Not Today

In another startling example of the Dunning-Kruger effect, I present the following explanation/ apology.

The more you know the more you know that you know nothing at all. 

What separates data from opinion is the same thing that creates debate. Whether fact or fiction is largely a matter of choice. Do we really want to believe something that has been ingrained into our consciousness since childhood, or, will we find the courage to look at whatever the subject matter independent of possible bias collusion? As my dear friend Laura Lee used to say, let’s look at this with open minds - not gaping minds. The imagery of one’s mind needing to be like a parachute, they work best when open, always struck me as appropriate. 

The issues behind my comparison to gaping holes and skydiving I have been considering lately. The main issue being that I could be wrong. Bluntly, there is a strong possibility that I am. Not so much because there are but a few areas that I could be considered an expert, that place where depth of knowledge knows no bottom, but because there are so many areas on which I hold rigid opinions. Based on nothing other than bits and pieces, charred and broken, culled from the dumpster fire of humanity’s ignorance. This bothers me. It interrupts my flow. I challenges my self-confidence. 

ALL GOOD.

I (we) should be bothered by things we don’t completely understand, and vow to learn more about them. It should interrupt my (our) dynamic dance wit the cosmos - but just long enough for us to preform due diligence and use the google tool, and my (our) self confidence should be challenged at regular intervals in order to ensure correctness and optimum compassion. 

Why then do I rile with such vehemence when my values are questioned? To be clear, this is not random. My dogs do not ask why we only walk for two miles before dinner. It is from the people that I find simultaneously suffering from spiritual corruption and the false hubris provided to them by greedy totalitarian capitalists, you know, conservative republicans. 

I told you yesterday of my singular commandment. The Hippocratic oath-like catch-all of doing no harm - not imposing necessary suffering on people, especially when those people are vulnerable to exploitation. This appears to be the on-going policy of the party whose leaders are more interested in profit than peace. And I find it shameful. Repulsive and alarming. 

But I could be wrong. Maybe I am suffering from thinking that I know more than I do. Perhaps, as has been suggested, I should STFU and fall in line. Take the money and run. Be glad that I am a white, straight male and able to drive to the store without being profiled. Stop worrying so much about drug prices, health care, immigration, gun-control, pollution, genocide, corruption, nepotism, witch hunting, blackface scandals and our constitutional crisis. Or volcanoes erupting. 

I am sorry, but no. Not today. I know better. Or I think I do.