The Holocrons of Darth Grampus

Socrates is credited with saying, "I know only that I don't know." Socratic ignorance, it's called. Now I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed, but Darth Grampus considers that claim, to know only that you don't know, to be about the most honest self-reflection ever made. Today, there seems to be little to no value found in that kind of honesty.  Perhaps the purpose of this dichotomy is to keep one from straddling a fence. Consider: the algorithms we all work for? The ones that provide suggestions to our YouTube, Insta and other social media feeds? There is a definite bias against the "middle of the road" content in these algorithms.  For example, if one is, say, super Pro-Trump, the algorithm loves their content. If one is super anti-Trump, the algorithm loves their content. But the middle riders? Pssh... you're not likely to see their content on your feed. That's just a 1s and 0s example of what I'm talking about, but it mirrors the broa...

We all navigate our trips from the cradle to the grave deaf and blind in important ways. Some of these ways are obvious, if we have some humility. Others require taking a long look into the ugly mirror of human experience.  How do we know? How we do sift truth from narratives and agendas? None of us have enough time to chase down everything, do all the experiments, or check the backgrounds of the talking head we listen to the most. We're all affected by carefully crafted planes of possibility, and we're all conditioned to dismiss claims that venture beyond those planes.  CNN and Fox report on the same incidents, but their rhetoric presents them entirely differently. One says this about the event, the other says that. Both claim to be telling the truth, so... how do we know which is truth and which is lie? We don't. We choose what to believe and commit to it. We commit to it so strongly that we will regurgitate what we hear on our channel of choice as though it's the gos...

In my early retirement, Darth Grampus spends a lot of time listening, reading and trying to learn. Sometimes I engage in conversation with people about this or that hoping to have my own perspective expanded and, when possible, to expand the perspectives of others.  But today is a bit of a... I dunno... some circus combination of "Ripley's Believe it or Not," lies, damn lies, propaganda and half-truths. We are inundated at all times, and everywhere we look, with different takes on similar events, highly suggestive and powerful arguments, framing and reframing, religious and social pressures surrounding particular ideas and narratives, and all of us, Darth Grampus included, is susceptible to being fooled. Big Numbers and Impossibilities I saw a video the other day of a young man talking about a megalithic structure built into a mountain where he claimed that 400,000 tons of rock and dirt was removed over the purported 18 year construction period of the structure. He made a...