Saturday, October 09, 2021

When Truth is Partial: Horses Like Apples

Did you know that horses like apples?  Give a horse an apple, and he will eat it.  I have observed this.  Every time I have given a horse an apple, he has eaten it.  In addition, I once gave a horse a tomato and the horse did not eat it, even though the tomato looked like an apple.  A reasonable hypothesis could be made that horses dislike tomatoes, although it would require further testing.

Now, imagine a world where you do an internet search about apples, And all the leading results are about how horses like apples.  

But you know there is more to apples than horses.  So you do a search on the health benefits of apples for humans.  The results return that if you eat apple seeds it can kill you.

Then you do a search on Snopes about apples.  It returns: An apple a day keeps the doctor away? FALSE.  

In such a world, two things might happen.  First, the majority of people might conclude that apples are for horses, and should not be eaten by humans.  And the FDA could ban apples for human consumption.

But something else might happen instead.  People could decide that they do want to eat apples, and that they are smart enough to understand the nuance between eating apples and apple seeds,  In  such a world, people would start to trust less the powers that be.

That's my thought for the day. :) 


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