people will assume the knowledge and competence of the speaker is high quality and trustable. 

• • • Video: Rockwell Retro Encabulator

    • Script: Rockwell Retro Encabulator Script

The result is that you, including a great many people, will end up thinking a person is profound when they are only spouting words to make you think they know what they are talking about. We want to find meaning in things, and when we don't we will unconsciously invent it. 

#205 - Profundity

It seems easy to detect in science fiction, but when people talk about consciousness and spirituality with new-age language, we have the same reaction. We give high respect to people who are saying nonsense. We avoid admitting that we don't understand what they are saying.

• • • Study: On the Reception and Detection of Psuedo-Profound Bull**** - Judgment and Decision Making Vol 10 No 6 - November 2015

Script generated profound statements to be rated

• • Hidden meaning transforms unparalleled abstract beauty.

  • Attention and intention are the mechanics of manifestation.

  • Imagination is inside exponential space time events.

  • We must learn how to lead ancient lives in the face of selfishness. 

  • You and I are travellers of the planet. To engage with the vision quest is to become one with it.

  • Without health, one cannot live. Only an entity of the dreamscape may discover this rekindling of power. 

  • Child, look within and synergize yourself. 

  • It is a sign of things to come. Eons from now, we seekers will live like never before as we are recreated by the universe. The future will be a sacred awakening of nature. 

  • Desire is born in the gap where self-actualization has been excluded. 

  • The goal of chaos-driven reactions is to plant the seeds of purpose rather than yearning. 

  • The complexity of the present time seems to demand a redefining of our essences if we are going to survive. 

  • The nexus is bursting with superpositions of possibilities.

  • We are in the midst of an enlightened condensing of wellbeing that will enable us to access the infinite itself. 

  • Throughout history, humans have been interacting with the totality via ultra-sentient particles.

  • Consciousness consists of electrical impulses of quantum energy. 

#206 - "Qualifying" for Best Seller Lists

To qualify means to reduce from a generalized status to a more particular and restricted status. To move from the category containing everyone to a subcategory that contains a few. To stop competing for Best Movie of the Year, and to start bragging that you are the #1 Romantic Horror Comedy of the Year.

Some of the things we hear when media is advertised is hard to understand. What is the difference between a 4-star and a 5-star movie critique? What does it mean to be on the New York Times Best Seller List?

Sometimes the game is rigged, the rules are made up, and the points don't matter.

Publishers arrange for their friends to buy enough copies to make the Best Seller List long enough so that they can advertise with the title Best Seller. Political campaigns have politicians write a book, and then the campaign will buy a million copies sending campaign money legally to a person, and then hand out the books at campaign events. If you don't have many friends, you could get yourself on this best selling list for under $250,000 on your own, sometimes less depending on the category.

It turns out, this is even easier on Amazon Books.

• Article: Behind the Scam: What Does It Take to Be a ‘Best-Selling Author’? $3 and 5 Minutes. - Medium - Brent Underwood - January 31, 2017 

The Wikipedia Warning

First a couple fun facts. Wikipedia is a portmanteau (word mashup) of encyclopedia and wiki meaning fast in Hawaiian. It is a fast encyclopedia. It is a good place to get generalized information now, and it is a reliable first step for understanding. 

However it is unacceptable to use as a source for any reason ever. Ever ever. Just don't do it.

The problem is the credibility of the author. Since anyone can sign up and make edits, we're not sure who wrote the article. That is enough right there. On many Wikipedia articles there are little footnotes all over that are referenced at the bottom. Those are often sources that can be evaluated for use for academic work. Check the footnotes and wander through that rabbit hole and you will often come across something useful. 

Now for the second warning. Wikipedia can't moderate every change. There isn't an editorial staff big enough to guarantee quality or accuracy. You can go on minor pages of Wikipedia and make changes that might stick. You can make a page about yourself and make your list of life accomplishments truly impressive. If anyone is bored, Inderkum High School has an article.

Here is a warning story that I found once about what can happen on Wikipedia. A teacher decided to prove this to his/her students in 2004 that you can't believe everything you read online. He changed some information about whales and waited to see if any of his students would repeat his lie in a report.

Norway Teacher Changes Truth

• Source: https://old.reddit.com/r/confession/comments/aaxce7/i_edited_a_wikipedia_article_on_killer_whales_in/ - SuperMyge - December 30, 2018 (This has since been deleted)

• Site: https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spekkhogger

"I edited the text, stating that the killer whales (would love if they where called Panda Whales instead...) sometimes ate children, because from underneat they’d look like a seal. I put this in one day before giving them a task on writing a small essay on the subject, and also asked them to not believe everything online. 

To my amusement, most of them used Wikipedia, and wrote that they ate children. 

I then showed them that I had edited this in the day before, and that no other sites, documents, encyclopedias or anything else said anything about it.

But then there was a slight problem... when I tried to delete this info, it was put back again by some admin user. I tried to remove it again, but the sentence on what they ate, came back. This was in 2004 or 2005. It still stays there, can’t get it removed! 

So, today, lots of reporters and journalists, says in reports in media, when they are spotted in Norway, that they can eat human children. 

I find it slightly amusing, but also regret that I did it. They are beautiful animals, and they don’t eat kids. Please tell you children this."

Eating Spiders In Your Sleep

• Source: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/spiders-inside-her/

• Source: http://mentalfloss.com/article/50951/how-many-spiders-do-you-really-swallow-your-sleep

The fact that you eat a certain amount of spiders in your sleep over a lifetime was made up to prove the gullibility of people on the internet. The source of this is said to be a Lisa Holst article from a 1993 article in PC Professional. This article and magazine do not seem to exist as well.

The Crying Indian Commercial

https://valleyrelicsmuseum.org/general-museum-news/iron-eyes-cody-the-crying-indian/

What's more is that Keep America Beautiful is a front group for companies who make and use bottles and cans. Increased pressure on their corporations for making disposable containers led them to create the Keep American Beautiful campaign that pointed the finger at consumers for littering. 

The Taste Map

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klEcayEJ_o

https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/health-nutrition/water-myth

https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/the-eternal-lie-of-the-pools-that-turn-blue-if-you-pee-in-them

#207 - Extra Adjectives, Compound Adjectives, Prepositional Phrases, and Alliteration

The most impressive nouns get two adjectives. One thing in the review gets a triple. One important noun should get a multiple word adjective or a hyphenated multiple word adjective.

The most impressive verbs get paired and conjoined. One action in the review gets a parallelism triple.

One important noun should get a compound adjective.

https://grammar.cl/english/compound-adjectives.htm 

Consonance: Repeated consonant sounds in consecutive words.

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    • Pineapple Upside-Down Cheesecake: Pineapple cheesecake between two layers of moist buttery pineapple upside-down cake. 

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• • • Levi's Women's Mid-Length Shorts: Levi's® jean shorts are a warm-weather essential. This classic rendition is the wear-anywhere pair your closet has been missing! 

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