At left is a meme supporting the mode of thinking employed by conspiracy theorists, i.e., that they, unlike the rest of us, “have the cognitive capacity to think critically for themselves.”
In fact, the reason that reasonable people trust science is that we’re aware that we lack the time and resources to conduct this research ourselves: formulating hypotheses, experiment design and execution, analysis of results, drawing conclusions, publishing findings, and having them peer reviewed.
Shortly after I entered the field of climate science, some well-meaning guy suggested that I come to my own independent conclusions on the subject. I respectfully pointed out that there are tens of thousands of people who have made it their lifework to study this subject, and they have, in most cases, some serious headstarts over me, including several decades of work, uncountable terabytes of data, and billions of dollars of surveillance equipment on and above the Earth.
I’m equally unqualified to “do my own research” in disease control, anthropology, and quantum physics.
If a few crackpots think this renders me intellectually deficient or gullible, I’ll have to learn to live with that.
I’m not a financial pro, but here’s some advice:
Don’t live on a budget. Make a lot of money and live far beneath your means. What value does luxury actually bring to your life, especially if it makes you nervous about running out of cash?
As I told my kids when they were growing up, “Unless you’re completely shallow, showing off your money is an idiotic thing to do. You make false friends and have people glomming onto you to sell you stuff you really don’t need.”
Warren Buffett still lives in a modest house in Nebraska, a state in which he could buy an entire country. Maybe there is something about him and his values that could benefit you.
I see.
There’s not enough land in Spain to support rooftop and ground-mounted solar at a fraction of the cost.
LOL.
It’s possible that right now, there are other civilizations observing the human race, studying us from afar, and noticing our decline into savagery and eventual extinction by turning billionaires into trillionaires.
People say that the principal weakness of human beings is that we can’t plan for the future as a species. Dogs are arguably even worse, though they aren’t consumed with greed. They don’t plot the starvation of millions of other dogs so they themselves can have enough food to last a billion years.
As an elderly man, I’ll be leaving this planet soon, but I won’t cease pondering this until my heart stops beating.
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