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Cite your sources

Michael 12 Comments

Somewhere sometime someone is having a crisis. It’s me!

I’m having a crisis. I am losing touch with the part of the world that feeds me information and I’m worried I am starting to sound like a one of those people who spouts so-called facts that you know aren’t true. Their verity may be questioned without question because they (the facts) are so ludicrous that nobody but a Dimwit Donny Disciple (DDD) would believe them (e.g., did you know gas is only $1.98/gallon), or because they (the fact-spouters) are DDDs or DD hisself.

Believe it or not, this is not a political post. It’s a true personal crisis. I’m forgetting not things, but that which made me aware of the thing. Don’t question. Just read on. It will become clear.

It came to me when I mentioned to my daughter, “I just read somewhere that keeping cut fruit in the fridge in glass containers will add at least 2 days to their use by date versus storing them in plastic.” This isn’t something I dreamed or something I overheard in the produce section while working my way around the gaggle of grocery gals gathered in front of the mango display. This was a real “read somewhere” moment, but I can’t recall where. If it was say in Food Network Magazine, then it’s probably a pretty good tip. Likewise in the food section of the newspaper or a real food expert’s social site. On the other hand, if I read it in the comments section of an online recipe or in the social site of the dingy broad who records entire recipes in 30 seconds and posts them to a site known for lip-synched videos and blasphemous AI generated images, it likely is as true as claims of sub $3.00 eggs (per dozen, not apiece).

This worries me because I always would be able to recite the source of my information as readily as the information. I know I found the cut fruit tidbit in a respected, responsible source, but not being able to recite that source feels like I should be being fitted for a red hat. (By the way, why does the Dummy in Chief always have those stupid hats on its desk in the Oval Office. Is there a merch table at the back of the room to visit between acts?) if I should be challenged in the fresh fruit freshness extension tip, I wouldn’t be able to cite my source other than to say, “I read it somewhere.” Well, that’s not an answer. I might as well expound on the sphericalosity of the earth without doing the math.

So you now understand my crisis. (You do, don’t you?) How will I ever be taken seriously again. How will I ever take myself seriously again. I won’t be long before I begin a conversation with, “I saw somewhere that someone did something that I thought was interesting. What do you think?” My sole reasonable conversation partners will be clairvoyants, mediums (It is mediums not media when you’re speaking of those who communicate with dead, right?) (I figure they’d be a decent one to chat with considering by then I’d be at least brain dead), or DDDs (because they are experienced in listening to unfounded, unproven, unreliable sources of disinformation).

Anyway, I read somewhere than fresh cut fruit stored in glass containers will extend its life. That all I had to say.

Tell Me a Tale

Michael 2 Comments

Finally! Yesterday they finally awarded this year’s Oscars. Sorry, Oscars®. You’ve read me long enough to know I like movies. Old movies. Not so much old as good movies, so yeah, old movies. I don’t particularly care who won yesterday. See me in 24 or 25 years about the 2021 awards. We’ll see then which ones stood the test of time. I’ll tell you right now, it won’t be the ones that told a story. It will be the ones with a story worth telling.

Quite coincidentally this year, tomorrow is National Tell a Story Day. When one thinks of “a story” the first thought is usually a tall tale, perhaps inspirational, perhaps traditional, maybe something fictional with just enough truth in it to keep it interesting. Few stories hit all the notes although through the years you will find one or two each generation that live on through many generations. They are the ones with a story worth telling and telling again.

Today, everyone can tell a story. All you need is a connection to the Internet. Thirty years ago I would have said all you need is a typewriter, a fresh ribbon, a ream of paper, and a willing audience. Twenty years ago I would have said, all you need is a word processor, access to email, and a willing audience. Ten years ago I would have said, all you need is a keyboard and a connection to the Internet. Today you don’t even need a keyboard. A phone, a camera, a screen and access to your favorite social site, and the modern day storyteller has all the tools needed to tell the tale. You will note that the willing audience has dropped from the list of needs. With the internet comes an audience. Willing or not, there are people there. When we accepted losing the typewriter or keyboard as tools of the storyteller, we may also have lost the criterion that a story, a good story, be one worth telling. Another loss in many stories we hear today is the presence of truth.

Of course truth is not necessary for a good story. Any successful novelist knows the truth is incidental to a good story. Any successful novelist also knows nobody expects fiction to be truthful or accurate. That’s pretty much the point of fiction. But just to be on the safe side the successful novelist also…well, go pull your favorite novel off the bookshelf. I’ll wait. {Dah di dum di dah di dum dum dum} Oh good, you’re back. Okay, now turn to the copyright page. There, do you see it? It says something like:

[Name of Book] is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents are the product of the imagination of the author or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, or any event, company, country, or location is entirely coincidental.”  

Disclaimers have long been used on fictional works, written and filmed. They aren’t on computer, tablet, or phone screens even though it is more likely that fiction will be taken for fact there than on the pages of that book you pulled off the shelf or in the movie theater. The social media storyteller specializes in sharing and forwarding unconfirmed material in the guise of news or pertinent information is as guilty as spreading lies and fabrications as the one who intentionally misleads or deceives, and the one who intentionally misleads or deceives is no more than a common liar who isn’t worth the electricity needed to post a rebuttal. But rebut we must. The charlatans foisting untruths, fact-sounding fallacies, misinterpretations of scholarly works, and ugly harassment must not be allowed to spread misinformation without challenge. If the social network platforms will not police their lines of distribution themselves then the professionals must remain vigilant to the lies circulating, whether about health, policy, government, or safety and security. Those who use the internet for news and information must recall the social networks are entertainment and any “information” gleaned from a social post should be taken with the consideration afforded to the “news” heard over the backyard fence or while standing in line at the supermarket deli counter. Consider any story heard on line as just that, a story, no more factual than Snow White and the Three Big Bad Wolves.

Hopefully your only encounter with storytellers will be with those with a story to tell that is perhaps inspirational, perhaps traditional, or maybe something fictional with just enough truth in it to keep it interesting – and with a story worth telling and worth telling again. No disclaimers necessary but there – just in case.

Once upon a time they lived happily ever after

I Didn’t Know That (Ooops, corrected copy)

Michael 1 Comment

I recall a time when a graduate student would say something and by gosh, that was the way it was. It was sort of like the 1970s (ugh) equivalent of the Internet. You know darn well that 99.9% of what is on it would be disallowed in a court of law as hearsay, unfounded, or speculative, yet there is that part of you that is sure if you read it there, just as we used to be sure if we heard it from them, then it must be true.

There is no end to the things that I am sure are true. Well, that’s probably a bit overstated. I’m sure there is some end but I figure my end is closer than that end so to me it’s all endless. However, there are still some things that I don’t know that I want to add to the things that are true before one of those ends shows up around the bend.

For example, I know exactly where dust comes from. (If you don’t, don’t look it up, it’s disgusting! Ok, I’ll tell you. It’s mostly sloughed off skin. Yuck.) But I have no idea how I get dust inside a closed cabinet. Is that where the kitchen fairies who clean up the messes and put the dishes away hang out and let their skin hang out with them. If so, why are they just hanging out in my drawers and cabinets and not wiping the kitchen experiments gone awry off the counters and walls.

Another thing I can’t figure out is radio. I’m an educated person, a science educated person, who actually understands (and can spell) gluconeogenesis. I understand the theory of radio waves and how transmitters excite the air and receivers replicate the original wave patterns. But I have no idea how they know which is which. They say (“They” being the grad students of the 70s from whom I first heard this and “They” also being the Internet of the new millennium where I confirmed this just yesterday) that radio waves never stop. Whatever has been still is. So if everything ever transmitted – radio, television, cell phones, CB radios, walkie talkies, blue tooth, satellite radio, GPS, and the thousands of other things that I’ve forgotten or never knew about – is still floating around out there, how does my car always know what station to pluck out of the air for me? Personally, I think it’s magic.

They (there go them again) claim that it takes more calories to eat celery than celery contains making it a true negative calorie food. Assuming that you consider celery food. I’ll buy that because I can read how many calories celery contains (6 calories per stalk according to some sources) and how many calories it takes to chew, swallow, digest, and -ummm- eliminate celery (8 calories based on a University of Warwick study when extrapolated per stalk). I even know what a calorie is. That is, the energy needed to raise one gram of water one degree centigrade. And I know that the US FDA wants to require that calorie content of food be included in labeling, menus, even on vending machines. What I have no idea of is how you figure out how many calories a food has. Does burning that one stalk of celery raise one gram of water by six degrees? Or to make it more easily measured would you burn 1,440 stalks of celery to attempt to raise the temperature of one cup of water 240 degrees? And how would you even do that with a Quarter Pounder with Cheese or an Extra Crispy Chicken Little Sandwich, or a pack of Grandma’s Famous Chocolate Chip Cookies (the vending pack)?

So, in an Internet filled with people proclaiming all the things that they know, there you have a few things I am willing to admit that I don’t know. If you do, please feel free to add your comment and add to the things that I know and help me get the end a little further away from that other end. One thing though, even if you do know, I really don’t want to know how to measure how many calories are burned by digesting a bowl of chocolate moose tracks ice cream. Some things are best left a mystery.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?