What did you get told as a child that you realised was a lie as you got older?

CalciumDeficiency@lemmy.world to Asklemmy@lemmy.ml – 212 points –
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If you work hard you'll have a successful life

See also: "get good grades in university and you'll be flooded with job offers!"

That wasn't a lie, exactly, it was just Baby Boomers not realizing how much the world changed since they were in school. It used to happen that way. My mother got her first job out of school when the employer came to campus to recruit through a job fair.

It's just an overly positive way of saying, "If you don't get good grades in uni, many HRs will de-list you before looking at your resume".

I literally have never come across a job posting that asked for GPA. Unless it's like an academic internship or something. Get the degree, and nobody cares about your grades.

I don't know if they still do, but Epic Systems (the medical records company) asked for GPA when I looked at their job applications. I'm not sure if they care about the GPA, per se, so much as using it as a way to practice their notorious (but hard to prove) age discrimination.

Relevant quote:

If wealth was the inevitable result of hard work and enterprise, every woman in Africa would be a millionaire

-George Monbiot

We're laughing will Ferrell.gif

I don't think it's a lie, just outdated and obsolete advice.

God exists and watches everything you do and loves you while threatening you with eternal damnation.

You're allowed to be atheist of course, but do you have any more proof that there are no gods than they have that gods exist?

EDIT: Y'all can have your opinion, no one's questioning that. You're allowed to believe there are no higher powers, but I'm not allowed my personal belief that there is?? Not one person has provided proof that there is no Higher Power. Grow up....

I'm not against religion, but that's not how evidence and proof works. Do you have any proof that tiny invisible pink elephants aren't hiding in your fridge?

that’s not how evidence and proof works.

Proof of a negative is common in science and mathematics.

No, you can’t prove that something never happens or that something doesn’t exist.

Edit: For those who are downvoting here are some sources

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burden_of_proof_(philosophy)#Proving_a_negative

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_impossibility

No, you can't prove that something never happens or that something doesn't exist. You can sometimes prove something that contradicts the existence of something, but that's not proving that the thing itself doesn't exist, because it's epistemologically not possible

No, you can’t prove that something never happens or that something doesn’t exist.

Science, philosophy, and mathematics say otherwise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burden_of_proof_(philosophy)#Proving_a_negative

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_impossibility

Then why did you dodge the request to prove there are no tiny invisible pink elephants in your fridge, wise guy? lmao

If you're claiming my fridge has no tiny invisible pink elephants you are welcome to provide evidence.

I will make no claims on the matter and thus have to provide no evidence either way.

Edit: I think you're confusing me for the other guy.

I think you're confusing me for the other guy.

I was, but you're running defense for him so I think the point still stands.

Believing claims on the grounds that they haven't been disproven is just bad epistemology, and it certainly isn't good science. Hence the elephants.

Believing claims on the grounds that they haven’t been disproven is just bad epistemology

Well, it's a good thing that wasn't my position.

That's not really how it works though. If I tell you there's an invisible dragon living under your bed who will burn your house down at some time in the future if you don't give me $10. You can't disprove it, but because I'm the one making the claim that the dragon exists the burden of proof is on me.

The burden of proof tennis is quite tricky here because it's not about whether you claim something exists, it's whether you claim something that goes against what's generally accepted. If I claim quantum mechanics don't exist, it's not on you to prove they do.

And that's before we get into the fact that there isn't a general consensus on whether God (or any gods) exist.

Your premise is incorrect. The burden of proof for quantum mechanics is on the people claiming they exist. They provided those proofs, which is why people believe in them. I haven't studied quantum mechanics, but if you asked somebody who does, they could offer proof or evidence. And if they couldn't, then your claim it doesn't exist (until proof was proffered) would be correct.

It was on them until society generally accepted it. Now if I claim it doesn't exist, the burden is on me.

Or how about this: if I claim dinosaurs never existed and thus the fossils didn't come from them, it's not on you to prove they did.

You're missing the point. It's not a one time thing. Evidence existed, that evidence was found, and that's what made it change to being accepted.

That evidence still exists, so if you claim dinosaurs don't exist, we can just point to the evidence that still exists. That evidence didn't get spirited away like golden plates to heaven. We're still finding dinosaur bones.

If you claim dinosaurs don't exist, I would point to the wealth of evidence that they do. If you were raised in some religious cult that never taught anything about dinosaurs and taught that the Earth was 6000 years old, and therefore didn't think giant creatures existed hundreds of millions of years ago, it would absolutely be on the person claiming they exist to show you dinosaur bones. Which is evidence.

I see your point, but the idea here is that, since I'm starting from the assumption that dinosaurs don't exist, I conclude that the fossils came from some source other than dinosaurs, so they can't be used as pro-dinosaur evidence. But at the same time I don't offer an alternative explanation on where they came from.

No. Your claim has shifted; you are now claiming that the evidence is false/incorrect, and now the burden of proof is on you to prove that it is.

The existence of dinosaurs is well-established through a variety of scientific evidence. Here are some of the key proofs:

1. Fossil Evidence

  • Bone Fossils: The most compelling evidence for the existence of dinosaurs comes from fossils. These are preserved remains found in sedimentary rocks that have formed from sediments laid down in ancient rivers, lakes, and seas. Dinosaur bones show distinct features, such as air-filled cavities that indicate they were adapted to support massive bodies while being lightweight, similar to modern birds.
  • Tracks and Footprints: Fossilized footprints and tracks give clues about the behavior, movement, and size of these creatures. Sites like the Paluxy River trackways in Texas and others around the world show clear, sequential dinosaur footprints.
  • Egg Fossils: Fossilized eggs have been found in many locations around the world, providing direct evidence of reproduction in dinosaurs. Some nests even contain embryos, which help scientists understand growth and development in these creatures.

2. Geological Distribution

  • Global Spread: Dinosaur fossils have been found on every continent on Earth, including Antarctica. This widespread geographic distribution is consistent with the known plate tectonics and continental drift over geological time scales, supporting the timeline in which dinosaurs are said to have existed.

3. Radiometric Dating

  • Age Determination: Radiometric dating methods allow scientists to determine the age of rock layers where dinosaur fossils are found. These methods typically use the decay of naturally occurring isotopes, such as uranium-lead or potassium-argon dating, to establish the age of rocks as ranging from about 66 to over 200 million years old—corresponding to the Mesozoic Era, the time period during which dinosaurs thrived.

4. Comparative Anatomy and Phylogeny

  • Anatomical Similarities: The study of dinosaur fossils allows scientists to reconstruct their skeletons and infer muscle attachments and body shapes. Comparisons with modern animals can help interpret their posture, diet, and lifestyle.
  • Evolutionary Relationships: Dinosaurs share many features with other groups of vertebrates, especially birds. In fact, modern birds are considered the direct descendants of theropod dinosaurs, a relationship supported by numerous anatomical and genetic data.

5. Soft Tissue and Molecular Evidence

  • In some rare cases, soft tissues have been preserved in dinosaur fossils. For example, flexible blood vessels and cells have been reported in Tyrannosaurus rex fossils. While controversial and rare, such findings can provide insights into the biology of these ancient creatures.

6. Paleoenvironmental Reconstructions

  • Contextual Clues: Fossilized plants, pollens, and associated animal fossils found alongside dinosaur remains help reconstruct the environments they lived in, further validating their existence and providing context about the ecosystem dynamics of the past.

Collectively, these evidences from paleontology, geology, and biology robustly demonstrate that dinosaurs existed as real, living organisms on Earth millions of years ago. Their study continues to provide valuable insights into the history of life on our planet.

Thanks ChatGPT. Those are all from fossils.

It sounds like you're taking a skeptical stance towards the conventional interpretation of dinosaur fossils without proposing an alternative hypothesis for their origins. This approach can be useful for critically examining evidence but might limit understanding if alternative explanations aren't explored. In scientific discourse, it's typically valuable not only to critique existing theories but also to propose viable alternatives that can be tested and evaluated against the evidence. If the goal is to challenge established views like the existence of dinosaurs, developing a coherent alternative theory on the origin of fossils could strengthen your argument and provide a new perspective for consideration.

Just to address the chatgpt comments, I assumed you were a troll but I now see that you're a real person, deserving of a real answer. My standpoint is that science should enhance religion: as they approach different problems, they should be compatible. Science deals with the workings of the natural world and how things happen, while religion often addresses why the world exists and what our purpose might be. For this reason I'm against dismissing scientific discoveries solely due to religious teachings. Some see new discoveries about the universe as enhancing our understanding of God. Just because the bible was written without the understanding we have today doesn't mean that the progress of all modern knowledge is false. And similarly when specific bible teachings are disproven doesn't mean that the underlying purpose or values are invalid. In summary, ai think the purpose of religion is to improve society and wellbeing by addressing fears, providing a deep need for community and creating a moral code. I think problems and frictions arrive when, the moral codes develop over time due to new understanding of what is right or fair, and knowledge of the world improves. There are religions that accept that they should change over time and accept these new viewpoints, such as evolution, dinosaurs, or to respect womens rights. There are other hardline religions that believe that the world is 6000 years old, that women have no rights, that dinosaurs are false creatures created by the devil, and that technology is evil and should be avoided. Right now you seem to be leaning towards more hardline standpoints, which can anger some people, as you've seen by the down votes. I would encourage you moving forwards to not see new viewpoints and scientific understanding as a challenge to your religion, and instead accept that the world is beautiful and this knew knowledge was a gift to you from God. Gay marriage is legalised, so God accepts that people should be allowed to be happy in themselves, accept that into your religion. Dinosaurs are found and thousands of people work to understand them, God has given those people a gift to work in such an exciting career, accept the gift into your religion. To dismiss knowledge, is to dismiss a gift from God. Ancient wisdom and modern understanding should go hand in hand.

The dinosaur thing was just an example to deal with the concept of burden of proof. So I suppose in a way I was trolling about it, or at least I didn't make it clear enough that it wasn't what I actually thought.

I do believe in science, and I haven't found that scientific discoveries conflicted with the Bible. Interpretations of the Bible do change over time, but the actual text in the Bible does not go out of style. Well, I guess translations do, but you know what I mean. The Bible says God created the planet in a week, and that includes all the plants and animals. We have evidence of evolution, but that doesn't necessarily invalidate the creation story. God is fully capable of kicking off, directing, and accelerating evolution so that it still fits within the allotted time.

I take issue with your line of reasoning in the gay marriage sentence, but to be clear, I'm not saying it should be illegal, just addressing the logic. Just to avoid misconceptions, let's apply the same reasoning to alcohol instead. Something being legalized has nothing to do with whether God accepts it. Yes, God ultimately has all authority, and yes, the Bible says to follow the laws of man, but the laws of man are ultimately the laws of man, and there's a clause that the laws of God take precedence in a conflict. But even if that weren't the case, if the laws of man say we're allowed to get drunk, that doesn't mean we have to. The Bible still says it's a sin (which I think is because it leads to unwise choices and other sins that you could blame on the alcohol,) and what mankind thinks doesn't change that.

Also, to be clear, since you think I'm a hardline kind of guy, something being a sin does not mean we have to fight to make the laws reflect that. There's a lot of talk in the Bible, especially in the new testament, about how the laws are not enough to make someone righteous, and that was the whole point of Jesus. I do take hardline stances in that what the Bible says is true, but I'm not going to condemn people around me for working on the sabbath, and I'm certainly not going to try to make it illegal. (Well, a law against employers requiring you to work 7 days a week would be good on its own merit, but it doesn't have to line up with the sabbath.) Another biblical principle is that the way to reach someone is by love, not force.

So if everyone believed in the invisible dragon under your bed, would that shift the burden of proof to you? I don't see what the general consensus has to do with anything.

The people who say quantum mechanics exists don't just claim it, they can demonstrate it through peer reviewed evidence. Quantum mechanics is also a theory based on observable facts intended to propose testable mechanisms by which those facts can be explained. My claim of a dragon under your bed has no such backing.

As smarter people than me have said, that which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

Yeah, if everyone believes there's an invisible dragon under my bed, then that means the burden of proof is on me to claim there isn't. And I'd probably address that with a stick.

As for assertion without evidence, how do you feel about eyewitness accounts of miracles? Or sociological reasoning on the odds of the disciples keeping a conspiracy for their whole lives? Or how about the origin of the universe - we had all the matter in the universe condensed into a single point, complete with laws that would lead to such interesting things as nuclear fusion, complex planetary orbits, and even pockets of life. Do you take it as a given that it's far more likely for that to have come out of nowhere than for a higher power to exist and have arranged it as such?

You're free to discount the evidence (though I'd be happy to debate it with you,) and dismiss the claims because it doesn't align with your experiences. But note that the idea that all this happened without God is as absurd to me as the existence of God is to you, and equally unsubstantiated.

No no a stick won't work, the invisible dragon is very small and agile and would easily dodge your stick. It only makes itself known when it wants to.

I feel the same about eyewitness accounts of miracles. Eyewitness testimony is not evidence. It could be a good place to start to investigate miraculous claims but that's all.

I'm not dismissing claims because it doesn't align with my experiences, but because there is no reliable evidence. In fact depending on the type of diety you propose I think many claims can be shown to be false because they a contradictory with reality.

I'd be interested to hear the evidence you have for sure. I'm open to changing my views. I'm not scholar but my understanding is that the best we have is a collection of anonymously written books which isn't enough for me to accept such a huge claim.

I don't know about the origin of the universe but I don't think anyone claims things came from nothing, we simply don't know what was before the big bang. Not knowing the answer to me isn't a good enough reason to assume a divine entity is responsible.

Eyewitness testimony isn't evidence, eh? Before I get too invested in this, I want to know what you do consider to be evidence. Suppose that, hypothetically, I run a study where I recruit 1000 people off the street. I tell them that at some point over the next 10 days, I'm going to pray for them to experience peace. For each person, I roll a 10 sided die to choose which day to pray on, do so, and record the result. Then at the end of the 10 days, I bring them all back and ask them to indicate on which day they felt the most peace. ~600 of them say the same day that I rolled for them, ~150 of them are one day off, and ~100 can't give an answer. If this were to happen (solely hypothetical, ignoring any arguments about whether God would play along for a study,) would that count as evidence?

Yes that would count as evidence but only if you modified your experiment slightly:

  1. Don't tell anyone that you will pray for them.
  2. Instead of personally praying for each person, give the list of participant names to someone you trust.
  3. This person can then pray for a subset of the people listed on random days, recording the person they prayed for and the day.
  4. You conduct interviews with the people as you suggested.
  5. After you record the results of the interviews, you then look at the data from the person who prayed and see where things matched up. You can then observe if there are any statistically significant differences between those who were prayed for and those who were not

The reason this counts as evidence is because it's not eyewitness testimony, it's a controlled experiment which should be reproducible by anyone. By itself it doesn't prove anything but it would help to start building a body of evidence that prayer can work, or not depending on your results.

This is how you do experiments. Double blind all the way.

So if it doesn't meet the standards of a double blind study, it's worthless as evidence? What about case studies?

I get that double blind studies are superior because they combat bias, but sometimes double blind studies aren't what's been done. Other types of studies aren't invalid, you just have to take them with salt and consider alternative explanations - just as you do with a double blind study.

Case studies are similar in my mind to anecdotes or eyewitness testimony, an interesting starting point or indication that something might be worth digging into but not really evidence.

And yeah I suggested a double blind study because it has the most value for providing potential evidence although even that is no guarantee depending on the experiment design. It'd definitely be a good start though at the very least. You could do a non blind study but then the fact that it's non blind will be the first thing to come up and cast doubt on the results. If you want to provide solid evidence I don't think you would want to settle for less than that if you can avoid it.

FWIW I think there have already been studies done on prayer but they don't seem to be conclusive from what I could tell at least but hey, I'm not a scientist. You just asked what I'd consider evidence so hopefully this has helped answer that somewhat. Even with a double blind study though I think you would have some work ahead of you but you'd definitely have my interest!

Honestly, I'm getting flashbacks from old debates where people were really picky about evidence. If you don't mind a too-long backstory, read the next paragraph. Otherwise, skip it. Sorry for the amount of context needed.

There was a certain mobile app I played with an arena gamemode, where each player was part of a certain arena pool, and you could go up in the ranks by attacking others or go down by being attacked. I figured that, for each arena pool, there's a certain point of no interest, beyond which nobody would bother attacking you because they don't play that gamemode. As part of a debate on Reddit, I wanted to give a general indication of where this point was. To do this, I set my defense team to actual garbage (that anyone who unlocked the gamemode could stomp,) stopped doing offense, and recorded my arena ranking as it dropped. This went on for many weeks, and I published my results to Reddit, figuring that when it stops dropping, I'm probably somewhere near the point of no interest. The other guy refused to accept that it had any worth as an indication, though, because it was a sample size of one and too stochastic. We argued about it for... probably weeks, I can't remember.

Anyways, because of that argument, I'm cautious about dealing with internet debaters who have rigorous standards about what counts as evidence. I'm just a guy on the net, not a professional scientist, I don't have the energy to do research papers to convince one person of something they're probably not going to believe anyways. This thought especially comes up when I hear things like "if it doesn't meet the standard, it's worthless." Though looking back, it appears I put that word in your mouth, sorry.

To be honest, you're still setting off that red flag in the back of my mind, but unlike everyone it's been a problem with before, you seem pretty friendly about it (unless you're one of the people downvoting my every comment.) I'd be willing to talk about it, but it would have to be with the understanding that I don't have scientifically rigorous evidence because I'm not a scientifically rigorous professional. What I do have is personal experience about subtly yet distinctly answered prayers, paired with mental note-taking to ward off confirmation bias. I also have a couple anecdotes that work better as funny little stories than evidence. And I also have, as mentioned before, a line of reasoning showing that it's extraordinarily unlikely for the disciples to have been conspiring or hallucinating when it comes to the resurrection of Jesus, though I'd have to dig up my notes on that.

Does any of that interest you?

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Not really though? Non-existence of anything is the default. Existence of something puts the burden of proof on whoever claims this something exists. "Quantum mechanics" is a bad example, it's a set of theories, not a single theory (like "a god exists"). Depending on what is being claimed, you can easily show people papers, such as this one which shows experimental observable proof of principles of quantum theory.

At one point, quantum mechanics didn't exist and wasn't generally accepted. Physicists like Heisenberg took upon them the burden of proof and provided it.

General acceptance is how it is treated since then, by non-physicists, but it is simply possible to follow the proof of it if you really wanted to. There are experiments that have been performed and that can be performed again that create observable evidence of the principles of quantum mechanics.

The burden of proof still lies on proponents of quantum mechanics. What you're talking about is more of a societal shortcut, accepting that the burden of proof has been verified by other people, not by yourself, as it's impossible to go deep enough into every subject to actually verify every proof you come across. That's why specialization exists.

The difference is that 99% of physicists confirm the proof of quantum mechanics. Specialists on religion are all very much divided on which god(s) or whether at all one exists, and no proof exists for any religious theories.

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You should familiarize yourself with the concept called Burden of Proof. They (those who believe in God, and claim he exists and created all things, etc) are the ones where the burden lies. It is not for the rest of us to prove their beliefs for them, or you.

The default position is that we don't know if a specified thing exists. To prove or disprove it, you need evidence. I can prove that the Christian God doesn't exist, as it is logically impossible, but it's possible that some other version of a god might exist, I don't know. I don't have evidence either way.

How can you prove the Christian God doesn't exist?

It's logically impossible, it has contradictory aspects.

Yes, you said that, but what exactly?

It's impossible to prove the non-existence of something. It's on those who believe in god to prove its existence.

And the Bible doesn't count as sufficient evidence because that would be like believing Harry Potter exists because JK Rowling says so.

Unless you claim, as OP did, that you can actually disprove it.

I agree that the Bible is not sufficient in the sense that it proves anything or sews up their arguments, but to suggest its historical value as evidence is the same as modern day fiction is absurd.

For example, omnipotence is a self-contradictory term, as you have a dilemma - if a being is all powerful enough to give itself limits, it is not omnipotent as it wouldn't be able to do the things it limited itself to do. Whereas if it can't self-impose limits, it's also not omnipotent as it isn't able to self-impose limits. Another example is that suffering exists in the world, which would be a contradiction if an all-powerful being that wanted to end suffering existed, since it should, but it isn't.

And these are just contradictions within God's character. If you want to look at the things he actually claims to have done, you'll find numerous more in the Bible. Just as one example, Jesus's last words are different in almost every gospel.

None of this is new or hasn't been thought about, written about and deflated for centuries. I doubt you have any theologians shaking in their boots.

The meaning of omnipotence as it translates to Good has always been nuanced. There have always been things God can't do - sin being the obvious example. You could debate whether he can, but just never would because of his character, but it amounts to the same thing and has been orthodoxy for centuries.

The apparent contradictions on the Gospels (especially synoptic) have been done to death. Debated and answered more times than you've had hot dinners. There is no serious theologian or biblical scholar who would hear that argument and be at all concerned by it.

Honestly the same applies to the idea of a good god and suffering.

Just because people think they've put forward an excuse doesn't mean it's a good excuse. None I've heard have convinced me yet.

And that's fair enough. Claiming you can definitively disprove the existence of the Christian God and having some objections that you haven't heard a convincing response to aren't the same thing though...

You made a typo in your original comment

I can prove that the Christian God doesn’t exist

Let’s start with clarifying an element of the question:

Which characteristics define a god? Do these characteristics violate the laws of physics and/or internal logic? If these characteristics do not violate the laws of physics, then what aspects distinguish a god from a mundane or natural entity?

Not one person has provided proof that there is no Higher Power. Grow up....

Because that's not the atheist position. You're wrestling with a claim nobody is making.

Atheism doesn't claim there is no "Higher Power", it's just a disbelief in theistic claims.

Careful, many online atheists don't understand that they have to prove a negative. That they have to prove the assertion: "There is no god."

The default position is that there is yet insufficient evidence to draw a conclusion.

Edit: Thank you for the downvotes, you have provided me with further evidence that online atheists don't understand that they have to prove a negative. Your butthurt fuels me.

This guy eats babies

prove me wrong

You have made the assertion, thus you have the burden of proof.

"what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence" QED

...Do you not realize that the same goes for god?

I wasn't arguing for the existence of god.

Let me break this down:

  • "There is a god." --> Burden of proof
  • "There is no god." --> Burden of proof
  • "Hey, man. I don't know." ---> No burden of proof

The second one is wrong, there is no god is not a claim that requires evidence in the same way there are no fairies in my fridge doesn't require evidence

Negative claims require evidence.

Otherwise a safety engineer can go to a regulator and say "There are no structural issues with this building." He is claiming there are no issues, he needs to back that up with evidence.

Your Jedi mind tricks won't work on me. 😜

That's making a positive claim about a negative outcome. "There is enough evidence to be confident there aren't structural problems" is what they're really saying.

This doesn't work for god because there's nothing to check, there's never been any evidence for god, but there's been plenty of evidence for structural issues existing.

“There is enough evidence to be confident there aren’t structural problems” is what they’re really saying.

Bro, the graphite is not there. Everything is completely normal.

In that instance, the claim is "There is evidence of X problem"

They then provided the evidence of that problem and were ignored, the burden of proof was on the person making the claim that there was a problem, and there was a problem, they provided proof, and were ignored.

This has nothing in common with the previous scenario.

Are you implying that a negative categorically cannot be proven?

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When I was a little kid, I asked my grandfather what the bumps in the middle of the road (the reflectors) were for. He told me that it was so blind people could drive. It made perfect sense to me, and I believed that for longer than I should have!

Your grandfather sounds rad

They’re called Bott’s dots! Most places where it snows don’t have them because they don’t survive ploughing.

  1. interesting, never thought of that before. Las Vegas Nevada (never snows there!) has excellent road infrastructure and these dots are everywhere. You can tell casino dollars and tax dollars are well used in Las Vegas. The roads are very nice.

  2. Bott's dots -- first thing that came to mind was like Dippin' Dots

"you're not going to carry a calculator with you everywhere"

The thing is I believe that statement is a bit misunderstood.

Calculators were already becoming pocket sized back in the day, but using it to calculate things if you don't know how to use it is where the actual problem is.

Hence the reasoning to learn how to math vs only having the device.

Calculators were already becoming pocket sized back in the day…

True, but I can count on 0 hands how many people I knew carried one in their pocket.

Now if the calculator were built into a beeper, everyone would have had one.

I'm not saying I disagree, but I had a different experience.

it's very easy to enter wrong numbers on a calculator, but you need some basic reasoning and familiarity to know when an answer is off, and you need to start over

Yeah, in my experience "You won't carry a calculator with you everywhere you go" was what they said to justify pointless busywork.

You may carry one now, but can you calculate percentages on it without your maths lessons? Can you convert fractions? I blame the technology, if it's going to math it needs to math all maths

Frankly, these days? Yeah you totally can. "Hey Siri, what's 3% of 235,889?" or "Hey Siri, what's 8/37ths converted to 300ths?" will most likely just feed you a correct answer.

And you might not have a smartphone or smartwatch with you. I've seen people who needed a calculator to do basic math.

"Girls desire a knight in shining armor to come sweep them off their feet!" — my pastor

For the longest time, I struggled because I was told all my life what a "woman's purpose" was, and my desires never lined up with that. Felt like a freak because I never desired romance, sex, or partnership with a man (or anyone else, for that matter). If that was my purpose, was I supposed to will myself to want that for myself? Was I doomed to be alone forever? Was I wrong to want to pursue adventure and things that I wanted?

If my desire ≠ God's desire (which was apparently union with a man at some point in the future), then my desires were.. wrong. Maybe/probably even evil.

So I fucked up my life trying to follow that and fit into that mold. I did things I never wanted to do because it was the "right thing" to do in the eyes of God.

After I escaped, I never really recovered. But.. I discovered a lot about myself.

I did bearded dragon rescues & fostering, I got into cosplay, learned how to sew stuffed animals, got some mental health care, rekindled my love for nature.. all by myself. I learned to love me and not base my worth on what other folks believe I should do or how I should behave. I don't have a partner who gets to dictate my personality. I got to grow on my own.

I'm still coming to terms with.. a lot of things about myself, but now I'm able to grow freely instead of being confined to such a small pot.

Don't let people define who or what you are, or what your purpose is in life. Only you get to do that. It's both terrifying and freeing, but you can do this.

Even for those us who fit into the straight/white/cis mould, learning how to create purpose and meaning for yourself is a really hard battle against expectations imposed growing up. Thanks for sharing a really wholesome story :)

  • all colors can be made from red, yellow, and blue
  • how an airfoil works
  • language is immutable
  • you won't always have a calculator in your pocket
  • infinite growth is sustainable

The first one seems OK as it’s the basis of CMYK colour printing? Obviously missing black of course though.

The color people will tell you that cyan and magenta do not equal red and blue. My university advisor tricked me into taking a 400 level class from the college of art and design on color theory. Really interesting class but an insane amount of work. Very early on the professor told us to throw out any book that identified red, yellow, and blue as the primary colors. It’s red, green, blue for light or cyan, magenta, yellow for pigment.

Yes, additive colour theory is based on red, green and blue (RGB). These are the colours you see if you look at your TV screen very closely.

Subtractive colour theory uses cyan, magenta and yellow. In printing black, abbreviated ‘K’, is added for contrast—CMYK. These are the inks used to print the dots you see if you look closely at a magazine photo.

I think people are confused by this because they’re taught a bastardised version of subtractive colour theory, using red, blue and yellow, at a very early age.

Red/yellow/blue are the primary colors for paints (as distinct from dyes/pigments, that’s CMY(k) and as distinct from light, that’s RGB).

Why would paints have a different primary palette than dyes or pigments? They're all subtractive, so the primary colors are CMY.

The red/yellow/blue is a lie!

Are you asking me why is paint the way it is? I don’t know, take it up with nature, but stop spreading misinformation.

I'm saying that, with respect to color reproduction, paints work exactly the same as dyes and pigments. You can't make magenta paint from red, blue, and yellow. So the "primary colors" of paint are actually CMY.

Yeah it’s just historically been very difficult to make magenta and cyan paints so ryb has stood in for cmy

I see you've been tricked by their lies. Blue is sorta close to cyan, and red is kinda close to magenta, but they're not the same.

If someone tells you that you can make any other color from RYB, ask them to make magenta. Doesn't work.

Black in CMYK is not strictly necessary, you can absolutely make black out of CMY, but the separate ink gets added since black is such a regular occurence it's simply cheaper to not mix it out of the other colors.

In CMY (printing) you get black by adding them all. In RGB (lighting) you get white

That republicans are better on the economy. Nah it turns out they consistently screw it up by every measure.

It's like saying tapeworms are good for your nutrition

Yeah that was a persistent "it's just generally known" type of thing in the area where I grew up.

That you should base your diet on carbohydrates, and minimise fat intake.

Wait why the f the base is full chok of calories? Is this *how to get child obesity " manual?

Do you not remember the food pyramid? This is what they used to use for nutrition:

Now it’s this:

I remember food pyramids but in my country nobody cares and I don't think people would accept it unless it has beans and rice clearly at the bottom.

The food pyramid is commonly taught in American schools as the “ideal” diet.

It was started as a sales tactic to boost grain sales, but was marketed as scientific research. And since this was started decades ago, you couldn’t simply google their sources to verify whether or not the studies were legit.

Turns out it’s a crock of shit, and teaching it to kids does make childhood obesity rates worse. Because of course it does, an excess of carbs is horrible for you.

Fuck

So the short answer is greed again.

I went through the 30 seconds of effort to make the always has been meme.

Image uploads are down at the moment so just imagine I posted it here, thank you.

Thx for your 30s effort, that's s high compliment from you considering this is the substitute of reddit lol

Because it was sponsored by grain industries. Similar to the “breakfast is the most important meal of the day!” and “milk is good for your bones!” myths.

Had to learn this pyramid but never applied it. I mean, what did people eat for millions of years? Grains, roots, vegetables and fruits from foraging and now and then a ton of flesh (you can count dairy as extra-fatty flesh). So a lot of full-grain, vegetables and inbetween fruits and once or twice the week flesh and dairy it is for me.

Yes, agreed. But not refined grains. And vegetables/fruits picked when they were ripe; it weeks before and shipped across the globe.

Basically everything my mother ever said. I repeat a lot of it back to her now, and she always asks, “where did you hear such absurdities?”

"that's not what I remember" "That's not how I remember it" "You must be remembering it wrong" "I would never say that"

That I'd never have a calculator in my pocket

That I'd get more conservative as I grew older

People who gain/have a lot of wealth over their life do tend to want to lock that wealth in by being Conservative I think. Wouldn't want to shake things up!

I didn't get more conservative as I grew older. At least I don't think I did. What happened is that the definition of conservative changed.

Criticizing censorship and restrictions on free speech didn't use to be a conservative cause, it is now, so I grew "more conservative" without any of my beliefs changing.

Conservatives are still quick to suppress speech they don't agree with, though. Their criticism of censorship isn't a cause, it's a smokescreen.

That saying holds more truth if you're using the "non-political" definitions of conservative -- i.e. moderate, cautious, or resistant to change.

Moreso "set in your ways" as the world changes around you.

I suppose this is true, but remaining set in your ways while the world changes, taken to it's logical conclusion is political conservatism/fascism

People who aren't liberal when they're young have no heart.

People who aren't conservative when they're old have no money.

There are multiple things wrong with this, the most glaring of which is that a conservative with money would lack a heart as well. Conservatism is incompatible with having a heart.

That if a racoon saw you swimming, it would swim out to you and sit on your head and drown you.

My fully adult mother actually feared this was something that could happen to her children, and she warned us of this “danger” every summer when we were young.

If that were true I’d go swimming a lot more often!

I was raised christian so basically everything I was ever told was an absolute lie.

Same here friend. But they were lies Their parents told them and so on and so on so it's understandable how they thought they were doing the right thing.

True dat but its fairly easy to see through that nonsense and realise your parents are idiots (at best), one of the trials of growing up. Assuming there are no repercussions for it, like death, banishmanet etc

Spoiler alert: it probably wasn't

spoiler alert: it factually was. Go thump your bible elsewhere, Ive been deprogrammed already

What did they tell you that is factually false?

That gay and trans people are all disgusting perverts who hate me and want to destroy everything good. My queer friends provide more emotional support in a day than I ever got from my family, the church, or anyone else inside the Evangelical bubble I was raised in.

That people in "The World" (those outside the church) are all evil or unknowingly controlled by Satan and will always try to hurt me. Textbook cult programming from the people who were emotionally abusing me.

That God is speaking directly to me through a voice in my head, except when that voice says I'm a girl, then it's actually a demon or something. (It was likely undiagnosed DID as a result of childhood emotional neglect and repressed gender dysphoria.)

That scientists are all part of a massive satanic conspiracy to trick people into leaving the church.

Dungeons & Dragons being a satanic conspiracy. Satanic Panic stuff in general.

Lots of anti-evolution propaganda that turned out to be misrepresentations of science or complete fabrications.

That they actually believed in all that stuff Jesus said about loving thy neighbor, helping the poor and the sick, and being kind to immigrants, instead of spending their whole lives voting to hurt all of those people as much as possible.

Cancer didn't exist until the very modern age. Evolution is fake, a conspiracy. Jews are basically Christians who don't know if Jesus is the savior or not. I could keep going.

Me parent convinced a few of friends that the ice cream truck only played music when it was OUT of ice cream

When you grow up everything you write will need to be in cursive.

On the plus side, I have a pretty bangin' signature. On the minus side, they wasted a good chunk of lesson time teaching a useless script. Fortunately it was on the way out already, so I was never really required to use it even in school.

Millennial here and I haven’t yet seen a non-cursive self-identifying signature. Are they just like bubbly high-school antics and hearts dotting the letter i?

Christopher Columbus set out to prove that the Earth was round after eating an orange or something and that's how jesus discovered America

You probably had the same damn book I did, with an illustration of him eating an orange and seeing the wings of a butterfly coming up over it and supposedly realizing they look just like the sails of a ship and so, gasp, the world must be round like this orange!

" you can be whatever you want to be"

The real truth of it is: Through persistent action and discipline, you can dramatically increase the probability that you can be what you want to be.

I always use the lottery analogy with my kids: “How many lottery tickets did you get today?”.

The second part of the truth is: Some people come with a lot more lottery tickets that you, through genetics, income background, family support and, yes, luck. Don’t let that stop you; most don’t and you don’t need to be first to win this race.

Police are there to help

Depends on where you live it seems

Where do you recon they are helping? Out of three countries I've lived in, they are either useless or just simply ACAB.

It does exist. But it's 99% ACAB.

One of the countries I spend a lot of time, the police are amazing. There is no crime, so the police truly are just to assist. They don't carry weapons. They don't give out traffic tickets, it's all automated. They do give out directions, photo ops, perform ritual ceremonies, distribute free meals to anyone who wants one, give free workout sessions on the beach, give free sports training, lead free expeditions into nature, etc. It's a sense of community spirit that is their mission.

I'm sure there is a bad apple somewhere but every single one I've seen or interacted with has been pleasant to wonderful. I'm not even terrified to approach them as I am in the USA where I've almost been murdered twice by pigs.

Where I live they were systematically nice people that helped keep everybody safe. If they found some drunk/high person that needed help, they would drive them home. When we were teens and had beach parties, a couple of them would typically hang around somewhere out of the way, and only intervene if someone was being an asshole trying to start a fight (and they would tell people to pick up their glass bottles so kids wouldn't get hurt the next day). If we were otherwise hanging around they might chat to us and ask what was going on around the neighbourhood, and nobody had an issue telling them anything, because we knew they were just there to look after and help people.

Obviously, I can tell that my experience with police growing up is far from what can be expected a lot of other places. I really do wish more places had police like we did.

Over thirty years ago, I told a friend of a friend “Australians come from Australia, Romanians come from Romania, therefore Canadians come from Canadia”. She’s been calling it “Canadia” for thirty years.

We’ve been together for ten years now, and she’s just found out that it’s not called “Canadia”. Boy am I in trouble.

...i relish saying canadia; it rolls so deliciously off the tongue that i can't resist using at every opportunity...

That turning on the light in the car at night was illegal because it would cause a glare on the windshield.

I believed this into my mid-20s when my husband corrected me with a fuckton of teasing and incredulity.

I don't know which jurisdiction you're in but, while it isn't illegal in the UK, you're absolutely right about it being a bad idea and you are correct about the reason. In the event of a crash, it could count against you (in the UK, at least).

My dad got pulled over and warned about the light being on. I suspect it was really to check her wasn’t drunk-driving though, as he was giving me a lift me from the pub.

Some that others have already said (hard work = success, trust cops), and off the top of my head:

  • That my ultimate goal in life is to find a husband, and carry and then raise children (people don't stop saying it once you grow up, you just hopefully learn that they're full of shit)

  • That "blood is thicker than water" and that your family will always be there for you/want what's best for you

IIRC, the original "blood is thicker than water" quote is actually "the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb" which means those that stand by you and fight and struggle with you, and are there for you, are more valuable than those biologically related to you.

Writing in the 1990s and 2000s, author Albert Jack and Messianic Rabbi Richard Pustelniak, claim that the original meaning of the expression was that the ties between people who have made a blood covenant (or have shed blood together in battle) were stronger than ties formed by "the water of the womb", thus "The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb". Neither of the authors cite any sources to support their claim.

Nice, do you have a source for that so I can fix the wikipedia article? Either way it doesn't particularly matter.

That you'll be nobody without a degree. Maybe not told directly, but implied in many things that my inferiority-complex-mom said.

I was told they'd always be there for me. Then my dad passed away a few years ago.

I still miss him.

Half of you is him. He quite literally is right there with you.

Grandma adopted a puppy when I was probably 8 or 9. It got parvo. I remember going to her house and asking where the puppy was. She told me that he was sick, so he had to stay outside and I couldn't go outside for the same reason. When I would ask where the puppy is, she would tell me that he's on the side of the house where I couldn't see him. This went on for a long time, I never saw the puppy again and eventually forgot about it entirely.

A decade or two later I found out that my grandma had spent thousands of dollars trying to keep that puppy alive, but parvo took it anyways. She was very upset about it's passing and instead of having me go through it too, she lied to me about it until I completely forgot about it.

God is real.

Damn didn’t know Lemmy was this much atheist

Hah I had the opposite reaction, I'll surprised how many people there are in this comment section arguing that God is real. I didn't know religious people knew how to use the internet tbh

They’re certainly do. Why do you assume they’re dumb?

Ability to use the internet well means you have a lot of information at your disposal and can educate yourself out of believing in fairy tales

Some religions like Islam prevent you from doubting it, so it’s essentially a way in which many are just stuck in it.

But yea when you see political elections, takes on certain subjects etc… don’t expect people to take the time to find the info.

There might be some errors and mistakes that point towards religions being fake and man-made, but there aren’t really any obviously accepted error. Most of the time, they’ll end up with "it meant something else" or something like that.

They are subjects to some bias, yes, but that doesn’t mean they’re braindead, else you would consider vast majority of people on earth to be braindead.

You can at least understand that some people believe that the universe was created by some sort of entity, as the odds of all of this being created, with such a perfect balance, and having a creature with a developed conscience (humans) is extremely rare and lucky.

The post says a lie, not a truth lol

God is a 3 letter word created for stupid people to think they have the whole fucking universe wrapped up in a neet little package inside their heads.

That chocolate milk comes from brown cows.

When I discovered the truth, I learned an important lesson about betrayal.

Similarly I used to think cows just produced milk for us naturally and we had to milk them or they'd explode when I was a kid. Boy was I in for a shock when I realised what mammals are and that cows need to be pregnant to lactate like any other

Mammals don't need to be pregnant to lactate or, at least, they need to have been pregnant, but, after that, as long as they keep being "milked" they'll continue to lactate. I know you weren't necessarily saying otherwise, but just for clarity.

I used to work with a guy who genuinely thought all dairy cows were forcibly kept permanently pregnant in order to produce milk.

Mammals often lactate less and less as time passes, for many of them lactation stops even if you continue milking, which is why cows in farms are perpetually impregnated (which is horrific)

Wait, is that why so many adults in the USA believe that? Some childhood prank?

I can only speak to my own experience, but maybe?
Also, I lied about being American and participated in this thread anyways.

It does, it just doesn't taste like chocolate.

"maybe" was how my mother said "no."

"Ignore them and they'll go away" in the context of bullying. Hint; it took a mental breakdown and violence to make it stop, back in the mid-90s.

Anything having to do with Christianity.

Yep, I had a bully in elementary school and my mom tried to work with the system of teachers, principal, admin, etc. for months, and nothing at all was ever done about it.

Finally when the bullying escalated to physical levels and started to impact my personality outside of school, my parents basically told me that while I might still get in trouble at school, they wouldn't be upset with me at home if I did decide to stand up to the kid. They stressed to me the fine line between standing up for yourself and becoming a bully yourself, and sent me on my way.

A few days later, my bully found me at lunch and started messing with me. Pushing over my stack of booking, taking some food off my tray...I didn't do anything until he tried to push me out of my seat then it was kind of blurry, but basically I just took a swing at him and knocked him back out of his seat and he hit his head against the wall and started crying.

I did get in some trouble at school but nothing too bad (especially once Mom was called in and she explained how if they tried to suspend me, she'd put them on blast for how they'd ignored the situation for so long), and that kid was nice as pie to me for the rest of our schooling.

In middle school, I had an incident where a kid a grade above me (he was held back, so he should've been a high schooler by this point and was HUGE) began to mess with me, unprompted, at the end of the day.

He stepped on my shoes as we walked, poked me, called me names, etc. When I turned around and called him a bitch and kept walking, he sucker punched me and ran. It was so bad I ended up in the emergency room with stitches.

Anyways, my parents were called and they threatened legal action. The school begged them not to, because they were "going to take care of it, we promise." Once we found out he was only suspended for a week, my parents got all the info they needed to press charges for assault. He ended up in juvie.

Looking back, it's a shame he ended up "in the system," but that's what he gets for being a bitch. Lol

“Ignore them and they’ll go away” really is rubbish advice. But that’s of course not to say that the only other step is violence.

My oldest daughter didn’t have a great time in secondary school (UK, age 11-16) but through persistent discussions and alarm raising to the school, the bullies eventually got the message and left her alone. I’m happy to say she’s having a wonderful time in college now (UK, age 16-18).

Unfortunately that's a minority of cases. Most bullies in my experience, and especially those bullies that are themselves using physical violence, only respond to violence.

Don't meet violence with violence as your first option. But keep it on the table. It's a viable solution if nothing else works. Some people just don't respond to anything short of getting punched in the mouth, especially kids/teens with their brain chemistry fucked six ways to Sunday by puberty.

Don't meet violence with violence as your first option. But keep it on the table.

Something something “speak softly but carry a big stick.”

Basically, pacifism without the capacity for violence is simply inviting abuse. If you don’t have the capacity for violence, pacifism isn’t a choice; It’s being forced upon you as a tool of oppression. In order to be used effectively, it must be a choice, which requires the threat of violence if pacifism fails.

My father pulled that "just ignore it" shit, too. Somehow it wasn't the bully's fault for attacking me, it was my fault for being such an entertaining target.

Almost everything I was taught about nutrition later turned out to be BS

Yeah this is a great point!

Fat is bad! Sugar is fine (but brush your teeth)! Yes, this thing that’s been vacuum packed for 24 months is still edible food.

Yes, this thing that’s been vacuum packed for 24 months is still edible food.

it isn't?

Sitting in a hot tub as a kid will make you infertile.

Totally an old wive's tale. I looked it up when I was an adult and found out I had been deprived of tons of hours of hot tub time.

the hot tube temperature lowers the current batch of sperm's motility and count, alter the DNA and general quality. your balls cannot extend far enough to escape the hot tub. its not permanent. if you want to conceive, stop boiling your nuts.

Well you assumed my sex, but regardless, that claim is still disputed. Some research indicates that it does temporarily lower sperm counts.

None of that is particularly relevant though, because my family was claiming it would permanently cause me to become infertile.

That was them actually believing it, right? Or were they in fact using a deliberate lie to limit your bath tub time for some other reason?

Unclear, my grandma was a nurse. I thought she should have known better, but then again, maybe back in the day that was considered accurate advice medically.

We're all equal.

To borrow from Animal Farm, "We're all equal, but some are more equal than others".

That people are stupid because they don't have access to knowledge.

That truth is absolute. It's very much subjective. Much in the way right and wrong are subjective.

Life is complicated and things don't fit into perfect little boxes.

Except when it comes to Math. Math is absolute, as long as you ignore statistics.

as long as you ignore statistics

See? Conditions

Gotta ignore infinities too. The axioms they're based on are highly controversial.

And irrational imaginary numbers. I mean the numbers make sense, but it’s not like we can intuitively understand sqrt(-1).

You're thinking of imaginary numbers. Irrational numbers are real numbers that have an infinite number of decimal places and don't repeat.

Your example is a complex number. An irrational number would be Pi or sqrt(5)

Nah even statistics is perfectly logical and right, but not because truth is absolute (there may be such a thing, but we definitely don't have access to it in that case. [At this time?]), but rather because math defined there to be a way in which all you derive from it is 'absolutely' true. It just might be 'absolutely' true in a system that isn't ours, or isn't useful for answering anything we want to ask...

The garbagemen did not come back looking for me every week. They just came to pickup the garbage and not to take me away.

Younger Cousin Syndrome...

My older cousin convinced me the color red is linked to the spirit world. I believed it so much I actually started to see "spirits" when I was a kid.

  • My grandma always told me that if you push to hard while pooping your organs will come out. Technically hemorrhoids can do that but they are not really organs.

  • Microwaves cause cancer.

Prolapse is a thing. Good luck googling that.

Not only hemorrhoids but you can also get diverticula from straining too hard too often. They don't go away once they form, and can become infected (diverticulitis) which is most unpleasant. Pain like kidney stones or appendicitis.

your organs will come out

Hernia is also a possibility.

But you have to be pressing really hard and have other problems in connective tissue to have that.

They go away for some but you need to cut out caffeine. ( coffee, chocolate, etc)

Nothing good happens after midnight.

That becomes true again once you turn 40

If you have kids, you'll get a second wind when they're gone. Our adult son was staying with us for a while. We came in about 3:00 a.m. and scared the shit out of him because he thought we were upstairs asleep.

Men are logical. Women are emotional.

Such an enormous generalization and oversimplification. Very false.

That the crust is the healthiest part of the bread

When I was being taken into surgery they told me we were going into space and gave me gas that they said was to breathe in space. I didn't realize I hadn't actually been to space until I was like eight years old or something like that. Probably older.

In Catholic school in the nineties and early 2000's, we were all told that the sex abuse scandal was serious but that it was also "a small number of incidents." That we needed to pray for the victims and the souls of the perpetrators.

Then I went to college. Come to find out not only was the child rape widespread, not only did the church actively hide monsters from legal scrutiny, not only was this all directly effecting the local arch diocese (not my school specifically, but church leaders were forced to quickly rename another high school when allegations against a dead bishop proved too numerous to ignore)... not only all that but that it's still going on, just not in first world countries with robust networks of journalists and legal systems. That an alleged pedophile was (while I was in college) living in the Vatican, being directly sheltered from extradition by South American authorities.

I guess the lie was that it was all over. That it was a small problem. That the church was a safe place people could turn to. I left the church at 18 over it, became an atheist by 19, and that's where I'm at now at 35.

Engine breaking braking destroys the engine.

Today: DO NOT ENGAGE CLUTCH ABOVE 1300 RPM.

There's no little tooth bugs crawling back my neck. Toothpaste just isn't healthy to ingest.

Bahaha, don't swallow tooth paste because of tooth bugs!??!!?! This is the best thing I've ever heard

That gender and sexuality and sex is basic make is mean female is girl and heteronormativity.

Fuck all that. I'm free from that bullshit.

That pulling levers in the basement furnace room wouldn't blow the house up. It wasn't until my 20s when it randomly popped into my head and I thought about it with my adult brain and was like "wait... Why would someone install something that would blow the house up?"

Not as such. But it also doesn't mean that it can't have catastrophic results.

Your water heater has an overpressure valve, but just one. A failure in that valve and a temperature regulator and you can have your hot water heater shooting up through your roof.

Your furnace has a control board. It turns the gas on, hits the igniter, watches for flame. An older, shittier designs, it was entirely possible for just one or two sensors to go bad and run the furnace to the point of melting down and have the house burned down. Source: happened to me on vacation many decades ago.

Aside from the; obvious bullahit of relegion that you can figure out for yourself quite early .... not to be a bully to get what you want. It's near ubiquitous, from police to government, to wealthy people, business owners etc anyone with an asymmetric relationship gets what they want that way. As a boss, do what I want or I fire you and you starve etc etc.

I still see them pedaling the same lies to children today, bullying and cowexison are linked to inextricably liked to what we call success we are fine with it, the weird part is the denial and lieing to kids about not being a bully .

Not necessarily at all. Depending on where you live, anyway, but if you have supporting friends, you'll end up fine

I was never, at any point, as much of a child as I was told I was.