Some sane advice from one pair of communication directors to another.

"Here’s the first rule: Your job is not to suck up to your boss. We know he probably gave you marching orders to go out there on Saturday and say stuff you (and everyone else) knew was not only false, or even demonstrably false, but jarringly, alarmingly, monumentally false.”

"Dear Sean Spicer: A few tips to maker your job easier",  Peter Donolo and Jason MacDonald, former communication directors to Prime Ministers of Canada, to Sean Spicer, Donald Trump’s Press Secretary, The Globe and Mail, 24 January 2017.

What Main Stream Media bias really means

So many comments that I see on New York Time articles are complaints of media bias against Donald Trump.

Let's see, if Donald Trump makes a foolish comment and the media reports it at is, then the media is biased.

On the other hand, if the media chooses not to report the foolish comment, then the media is biased.

Gosh, there is no pleasing some people.

Hey folks, the major job of the mainstream media is to report that the emperor has no clothes! 

TRUTH or truth?

TRUTH is what some assert with certainty but with no coherent justification.  TRUTH cannot be challenged.

Truth is what people strive for with questions and tests; truth may never be fully achieved but enough has been discovered to offer a guide to life or improvement of lives.

One TRUTH is that the Bible is the inerrant word of God.  The truth is that the Bible offers many moral teachings even though it contains descriptions of many impossible events or even justifies bad deeds.

Did God on the sixth day create “man in his own image, … male and female created he them”?  Or did he create only Adam and then when Adam grew lonely, he created Eve from Adam’s rib.  I would think it would take more than a few days for Adam to grow lonely for a companion.

Is the “Great Flood” a recounting of some catastrophic flood in the Tigris-Euphrates valley in which some few had the foresight to build boats for their family and cattle, or was it a great flood to destroy all the “wickedness”, including babies?  Considering that the depth of the waters was 15 cubits (22-1/2 feet), it was probably the former.  Flood stages of over 20 feet are all too common even now.  The truth is that it is important to be just and that it is important to prepare for disaster.

Is it TRUTH that God let Satan bring many calamities upon Job, or is it truth that bad things happen to good people?  Certainly a just God would not let so many innocent people be killed to test one man, especially if God knows everything?

Is it TRUTH that heretics should be burned at the stake?  It is truth that the Bible only mentions “heretic” once.  “A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject” (Epistle to Titus, 3:10).  I don’t think “reject” meant to kill, but rather it meant to shun.

Is it TRUTH that Islam is a militant religion set on converting all to Islam?  It is truth that Mohammed and his followers had to defend themselves against the polytheists of Mecca who considered the Muslims a threat.  It is also truth that many Muslim-dominant cultures had a mix of Muslims, Christians, and Jews.

“Those who believe, and those who are Jewish, and the Christians, and the Sabeans - any who believe in God and the Last Day, and act righteously will have their reward with their Lord; they have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve.” - Talal Itani. “Quran In English. Modern English Translation. Clear and Easy to Understand”.

The Sabeans were a culture in South Arabia; this is supposedly where the Queen of Sheba came from, she who visited King Solomon. 

You can get many versions of the Qur’an from the iBook store and other sources.  However, like the Bible, it takes much reading to understand what is meant.

Consider “simple” documents like the “Declaration of Independence” and the “Constitution”.

Is it TRUTH that they are clear and unambiguous?  It is truth that people are still arguing over them over two hundred years later.  It is truth that what one Supreme Court decides may be overturned by another Supreme Court? For example, “Separate but Equal” was overturned by “Brown vs. Board of Education”.

Is it TRUTH that the United States is a Christian nation blessed by God?  It is truth that many of the signers of the “Declaration of Independence” or the “Constitution of the United States” attended Christian Churches.  It is truth that the “Declaration of Independence” mentions “Nature’s God” and the “Protection of Divine Providence”.  But it is also truth that the “Constitution” uses no words or phrases involving any deity.  It is truth that the United States took land from Christian Cherokees and others because white men wanted the gold that was found in Georgia.  So much for the “Protection of Divine Providence” for these Christians.

Is it TRUTH that Adam Smith advocated totally free markets?  It is truth that he used “free market” once and only once in “Wealth of Nations”.  But it is also truth that the heavily regulated market was brought about by the woolen manufacturers.  They asked for and received from Parliament many regulations that would keep the price of wool down so that their costs would be down and their profits up.  It is also truth that even today “Free Marketers” lobby for laws that are beneficial to them and detrimental to others.

Is it TRUTH that voters “decided”?  By the time you read this, the Iowa caucuses will have been held.  It is truth that many voters cast their votes for whoever “won”, but many other voters chose somebody else.  It is truth that better headlines would be that “a plurality of voters” or “a majority of voters” supported the “winner”.

It is also truth that no matter who is doing the reporting, they have a limited amount of time or space.

It is also truth that this column should end before you fall asleep.

Also published in Reader Weekly of Duluth, 2016-02-04 at http://duluthreader.com/articles/2016/02/04/6677_truth_or_truth.

Quotes of the day: Vaccination, personal choice, and public health

“The lesson of all this is that vaccination is not an individual choice to be made by a parent for his or her own offspring. It's a public health issue, because the diseases contracted by unvaccinated children are a threat to the community.”
- “The Toll of the anti-vaccination movement, in one devastating graphic”, Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 2014-01-20

“The old line about a lie traveling halfway around the world before the truth can get its boots on certainly applies to the supposed link between autism and the MMR (measles/mumps/rubella) vaccine -- in spades.”
- “More on the unsavory history of the vaccine-autism ‘link’", Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 2014-01-22

I wonder how much social media like Facebook give lies the wings to go around the world.  I see so many postings about cute stuff, clever stuff, and outright nonsense that ask readers to pass them on.  I don’t because I don’t want to bother, I don’t think all my friends don’t need to know those things, or I don’t think they are posted with any critical examination by the poster.

Serendipity strikes again!  Clearing up some Firefox tabs, I wound up finding:

“The charter school textbooks breezily dismiss evolution as “an unproved theory.” Here’s where inadequate science education and fundamental science ignorance show themselves. Science uses the word “theory” the way the rest of us might use “conclusion.” A scientific theory sums up hypotheses that are themselves backed up by testing and observation.”

and

“Ignorance is curable by education, but willfully ignoring the facts can be contagious — and even fatal.”

- “What creationists and anti-vaxxers have in common”, Patt Morrison, Los Angeles Times, 2014-01-23

Quote of the day.- Compromise

"Compromise, if you must, on the policy--but never on the truth."
Paul Krugman, End This Depression Now!

Contradictory thoughts on contradictory thoughts

"Apes and Humans" was one of Wisconsin Public Radio's "To the Best of Our Knowledge" (TTBOOK) broadcasts for 2013-06-09.  One segment was about the so-called "monkey girl", a five-year-old girl kidnapped in Columbia and then abandoned in the jungle.  Supposedly she survived with the help of monkeys who "adopted" her.  She, Marina Chapman, and her daughter, Vanessa James, wrote a book on Marina's experiences – "The Girl with No Name".  Philip Sherwell of the Telegraph was asked to go to Columbia to check up on her story.

There were some inconsistencies in the stories he heard, but considering the events were fifty years ago, he would have been concerned if they were consistent.  He came away not establishing anything that would make him "believe that she'd made it up…"

In other words, by compiling a mosaic of thoughts, Sherwell came away believing Chapman's story in general.

On the other hand, in the preface to his satire, "L'Ile des Pingouins", Anatole France claims if you have a "fact" about certain events from one person, you should believe it, but if you have reports from several people then their reports are always contradictory and always unreconcilable (my translation).

Unfortunately, too many people today rely on one source of news, and whatever is said by that source must be true.  They just don't want to believe that some of what the source says may be true, some may be partly true, and some may be completely false.

Quote of the day: Law as a game

I am cleaning my desk of many miscellaneous scraps of papers, some over ten years old.  One intriguing one is a photocopy of two pages from "The True Game" by Sheri S. Tepper.  I don't think it is buried in our bookshelves, and it is not in the Duluth Public Library.  It is at the Hennepin County Library, and so I must have borrowed it between 1996 when it was published and 1999 when we moved to Duluth.

The paragraph that I bracketed is:

"We are going to try to do what Windlow would have wanted," he said. "He told us that nations of men fell into disorder, so nations of law were set up instead.  He told us that nations of law then forgot justice and let the law become a Game, a Game in which the moves and the winning were more important than truth.  He told us to seek justice rather than the Game.  It was the laws, the rules which made Gaming.  It was Gaming that made injustice.  We can only try something new and hope that it is better."

How true!  One only need read the novels of John Lescroart or look at the work of the sausage factory called Congress to see how people game the system and ignore justice.

The truth shall make you free but "THE TRUTH" can imprison you

The truth is a never-ending quest that leads to more knowledge and sometimes wisdom.  For example, many people discovered chemical elements that they thought were indivisible.  Then others discovered that the elements were composed of protons, electrons, and neutrons.  This led to greater understanding of compounds.  Then yet others discovered that there were many more sub-atomic particles than these three.

Governance is another truth that many are discovering.  Once it was thought that kings ruled by divine right; how else could they have become kings?  More and more people are discovering that democracy can be a much better form of government.  Now we need more and more people to discover how to make it work better.

On the other hand, "THE TRUTH" can lock people into a very limited view of the world.  For example, "THE TRUTH" that the Sun revolves around the Earth gave very limited ability to predict celestial events, knowledge that was needed to make accurate calendars.

"THE TRUTH" can divide people based on religious or other differences.  If we still held "THE TRUTH" that women are inferior to men, would we have some of the scientific, literary, musical, and political ideas we now have if only men were deemed capable of complicated thought?

I got another view of the distinction between the truth and "THE TRUTH" reading Sheri S. Tepper's "The Visitor".  Most of it takes place centuries after "The Happening" when some astronomical object struck the Earth and wiped out most of the population.  One group of survivors considers themselves "The Spared" and believes that the only other beings are demons.  This belief gives inordinate power to a few, and as Lord Acton said "Power corrupts".  If you decide to read "The Visitor", be forewarned that the powerful deal in gratuitous violence.

The bureaucracy doesn't want the truth

Whether it's a government or a corporate bureaucracy, it sometimes doesn't want the truth, but the "right" answer.

I've put myself in this bind because of some passwords or secret question answers I've created. Rather than creating a "true" answer, I've created misleading answers. So if I'm asked a secret question, I can't give the true answer, I may only give the right answer, which I may have forgotten!!

For more on this, see "The True Answer and The Right Answer", Stanley Fish, New York Times, 2010-01-11.