Don’t Believe Anything Anybody Tells You
How to choose skepticism over gullibility
I used to believe anything. One could say I was quite gullible. This stretched from childhood into early adulthood (albeit at varying levels of gullibility). When I was young, I was repeating things with authority…simply because someone told me something. When I was not-so-young, I accepted things people told me, no matter how far-fetched.
I was gullible. Don’t be like that.
Along the way, I learned a new way to take information into my brain, and this has served me well. Basically, don’t believe anything anyone tells you. Don’t believe the things you read. Don’t believe things you hear on the news, from your neighbor, your kid’s teammate’s parent, or even politicians (gasp!).
Instead, be skeptical.
According to Google, skepticism is an adjective defined as “not easily convinced; having doubts or reservations.”
Set your default mental state to “Prove it.” Demand supporting evidence for every claim thrown your way. The weight of the claim can help you determine just how much evidence you should ideally be receiving.
If someone you trust says, “I had pizza for lunch,” clearly the threshold for evidence is going to be low. You can probably safely assume the statement is accurate.
If someone you don’t know says the coronavirus is a manufactured bioweapon from a Chinese pizza restaurant basement, for example, you would need a very high threshold for supporting evidence. I mean, there’s gotta be peer-reviewed scientific studies supporting that claim (which would include multiple genetic studies of the virus itself), along with video evidence of the secret lab in question, whistleblower testimony in a court of law (or Congressional hearing), and so on. There has to be a mountain of evidence supporting that particular claim. Because it’s super dumb.
Yet some people would just believe it without question, and then repeat that absurd, unproven whack-job conspiracy theory to all of their Facebook friends.
Here’s a real-world example of some people who are either truly idiotic dim-witted imbeciles, or bad actors engaging in psychological warfare using some dim-witted imbeciles spreading a coronavirus hypothesis, and then getting deleted from Facebook.
Don’t believe anything you hear without supporting evidence.
Also, be careful when using this skill with your spouse. Just some food for thought.
Skepticism is a skill you can build up over time. You can train yourself to hear or read something and say, “Hold up here. Where’s the evidence?”
With all the nonsense out there on the airwaves and internet-waves, do yourself a favor and demand scientifically sound evidence for anything of consequence.
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