Glossary G – M

For a comprehensive categorical listing of both formal and informal logical fallacies, cognitive biases, statistical broaches and styles of crooked thinking on the part of those in the Social Skepticism movement, click here, or on the Tree of Knowledge Obfuscation icon to the left.

The Ethical Skeptic Site Glossary (and Lexicon)

Garbage Skepticism – when the ‘skeptical’ reasoning employed is less rational or scientifically literate than the contention it is being employed against.

Gaslighting – a form of manipulation that seeks to sow seeds of doubt in a targeted individual or in members of a targeted group, hoping to make them question their own memory, perception, and/or sanity. Using persistent denial, disinformation, misdirection, contradiction, manipulated statistics and organic untruths, in an attempt to destabilize the target and delegitimize the target’s beliefs, understanding or confidence in self.

Gaussian Blindness (see medium fallax) – the tendency to characterize an entire population by both the mean (μ) of the population as well as a Normal Distribution profile or other easily applied distribution, as being descriptive of the whole body of a set of data. I’ve got my head in the oven, and my ass in the fridge, so I’m OK.

Gedanken-Experiment (Gedankenerfahrung) – considers some hypothesis, mechanism, theory or principle for the purpose of thinking through its cause to effect series. Given the structure of the experiment or the nature of its foundational problem addressed, it may not be possible to perform it. Moreover, if it could be performed, there would be no need to ask its inception question in the first place. For example, to understand completely how the universe works, one must create a model of the universe itself – which cannot be completed as a task, inside the universe one is to model.

Gell-Mann Amnesia – the habit or bias in which a person, upon finding a source to be unreliable and critically mistaken when reporting on a subject inside which they hold close expertise, wherein they tend to forget such error/bias and regard that source as reliable regarding other areas in which they do not hold close expertise. Gell-Mann exploitation is the realization on the part of casual effort media sources, that individual experts who can challenge their contentions, do not possess a means to aggregate their collective knowledge about the media, and craft a condemning perspective.

Gender/Racial Bias Fallacy – attributing the decisions or status of a person to be attributable to choice stereotypes presumed about their race or gender, which when observed in other races or genders, are attributed to environmental or victimization causes.

General Absence of Process Error – a subjective open avenue of convenience, wherein any disliked subject can be dismissed through its framing as not following, or possessing an absence of one or more steps of the scientific method. A denying of access to peer review, or ignoring of a study, which is then touted as evidence of ‘not following the scientific method.

Generational Blindness – when a next generation member of a group which introduces or enforces corruption accepts the previous generation’s corruption as a normal practice of business.

Genetic Fallacy – an informal fallacy of irrelevance regarding the origins of an argument or the person making the argument, wherein a conclusion is suggested or rejected based solely on someone’s or something’s history, origin, or source and/or rather than its current meaning or context.

Geneticide – genocide by means of genetic exploitation or introduction of environmental influences which produce a sustained dysgenic effect on target populations. The exploitation of the specific genetics of a lineage of people to craft impacts seeking to ultimately and eventually eliminate them from a population. Employment of food, mandatory medicines, product and environmental toxins, social policy, laws, pesticides, and allele manipulation as a means to effect in specific genetic lineages – developmental problems, protein malnutrition, cognitive impairment, encephalopathy, birth defects, attention and comprehension difficulties, growth inhibition, mental disorders, drug and alcohol susceptibility, auto-immune disorders, endocrine collapse, disease, low rates of reproductivity, premature death – and otherwise disrupt the general health and welfare of a target population.

Genocide – a set of actions characterized by the specific intent to destroy in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group by killing its members or by other means: causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; or forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Genocide Argument – an argument which supports a position where, whether known or not known through means of denial based ignorance or manipulative rational ignorance, genetic sub-groups are impacted through broadsweeping application of forced consumption of a substance. Forced consumption can involve means of concealment in a significant portion of human food or environment, ingestion mandatory for participation in normal public activities, or mandatory ingestion by law. A genocide argument is always framed, defended and justified as being science.

Gestalt-Heuristic (G-H) Gap – a fundamental but unspoken disconnect (G-H Gap) between those subject matter experts who execute the detail and craft of the discipline, its heuristics, and those who direct the purpose and accountability of the discipline as a part of a larger mission, or its gestalt. The Gap in competence wherein those who develop the analytics/heuristics/programs don’t fully grasp the question being asked (and may answer a different, political, or rhetorical one instead – under fear of negative career impact), and those who are responsible to explain and be accountable for the results, don’t really understand how those results were derived. The gap between the academic, administrator, technician, and recent college graduate versus the executive, department head, or senior associate who’s heuristic skills are rusty and/or outdated.

Ghost Variable/Ghost Assumption – a novel variable which is inserted into a model to artificially compensate for the model’s lapse in matching observed reality, or to ‘describe’ a putative effect which itself is not fully understood, has not been scientifically reduced, or has not been confirmed to actually exist. Despite an idea or input being implausible, inelegant, and non-observable in any direct fashion, a ghost variable solely exists because it is required in order to sustain the model which requires its existence. A type of circular reasoning. When used as a placeholder, such an assumption can bear scientific utility; however, a ghost variable or assumption should never thereafter be assumed as conclusive, based upon its model-utility alone. Eventually the idea behind the ghost variable itself, must be demonstrated as valid.

Gish Gallop – a tactic of argument wherein the arguer skips through subject after subject or data point after data point, in order to tender the appearance of a barrage of sound unchallengeable argument.

God – Ω • ⊕ – any entity which has been ceded ongoing power, yet at the same time retains an ongoing lack of accountability. A standard employed by a proxy agent, as a virtual mass in the social leveraging of a victim.

God Protects Fools and Drunkards Inversion – a condition inside a domain or system wherein the complexity of the system is so high, that few to no experts actually exist. In such a circumstance, those who deceive themselves with facile, apothegm-fueled, or simpleton understandings of the complex system are more dangerous than those who are completely ignorant of the system altogether. An inversion wherein the ignorant are wiser in their outcomes than are the learned. One example is metabolic pathways found in prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells (particularly as it pertains to obesity and dieting) – a discipline which is so complex that pretend experts abound, and the only actual inhabitants inside the study domain are researchers, hustlers, and the lucky.

God Proxy – any stakeholder which seeks to exploit the privileged existence as a god (power, money, notoriety, comfort), without appearing to pretend to the role. Also a stakeholder which serves to promote a set of mandatory beliefs and maintain the unaccountable nature of the entity they serve, justified by the entity’s un-assailability as either a personified or non-personified external standard.

God’s Dilemma (& The Satan Principle) – since ‘God’ can never cause harm, any instance of harm must be caused by someone or something else. (As well, since humans and randomness do not cause the full set of all harms, therefore there must be a harm-imparting agent who completes this set, an anti-God who can and does cause harm.) Generally, any person, buzzword, program, party, technique, intervention, principle, or action which is held under a God’s dilemma, can never cause harm. It is assumed holy from its very naming onward. All harm therefore must have come from other parties.

Godwin’s Gaffe – the habit of repeatedly referring to Godwin’s Law, as a defense against methodological comparatives of fake skeptics to Lysenkoists or the Nazi or Communist Parties. While at the same time them self, subsequently bearing no compunction to not comparing anyone who disagrees with them to such oppressive institutions.

Goodhart’s Law – when a specific measure becomes the sole or primary target, it ceases to be a good measure.

Goodhart’s Law of Skepticism – when skepticism itself becomes the goal, it ceases to be skepticism.

Google Blame Ranking Effect – if advice about what you are personally doing wrong, inhabits 90% of the first three pages of ranked responses on Google, it is most certainly wrong.

Google Goggles – warped or blinded perception cultivated through reliance on web searches for one’s information and understanding. Vulnerability to web opinions where every street doubter pretends to be an authority on science, every Cabal member and celebrity is falsely lauded and every unapproved person is disparaged through hyperbole and misinformation.

Google Reaction Effect – the tendency to discount as unimportant or invalid, information that can be found readily online by using Internet search engines.

Granger Causality – a refutation of a post hoc ergo propter hoc claim in that a variable X that evolves over time Granger-causes another evolving variable Y if predictions of the value of Y based on its own past values and on the past values of X are better than predictions of Y based only on Y’s own past values (or especially another assumed causality variable X₂). Granger causality may not indicate direct causation; however suggests a common mechanism of some type via a fingerprint signal means which is much stronger than mere correlation.

Greed – the unending appetite for gain despite the provision of nothing in return. The giddy joy of unjustified income. In this definition, greed is expressed by anyone who wants to steal from society, or feels entitled to ongoing income through power, position or designation/status.

Green Lumber Fallacy – a fallacy exemplifying the distinction between understanding and knowledge. Supposedly originating from a trader named Joe Siegel. He was one of the most successful traders in a commodity he called “green lumber,” which he actually thought was lumber painted green, instead of freshly cut lumber (called green because it has not been dried). Despite his lack of knowledge of the social-intellectual facts surrounding the matter of lumber, he understood by being a doer rather than an academic, the entire in’s and out’s of trading green lumber. It can also be taken as an example of a different fallacy – those who live in specially set up cocoons of protection, or of very focused expertise, can thrive based upon a small set of understanding, as long as access is controlled by high barriers to entry, one does not even have to be knowledgeable, in order to win.

Gresham’s Law of Information – Gresham’s Law is a monetary principle stating that “bad money drives out good.” In the currency of information, bad information will also displace good information into private chambers of power or collections of artifact hoarders, while the pervasive currency of bad information, fake news, and noise will inhabit the public commons, naturally biasing its narrative towards a lack of soundness.

Griefer – a bad-faith participant. Someone who is involved in a discussion or multiplayer video game who pretends to be a genuine member but intentionally annoys and harasses others (trolling). The griefer primarily aims to cause harm instead of achieving mission success or gaining knowledge. They exploit game mechanics or twist the concept of “truth” in unintended ways solely to hurt other players. You can identify them by their passive-aggressive behavior, avoidance of personal accountability or risk of their own constructive contributions, and sole concentration upon targeting specific individuals.

Group Attribution Error – the biased belief that the characteristics of an individual group member are reflective of the group as a whole or the tendency to assume that group decision outcomes reflect the preferences of group members, even when information is available that clearly suggests otherwise.

Groupthink Blindness – when a group fails to see their own faults, usually through the common spread of propaganda, and therefore must view any critique of, decline in or mistake by the group as being the fault of opposition or outside parties.

Gundeck/Gundecking – a form of methodical deescalation and Nelsonian inference. Meaning to slip away to lower decks of a ship or lesser functions of professional conduct in order to put on the appearance of working on an objective. However in reality, one is merely avoiding or falsifying the necessary work at hand. Being a scientist when one needs to be an investigator. Being a technician when one needs to be a scientist. Whatever keeps one from discovering that which they do not want discovered, or not performing work on the salient question at hand.

Halo Effect – the tendency for a person’s positive or negative traits to “spill over” from one personality area to another in others’ perceptions of them.

Hamming’s Axiom – a quip by mathematician Richard Hamming, “You get what you measure.” Which means that one will not find what they are not measuring for in the first place.

Hanlon’s Dilemma – a corollary of Hanlon’s Law which cites that one should never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity. A skeptic who denies conspiracy then in malicious/deleterious actions must then imply that ignorance and incompetence are therefore at play.

Haspel’s Paradox – a suppressed idea mutates to ever more virulent forms, these are then invoked to justify its continued suppression.

Hasty Generalization – basing a broad conclusion about a group on rumor, stereotype, a small sample set or scant observational experience.

Hate Rhetoric – unleashing of a sometimes rhythmic and sermon-like rambling circular logic, stringing together a series of emphatic good sounding one-liners and memes into a web of defacto hate. A surreptitiously directed hate, focused on persons who coincidentally also happen to be of a different ethnicity, gender or socioeconomic grouping than the person issuing the rhetoric.

Hawthorne Contrast – a principle wherein a pretend skeptic will improve an aspect of their behavior simply in response to the fact that they are being studied or observed in a debate, whereas an honest opponent in a disagreement typically will not change theirs.

Hawthorne Observer Effects – an expansion of thought based around the principle in which individuals modify an aspect of their behavior in response to their awareness of being observed or to a test-change in their environment. The simple act of observation changes both the state of mind of the observer as well as those being observed. These effects principally center on the state of mind change in the observer:

That which is observed, changes

That which is observed for the first time, appears exceptional

That which is observed obsessively, instills angst

That which bears risk, is observed less

That which is observed to move more slowly, is perceived as the greater risk

Hedging – the a priori employment of ambiguous words or phrases, for the purposeful instance wherein they can be reinterpreted in such a way as to appear in consensus, if one is later found to be wrong on a position of denial and opposition.

Hegelian Deception – a form of employment of the Hegelian Dialectic where a fourth party deceiver manipulates the dialectic process to guide external witnesses to synthesize a false truth that excludes an actual hidden tertiary element. In Hegelian philosophy, the dialectical process involves the interaction of opposing ideas (thesis and antithesis) leading to a higher level of understanding or resolution (synthesis). In this scenario, the deceiver sets up a primary event (thesis) and a secondary event (antithesis) to create a false narrative or synthesis that relates the false perception that a higher level of understanding has been achieved, and more importantly diverts attentions from the actual truth (a tertiary event).

Hegelian Dialectic – three dialectical stages of development: a thesis, giving rise to its reaction; an antithesis, which contradicts or negates the thesis; and the tension between the two being resolved by means of a synthesis. In more simplistic terms, one can consider it thus: proposition → anti-proposition → solution. In a Machiavelli Solution, a third party creates and/or exploits the self-sublation condition of this bifurcation in thesis, in order to sustain a conflict between two opposing ideas or groups, and eventually exploit those two groups’ losses into its own gain in power.

Hempel’s paradox – an observation supporting consilience on a constrained proposition bears inductive evidential merit; however, an observation in support of its unconstrained contraposed equivalence argument is not considered a basis for consilience or evidence in support by induction. Evidence of absence or presence in the case of an unconstrained question is not as weighty as evidence in support of a constrained question of the same ilk. The former many times becoming the basis for intuition which can serve to imbue bias or mislead.

Hidden Miracle Error – when a proponent develops a purported scientific epistemology by employing a less visible but nonetheless equally extravagant construct to underpin that cosmology – eg. ‘god’ or a fantastic unexplainable occurrence which cannot be approached by method and measurement, now renders my cosmology as coherent. It relates to the phrases ‘a hidden miracle is more scientific than an expressed one’ and ‘grant me one miracle and I can explain all the rest.’

The High & Low Poseur – do A, then B was the right choice. Do B, then A was the right choice. Do A and B, you are over-complicating. They are afraid to risk being wrong, or lack the skill to create their own work. They always know ‘how it should really be done’, but never can seem to actually do it themself – and rather, only bear the ability to critique ideas they disdain or the work of others.

Hindsight Bias – the inclination to see past events or actions by people or groups as being more predictable than they actually were; also called the “I-knew-it-all-along” effect.

Historian’s Fallacy – occurs when one assumes that decision makers of the past viewed events from the same perspective and having the same information as those subsequently analyzing the decisions; therefore the levels of bunk, belief and credulity can be used to dismiss past events with historically credible persons, just as the same as they are employed in modern discourse.

Hitchens’ Apology (Desire to Offend Bias) – when one uses Christopher Hitchens’ apologetics to excuse/cover for a bias. Using the familiar Hitchens quote, valid in its own right, to excuse a condition wherein, the desire to offend is so high or is a first priority such that, it imbues or reveals a bias all of its own. A way of masquerading agency under the apologetic “If someone tells me that I’ve hurt their feelings, I say, ‘I’m still waiting to hear what your point is.’ In this country I’ve been told, ‘That’s offensive,’ as if those two words constitute an argument or a comment. Not to me they don’t.”

Hoary Glory Bias – when one cites old ridiculous arguments from opposing groups from ancient times or older eras of scientific understanding, to serve as exemplary rationale as to the impeccable nature of and false incumbent merit of argument on the part of the arguer/arguer’s allegiance group.

Hoax (Fake) – hoax perpetrated to “Show how easy it is to fake this stuff.” A hoax in which the perpetrator discloses that the evidence is a fake; at some later time after they have gained the adrenaline rush of deception or when the revelation will increase their celebrity status to the greatest effect. The implication is that this hoax-and-reveal process is some sort of grand ethical action on their part.

Hoax (Straight) – anonymous or not anonymous hoax perpetrated to fool an audience of the credulous, entertain one’s self and obtain the adrenaline rush of magician-ship. The goal is to hold the deceived audience enraptured with the magician’s personal demonstrated skill, intellect, sophistry and implied authority and/or technical ability. Deception provides an adrenaline rush, especially when spun inside a cocoon of apparent correctness.

Hoax (Strawman) – anonymous hoax perpetrated to discredit. Typically outfitted fitted with a hidden “key” – the obvious or semi-obvious flaw or Achilles Heel which reveals the event or contention to be merely a hoax; purposely set to be discovered at a later time, to discredit a specific targeted subject or persons to whom the hoax relates.

Hate Hoax – A skit/joke or special kind of strawman hoax which celebrates oppression or mocks people based upon their opposition to oppression, based upon race, religion, sexual orientation, nationality or political beliefs – is indistinguishable from and should be treated as, the real thing.

Hoax-Baiting – fraudulent data crafted by SSkeptics to stand as evidence cited by other SSkeptics in countering disfavored subjects. In an epidemic of Hoax-Baiting, a SSkeptic will even cite that their evidence has been manufactured “to show how easy it is to fake this stuff.” In many instances Trolls or other SSkeptics are paid to create hoax videos on YouTube for instance, by third parties seeking to sway public discourse in and around a disfavored subject, and quash any relevant serious material on the subject.

Hoax Laundering – the employment of satire news sites to create completely false news segments, which are then passed around sympathetic advocacy groups, stripped of their source and/or satirical context to eventually emerge as potentially true, inside target opposition circles. This is not ‘fake’ news, as the common idea that this, and not mainstream media news, constitutes fake news, is another misdirection by the same advocacy groups. Rather hoax laundering occurs with respect to hoax news; as the laundering of the satirical context is intentional and useful in a lob and slam ploy advocacy effort.

Hoaxer (Fake) – hoaxer who perpetrates hoaxes to “Show how easy it is to fake this stuff.” A hoax in which the perpetrator discloses that the evidence is a fake; at some later time after they have gained the adrenaline rush of deception or when the revelation will increase their celebrity status to the greatest effect. The implication is that this hoax-and-reveal process is some sort of grand ethical action on their part. In reality.

Höchste Mechanism – aka an Omega Hypothesis (H_Ω) – when a position or practice, purported to be of scientific basis, is elevated to such importance that removing the rights of professionals and citizens to dissent, speak, organize or disagree (among other rights) is justified in order to protect the position or the practice inside society.

Homoscedastic Failure/Fading – a statistical association is homoscedastic if its random variables or their associations feature a consistent variance. This can also be described as a homogeneity in variance. A statistical analysis which derives its trend from data in which homoscedasticity is fading or has failed completely, will bear a low likelihood of the claimed statistical association being valid.

Honeydew Wagon Ride – that period of time between when one knows they are about to be caught in a lie or crime, but the key revealing information has not arrived and no one is aware of that fact just yet. People in this circumstance tend to be uncharacteristically quiet.

Hostile Media Channel Effect – the tendency to see a media report or specific network as being biased and purveying only pseudoscience, owing to one’s own strong partisan views.

Huckster’s Anxiety – a form of dissonance/anger wherein a sales person or person making a pitch thinks that they are about to close a deal, and the sales target starts probing into issues of soundness, after the sales person has already tasted blood. This can elicit a form of sudden anger and posturing on the pitch-maker’s part. It can also serve as a form of manipulation of the intended target of the sale.

Hume’s Law – a normative statement, or statement of what should be, cannot be deduced exclusively from descriptive statements. In essence the philosophical refutation of rhetoric.

Hume’s Razor Error – the false presumption that a seemingly miraculous explanation is assumed to be false if any alternative explanation provided is less miraculous. Suffers from penultimate set fallacy, “Occam’s” Razor error, and the idea that by the simple proposition of a conforming alternative explanation, one can then complete the scientific method and tender a conclusion purported to be of scientific origin, based solely upon philosophical conjecture.

Humor Hoax Fraud – when posing misinformation about disdained persons or subjects, posed inside or excused by a context of humor, knowing that it will be re-circulated as fact by those with whom you associate. Pretending to be innocent by expression technicality.

Humping the Elephant – an extension of the familiar ‘elephant looks different from every angle metaphor;’ wherein a fake skeptic is not actually trying to find out the truth, rather is simply there for personal benefit or agenda promotion. In this context having their way with the elephant rather than trying to find out what it is.

Hyperbolic Constraint – a form of special pleading wherein a ludicrous or cherry picked statistical constraint upon a set of data is used to lens that data in such a way as to make it appear to be more favorable to one’s a priori position. If they ended each game they played at the half, they would be undefeated. See also Goodhart’s Law.

Hyperbolic False Equivalence – using an analogy of an extreme or non-sequitur nature to exaggerate in eliciting a principle regarding an issue under discussion. For example stating that gardening is to farming as woodworking is to home contracting. It exaggerates the point being made, usually in serving an underlying agenda.

Hyperepistemology – transactional pseudoscience in the employment of extreme, linear, diagnostic, inconsistent, truncated, excessively lab constrained or twisted forms of science in order to prevent the inclusion or consideration of undesired ideas, data, observations or evidence.

Hypocrisy of Plenitude – when one employs the principle of plenitude in explaining the reality of a person’s existence and self identity (you simply are experiencing one of an infinity of potentials), which is then negated by the appeal to authority of mandating severe constraint of potentials in explaining that same person’s ontological future or past (you have never lived before, nor shall you have any afterlife). Especially when one is claiming that this hypocrisy is somehow derived from ‘evidence’ or science.

Hypocritical Appeal to Authority – when suddenly and uncharacteristically recognizing as a recitation authority a resource figure whom one has previously or regularly shunned as an authority, simply because in the case cited, that resource happens to agree with or provide evidence supporting the proponent’s argued position.

Hypoepistemology – existential pseudoscience in the relegation of disfavored subjects and observations into bucket pejorative categorizations in order to prevent such subjects’ inclusion or consideration in the body of active science. Conversely, acceptance of an a priori favored idea, as constituting sound science, based simply on its attractiveness inside a set of social goals.

Hypothesis – a disciplined and structured incremental risk in inquiry, relying upon the co-developed necessity of mechanism and intelligence. A hypothesis necessarily features seven key elements which serve to distinguish it from non-science or pseudoscience.

The Seven Elements of Hypothesis

1. Construct based upon necessity. A construct is a disciplined ‘spark’ (scintilla) of an idea, on the part of a researcher or type I, II or III sponsor, educated in the field in question and experienced in its field work. Once a certain amount of intelligence has been developed, as well as definition of causal mechanism which can eventually be tested (hopefully), then the construct becomes ‘necessary’ (i.e. passes Ockham’s Razor). See The Necessary Alternative.

2. Wittgenstein definition and defined domain. A disciplined, exacting, consistent, conforming definition need be developed for both the domain of observation, as well as the underpinning terminology and concepts. See Wittgenstein Error.

3. Parsimony. The resistance to expand explanatory plurality or descriptive complexity beyond what is absolutely necessary, combined with the wisdom to know when to do so. Conjecture along an incremental and critical path of syllogism. Avoidance of unnecessarily orphan questions, even if apparently incremental in the offing. See The Real Ockham’s Razor. Two character traits highlight hypothesis which has adeptly posed inside parsimony.

a. Is incremental and critical path in its construct – the incremental conjecture should be a reasoned, single stack and critical path new construct. Constructs should follow prior art inside the hypothesis (not necessarily science as a whole), and seek an answer which serves to reduce the entropy of knowledge.

b. Methodically conserves risk in its conjecture – no question may be posed without risk. Risk is the essence of hypothesis. A hypothesis, once incremental in conjecture, should be developed along a critical path which minimizes risk in this conjecture by mechanism and/or intelligence, addressing each point of risk in increasing magnitude or stack magnitude.

c. Posed so as to minimize stakeholder risk – (i.e. precautionary principle) – a hypothesis should not be posed which suggests that a state of unknown regarding risk to impacted stakeholders is acceptable as central aspect of its ongoing construct critical path. Such risk must be addressed first in critical path as a part of 3. a. above.

4. Duty to Reduce Address and Inform – a critical element and aspect of parsimony regarding a scientific hypothesis. The duty of such a hypothesis to expose and address in its syllogism, all known prior art in terms of both analytical intelligence obtained or direct study mechanisms and knowledge. If information associated with a study hypothesis is unknown, it should be simply mentioned in the study discussion. However, if countermanding information is known or a key assumption of the hypothesis appears magical, the structure of the hypothesis itself must both inform of its presence and as well address its impact. See Methodical Deescalation and The Warning Signs of Stacked Provisional Knowledge. Unless a hypothesis offers up its magical assumption for direct testing, it is not truly a scientific hypothesis. Nor can its conjecture stand as knowledge.

5. Intelligence. Data is denatured into information, and information is transmuted into intelligence. Inside decision theory and clandestine operation practices, intelligence is the first level of illuminating construct upon which one can make a decision. The data underpinning the intelligence should necessarily be probative and not simply reliable. Intelligence skills combine a healthy skepticism towards human agency, along with an ability to adeptly handle asymmetry, recognize probative data, assemble patterns, increase the reliability of incremental conjecture and pursue a sequitur, salient and risk mitigating pathway of syllogism. See The Role of Intelligence Inside Science.

6. Mechanism. Every effect in the universe is subject to cause. Such cause may be mired in complexity or agency; nonetheless, reducing a scientific study into its components and then identifying underlying mechanisms of cause to effect – is the essence of science. A pathway from which cause yields effect, which can be quantified, measured and evaluated (many times by controlled test) – is called mechanism. See Reduction: A Bias for Understanding.

7. Exposure to Accountability. This is not peer review. While during the development phase, a period of time certainly must exist in which a hypothesis is held proprietary so that it can mature – and indeed fake skeptics seek to intervene before a hypothesis can mature and eliminate it via ‘Occam’s Razor’ (sic) so that it cannot be researched. Nonetheless, a hypothesis must be crafted such that its elements 1 – 6 above can be held to the light of accountability, by 1. skepticism (so as to filter out sciebam and fake method) which seeks to improve the strength of hypothesis (this is a ‘ally’ process and not peer review), and 2. stakeholders who are impacted or exposed to its risk. Hypothesis which imparts stakeholder risk, which is held inside proprietary cathedrals of authority – is not science, rather oppression by court definition.

I Am that I Am – the principle which serves to cut theism as a form of belief, distinct from all other forms of belief as either philosophy or religion. From the Torah idiom, I Am (I Am that I Am or in Sanskrit, Aham Bramsmi): That which possesses the unique ability to be able to define itself, renders all other entities disqualified in such expertise. There is no such thing as an expert in god.

Iatrogenic Skepticism – skepticism which serves to mislead science in its role as the philosophy underlying science. Skepticism which is actually the cause of ignrance rather than a mechanism helping reduce the entropy of understanding. Skepticism which results in such things as flat Earth theory, Moon landing denial, useless supplement claims and risky corporate science injury denial.

Idea vs Belief Blurring – the false practice of regarding an idea observed by a curious person, to constitute a ‘belief’ the observers’ part. This in an effort to subjugate such ideas into the category of personal religion or MiHoDeAL set. In fact an idea is simply that, a thought, and its false dismissal under the pretense of being deemed a ‘belief’ is a practice of deception and pseudoscience.

ideam tutela – concealed agency. A questionable idea or religious belief which is surreptitiously promoted through an inverse negation. A position which is concealed by an arguer because of their inability to defend it, yet is protected at all costs without its mention – often through attacking without sound basis, every other form of opposing idea.

idem existimatis – attempting to obscure the contributing error or risk effect of imprecise estimates or assumptions, through an overt focus on the precision or accuracy of other measures inputs inside a calculation, study or argument.

Identity Compromise – a lending of fealty to a group to which one’s values or ethics would normally conflict, as a matter of expediency or self protection. Often characterized by usage of the phrase ‘I identify with’ in such a way as to divorce the person, who would otherwise in a normal context employ the expression ‘I am’, from accountability for the actions or impacts of the philosophy to which they are lending fealty. This allows one to act as a member or protect one’s self from reprisals by falsely holding a position, which an internal conflict or conscience would not allow one to otherwise normally hold. It is indicative of social programming and brainwashing.

Ideoblather Effect – the unconscious habituation to one liners and memorized/canned responses which are spoken by means of an autonomous reaction on the part of one faced with a troubling idea, observation, evidence set or perceived opponent.

ignis pugna – for ‘fight fire with fire’, a Latin idiom. A condition of false appeal to hypocrisy wherein one defending the innocent from the powerful, or only defending from an unjust attack, appropriately uses the same tactics as the attacker, or tactics they themself might have previously decried. For instance, one condemns doxing in general, but is forced to use it as a means of stopping a person conducting malicious aggression, harm or bullying. A condition wherein one uses a gun to stop a crime, and then is invalidly criticized for having used a gun, as if that constituted a crime of violence itself. This is a deceptive appeal to hypocrisy, which is easier to conceal when the circumstances are not as stark as in the case of justifiably using a gun. This is the converse of tu quoque – wherein a person falsely believes that just because an opponent has committed any or a specific broach in tactic, therefore now the arguer is also allowed. The fallacy, ignis punga is the special condition where either tu quoque or an appeal to hypocrisy is falsely applied.

Ignorance – is not a ‘lack of knowledge’ but is rather a verb, meaning ‘a cultivated quiescence before an idea or group which has become more important to protect than science, human rights, well-being, and life itself.’ The belief that one has personally attained a state of immunity to incorrect information. The action of blinding one’s self to an eschewed reality through a satiating and insulating culture and lexicon.

Ignorance-God of the Gaps – when we obfuscate a mystery in science by means of ignoring it as taboo – then Ignorance too becomes a ‘God of the Gaps.’

ignoratio elenchi – a misdirection in argumentation rather than a weak inference. A misrepresentation of the logical calculus or evidence for an opponent’s claim, so as to frame the opponent’s contention in the poorest light.

Bifurcation Proof – when one makes up or spins an overly negative representation of another person’s position or a set of ideas/observations, and contends that this condemnation, and an implied sleight-of-hand bifurcation, therefore proves their own position or stands as scientific proof of their own idea.

“If I Only Had a Brain” Straw Man – an argument which would have constituted a straw man argument had the claimant understood it to begin with, however appears only to stem from the arguer’s inability to grasp the issue or logical calculus under discussion or contention.

Appeal to Ridicule – an argument is made by presenting the opponent’s argument in a way that makes it appear ridiculous.

Chewbacca Defense – a tactic in which the aim of the argument seems to be to deliberately confuse rather than actually refute the case of the other side.

Red Herring – presentation of an argument that may or may not be logically valid on its own, but distracts the discussion away from a failing argument, as well as failing nonetheless to address the context of the issue in question or address its logical validity.

Relative Privation (also known as “appeal to worse problems” or “not as bad as”) – an informal fallacy of dismissing an argument or complaint due to the existence of more important problems in the world, regardless of whether those problems bear relevance to the initial argument. A form of ignoratio elenchi argument.

ingens vanitatum Argument – citing a great deal of expert irrelevance. A posing of ‘fact’ or ‘evidence’ framed inside an appeal to expertise, which is correct and relevant information at face value; however which serves to dis-inform as to the nature of the argument being vetted or the critical evidence or question being asked.

Straw Man Fallacy – misrepresentation of either an ally or opponent’s position, argument or fabrication of such in absence of any stated opinion. Exists in several forms:

Straw Man Argument – crating of or logical calculus under, an argument which either does not exist, is irrelevant or is manipulated and twisted into a different form by a proponent.

Straw Man Conformance – the idea that since a person or group believes or considers subject A to be a potentiality, then an opponent insists that they therefore have endorsed extreme misrepresentations of subject A as well.

Straw Man Profiling – profiling of an individual based on an extreme or misrepresented version of their position. Any man can be made to appear irrational and vile, if his opponents only are allowed to speak on his behalf.

Scare Crow Fabrication – crafting of a position or stance on an issue which an opponent has never tendered, implied or stated. An argument fabricated from complete fiction and used to dissuade persons from viewing that opponent in a positive light.

Straw Man Egoism – a self-focused belief that every argument raised by an opponent is a straw man issued at them personally. Especially when the argument is common inside the domain being discussed.

Ignoring as Accident – exceptions or even massive sets of data and observational counter-evidence to an enforced generalization are ignored as anecdotes or accidents.

ignoro eventum – institutionalized pseudoscience wherein a group ignores or fails to conduct follow-up study after the execution of a risk bearing decision. The instance wherein a group declares the science behind a planned action which bears a risk relationship, dependency or precautionary principle, to be settled, in advance of this decision/action being taken. Further then failing to conduct any impact study or meta-analysis to confirm their presupposition as correct. This is not simply pseudoscience, rather it is a criminal action in many circumstances.

Ignosticism – ontological silence : a personal discipline that holds that the concept ‘god’ bears no falsifiable (Popper) definition (Wittgenstein), and therefore prohibits me from concluding or making further scientific comment on the matter. A personal freedom from antiquated, imperious and incoherent claims of traditional religion and atheism.

Illicit Major Fallacy – all researchers of pseudoscience are irrational. No scientists study pseudoscience. Therefore, all the positions of scientists on pseudoscience are rational positions.

Illicit Minor Fallacy – all skeptics are rational thinkers. All scientists are rational thinkers. Therefore, all scientists are skeptics.

Illusion of Asymmetric Insight – people perceive their knowledge of their competitors to surpass their competitors’ knowledge of them.

Illusion of Choice Fallacy (or two-sided coin analogy) – when an argument is made that one has at their avail a choice between P -> Q or Q -> P, yet there is not discernible nor critical difference between either argument, or two alternatives are presented which are essentially the same thing, or two issues are simply two sides of the same coin. It is a way of tendering the appearance of a choice, when indeed there is not really one.

Illusion of Superiority – overestimating one’s desirable qualities, and underestimating undesirable qualities, relative to other people.

Illusion of Transparency – people overestimate others’ ability to know them, and they also overestimate their ability to know others.

Illusion of Truth Effect – that people are more likely to identify as true statements those they have previously heard (even if they cannot consciously remember having heard them), regardless of the actual validity of the statement.

Illusion of Validity – belief that furtherly acquired information or promulgated policy generates additional relevant data for predictions or information to bolster a position, even when it in reality does not.

‘I’m Not a Scientist’ Rhetorical Exclusion – an artifice of rhetoric in which one begins a pseudoscientific assertion with the preamble ‘Now, I am not a scientist but…’ What the claimant has done with this is to imply that scientists are a group, marginalized from society, which had made the claim of being the only ones worthy to speak on a topic of contention. It is used to isolate the concerns of science as therefore being fringe or oppressive in nature by default.

Immunity Signalling – a special form of virtue signalling usually practiced by a university or corporation, wherein once it realizes that a technology or science it intends to introduce might serve to place the environment, a species, or humans at risk – in advance they will fund a large project with regard to the at-risk victim or aspect of introduced risk, signalling support for that at-risk population, issue or ecosphere. Usually this will involve the employment of top scientists which study the at risk entity, which will serve to silence them or enlist them as allies in the anticipated social debate. The virtue signal, along with the employed senior scientists will intimidate universities and activist organizations into immunity-based silence on behalf of signalling entity.

Impasse of Contrathetic Inference – a situation wherein abductive and inductive evidence points in one direction, while field research and/or deductive evidence point in a completely different direction of inference. Often this is a circumstance wherein fake skeptics will cite ‘prior plausibility’ in order to suppress deductive research they find not to their liking. The circumstance flags: 1) bad Wittgenstein definition, 2) flawed assumptions, 3) poor research history, 4) scientific oppression, or 5) honest scientific conundrum.

imperium ex absurdum – the appeal to god or infinity or holiness. Because god is holy, therefore you must be holy also. The recitation of an unattainable standard, which can conveniently therefore be used to condemn anyone at any time. Recitation of god or perfection as the source for one’s morals, beliefs or opinions, often tantamount to using the appeal to god to defacto establish that one’s self is, for all intents and purposes, god.

Imposterlösung Mechanism – aka as the Cheater’s Hypothesis – Does the hypothesis or argument couch a number of imprecise terms or predicate concepts? Is it mentioned often by journalists or other people wishing to appear impartial and comprehensive? Is the argument easily falsified through a few minutes of research, yet seems to be mentioned in every subject setting anyway?

Imposterlösung Mechanism – the cheater’s answer. A disproved, incoherent or ridiculous contention, or one which fails the tests to qualify as a real hypothesis, which is assumed as a potential hypothesis anyway simply because it sounds good or is packaged for public consumption. These alternatives pass muster with the general public, but are easily falsified after mere minutes of real research. Employing the trick of pretending that an argument domain which does not bear coherency nor soundness – somehow (in violation of science and logic) falsely merits assignment as a ‘hypothesis’. Despite this, most people hold them in mind simply because of their repetition. This fake hypothesis circumstance is common inside an argument which is unduly influenced by agency. They are often padded into skeptical analyses, to feign an attempt at appearing to be comprehensive, balanced, or ‘considering all the alternatives’.

Ad hoc/Pseudo-Theory – can’t be fully falsified nor studied, and can probably never be addressed or can be proposed in almost any circumstance of mystery. They fail in regard to the six tests of what constitutes a real hypothesis. Yet they persist anyway. These ideas will be thrown out for decades. They can always be thrown out. They will always be thrown out.

In Extremis – a condition of rising or extreme danger wherein a decision which is dependent upon an outcome of scientific study, must be made well in advance of any reasonable opportunity for peer review and/or consensus to be developed. This is one of the reasons why science does not dictate governance, but rather may only advise it. Science must ever operate inside the public trust, especially if that trust requires expertise from multiple disciplines.

in medias res – a process, research initiative or argument which begins its discourse in the middle of a series of sequential questions as opposed to starting with foundational ones and/or outlining a specific objective. This does not serve to guarantee an errant outcome, however often can waste enormous amounts of time and attention trying to resolve questions which are orphan, ill timed or unsound given the current knowledge base. Can also be used as a method of deception. See also non rectum agitur fallacy.

Inchoate Action – a set of activity or a permissive argument which is enacted or proffered by a celebrity or power wielding sskeptic, which prepares, implies, excuses or incites their sycophancy to commit acts of harm against those who have been identified as the enemy, anti-science, credulous or ‘deniers’. Usually crafted is such a fashion as to provide a deniability of linkage to the celebrity or inchoate activating entity.

Incomplete Comparison – in which insufficient information is provided to make a complete comparison of arguments between a disproved one, and a disfavored one an opponent is attempting to debunk.

“Inconclusive” is a Conclusion – the fake sleuth is desperate to issue a conclusion and obtain club credit for having reached it. Their goal is to stamp the observation (what they incorrectly call a ‘claim’) with the word ‘Debunked’. However, they also know that most neutral parties have this trick figured out now. So they prematurely reach a conclusion which appears to be skeptically neutral, but tenders the same desired result: Inconclusive. It is like declaring two opponents in a field game to be of equal team strength through a tie, 0 to 0 – by means of simply turning on the scoreboard and walking off the field after 15 seconds of play. By means of an inconclusive status, the observation can be neutralized and tossed upon a ‘never have to examine this again’ heap. Defacto, this is the same as ‘debunked’. It is a trick, wherein, the fake skeptics takes on the appearance of true skeptical epoché, while still condemning an observation or subject, wherein it is nothing of the sort.

Indigo Point Man (Person) – one who conceals their cleverness or contempt. Based upon the tenet of ethical skepticism which cites that a shrewdly apportioned omission at Point Indigo, an inflection point early in a system, event or process, is a much more effective and hard to detect cheat/skill, than that of more manifest commission at Point Tau, the tipping point near the end of a system, event or process. Based upon the notion ‘Watch for the gentlemanly Dr. Jekyl at Point Tau, who is also the cunning Mr. Hyde at Point Indigo’. It outlines a principle wherein those who cheat (or apply their skill in a more neutral sense) most effectively, such as in the creation of a cartel, cabal or mafia – tend do do so early in the game and while attentions are placed elsewhere. In contrast, a Tau Point man tends to make their cheat/skill more manifest, near the end of the game or at its Tau Point (tipping point).

Inductive Argument – an argument in which if the predicates are true and the relative quality or structure of logic is sound, then it is more probable that the conclusion will also be true. The conclusion therefore does not follow with logical necessity from the predicates, but rather with an increase in likelihood, hopefully converging to certainty. For example, every time we measure the speed of light in various media, it asymptotes to 3 × 108 m/s. Therefore, the speed of light in a medium-less vacuum is 3 × 108 m/s. Inductive arguments usually proceed from specific instances to the more general. In science, one usually proceeds inductively from data to laws to theories, hence induction is the foundation of much of science. Induction is typically taken to mean testing a proposition on a sample, or testing an idea on an established predicate, either because it would be impractical or impossible to do otherwise.

Inductive Hyperbolic Leap – when a claim is put forward which is unsound through conjecturing far in excess of its supportive inductive inference. A claim which is made to falsification of all antithetical ideas through mere mild inductive research in its support. Jumping off a cliff and holding one’s arms out and making the claim to have invented flying. Finding a gene influence upon an illness and making the claim that the illness is therefore solely genetic in origin. Finding one case of hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy autism and assuming that therefore all autism therefore stems from hypoxic birth, etc.

Indurate – the nature of a solid object in terms of being robust to breaking into factions or crumbling when placed under duress or dynamics which seek to exploit its internal friction. The integrity of character, mission and/or knowledge by which a group can resist being exploited and caused to divide into factions of disagreement or hate.

Inexpertise – conditions of general familiarity with, political or agenda motivations toward or solely skepticism and/or experience in the making of arguments in the subject field inside which an argument pertains. Not all a negative, it is the adept recognition of personal, participant or industry lack of expertise in a particular subject or field which is the essence of skepticism.

Inferential Strength – the integrity and power of both soundness and logical calculus for an understanding or claim derived from body of evidence.

Inflation of Conflict – disagreement in a field of knowledge legitimizes an opponents’ assumption of the invalidity of that entire field.

Inflection Point – inflection points are the points along a continuous mathematical function wherein the curvature changes its sign or there is a change in the underlying differential equation or its neural constants/constraints. In a market, it is the point at which a signal is given for a potential or even likely momentum shift away from that market’s most recent trend, range or dynamic.

Inflection Point Exploitation (The Cheat) – a flaw, exploit or vulnerability inside a business vertical or white/grey market which allows that market to be converted into a mechanism exhibiting cartel, cabal or mafia-like behavior. Rather than the market becoming robust to concavity and exposed to convexity – instead, this type of consolidation-of-control market becomes exposed to excessive earnings extraction and sequestration of capital/information on the part of its cronies. Often there is one raison d’être (reason for existence) or mechanism of control which allows its operating cronies to enact the entailed cheat enabling its existence. This single mechanism will serve to convert a price taking market into a price making market and allow the cronies therein to establish behavior which serves to accrete wealth/information/influence into a few hands, and exclude erstwhile market competition from being able to function. Three flavors of entity result from such inflection point exploitation:

Cartel – an entity run by cronies which enforces closed door price-making inside an entire economic white market. Functions through exploitation of buyers (monoopoly) and/or sellers (monopsony) through manipulation of inflection points. Points where sensitivity is greatest, and as early into the value chain as possible, and finally inside a focal region where attentions are lacking. Its actions are codified as virtuous.

Cabal – an entity run by a club which enforces closed door price-making inside an information or influence market. Functions through exploitation of consumers and/or researchers through manipulation of the philosophy which underlies knowledge development (skepticism) or the praxis of the overall market itself. Points where they can manipulate the outcomes of information and influence, through tampering with a critical inflection point early in its development methodology. Its actions are secretive, or if visible, are externally promoted through media as virtue or for sake of intimidation.

Mafia – an entity run by cronies which enforces closed door price-making inside a business activity, region or sub-vertical. Functions through exploitation of its customers and under the table cheating in order to eliminate all competition, manipulate the success of its members and the flow of grey market money to its advantage. Points where sensitivity is greatest, and where accountability is low or subjective. Its actions are held confidential under threat of severe penalty against its organization participants. It promotes itself through intimidation, exclusive alliance and legislative power.

Inflection Point Theory (Indigo Point Dynamics) – the value chain theory which focuses upon the ergodicity entailed from neural or dynamic constraints change, which is a critical but not sufficient condition or event; however, nonetheless serves to impart a desired shift in the underlying dynamic inside an asymmetric, price taking or competitive system. The point of inflection is often called an indigo point (I). Inside a system which they do not control (price taking), successful players will want to be exposed to convexity and robust to concavity at an inflection point. Conversely under a risk horizon, the inflection point savvy company may revise their rollout of a technology to be stakeholder-impact resistant under conditions of Risk Horizon Types I and II and rapid under a confirmed absence of both risk types.

Informal Fallacy – flaws in the expression, features, intent or dialogue structure of a proposition or series of propositions. Any criticism of an argument by means of other than structure (formal) flaws; most often when the contents of an argument’s stated premises fail to adequately support its proposed conclusion (soundness), or serious errors in foundational facts are presented.

Information Diversion – the tendency to continually seek new information on a topic at hand in order to imply the invalidity or indeterminant nature of the subject, or to distract focus away from more relevant but disliked data.

ingens vanitatum – (Latin: ingens ‘vast’ and vanitatum ‘archives’ or ‘vanities’) – knowing a great deal of irrelevance (noise: lack of relevance) and/or inconsequence (smoke & mirrors: lack of salience), or the citing of such disinformation. A form of rhetoric through Nelsonian knowledge of most facets of a subject and most of the latest propaganda therein. A condition which bears irony however, in that this supervacuous, irrelevant, or inconsequential set of knowledge stands as all that composes the science, or all that is possessed by the person making a claim to knowledge. A useless set of information which serves only to displace any relevance, salience, or logical calculus of the actual argument, principle or question at hand. The skillful exploitation of irrelevance and/or inconsequence which serves to disinform or deceive.

Ingroup Bias – the tendency for people to give preferential treatment to others, or the ideas of others they perceive to be members of their own groups.

Ingroup Bias Projection – when citing superior morality, rationality or intellect as traits more likely characteristic of members of one’s own group.

Integrity Tell – a skeptic who has examined themself first, should never cheat nor mock objective dissent in order to provide an ideological advantage for favored views. This is the first sign that one’s integrity has been compromised. The telltale sign that one is not really a skeptic.

Intellectual Messiah Complex – the belief on the the part of a false skeptic, that their superior education/rationality/mindset affords them tacit justification to represent the unheralded real well being of the people. Often combined with the attitude that people in general are too stupid/irrational to have any input on matters which skeptics advocate on their behalf.

Intelligence – data is denatured into information, and information is transmuted into intelligence. Inside decision theory and clandestine operation practices, intelligence is the first level of illuminating construct upon which one can make a decision. Intelligence skills combine a healthy skepticism towards human agency, along with an ability to adeptly handle asymmetry, recognize probative data, assemble patterns, increase the reliability of incremental conjecture and pursue a sequitur, salient and risk mitigating pathway of syllogism. Authority, Data and Fact are merely information at best. They do not constitute intelligence. One cannot adopt a belief, nor take an action bearing risk, unless based upon intelligence. And in absence of intelligence, the ethical skeptic maintains a disposition of neutrality.

Intent (Burden of Proof) – a novel constraint which arrives into a chaotic/complex process or a domain of high unknown, which does not originate from the natural background set of constraints, and further serves to produce a consistent pattern of ergodicity – when no feedback connection between outcome and constraint is possible. An intervening constraint in which every reasonable potential cause aside from intelligent derivation has been reduced, even if such constraint is accompanied or concealed by other peer stochastic and non-intent influences. When one makes or implies a claim to lack of intent, one has made the first scientific claim and cannot therefore be exempted from the burden of proof regarding that claim, nor reside inside the luxury of a false null hypothesis (Einfach Mechanism).

Intentionality Fallacy – the insistence that the ultimate meaning of a construct, idea or ideology must be consistent with the intention of the person from whom the original idea, concept or communication originated; and that no new or empirically improved version of its understanding may be tested.

Interrogative Biasing – ask the wrong question and you are assured to arrive at the right answer. A method of faking science by asking an incomplete, statistical absence, non-probative, ill sequenced or straw man question, fashioned so as to achieve a result which implies a specific desired answer; yet is in no way representative of plenary or ethical science on the matter under consideration.

intra ludio – or the telltale of the inside actor. If someone is truly an expert proponent of a subject, then that proponent should also be able to offer his subject’s most profound expert critique as well – and be forthcoming about unanswered daunting questions inside that subject. The key is to watch for this honesty in conviction – the faker does neither of these things – an only defends his precious argument. As an evolutionist, I do not believe that you support evolution, nor really even know it – if you cannot offer up a cogent and accurate summation of its current challenges and shortfalls. You may offer them up as ‘gaps’, but to totally ignore them tells the ethical skeptic that their opponent is both ignorant and dishonest as well.

Intuitionism – is the process of reasoning from a set of internally developed ideas – in part or alone without necessary reference to objective and a priori reality, sources, epistemology or belief. Such ideas may originate in part from unconscious or conscious extrapolations from prior training, including scientific, mathematical, social, experiential and religious. There are three general forms of Intuitionism.

Ethical Intuitionism – a set of ideas that our intuitive awareness of value, or intuitive knowledge of clear evaluative facts and our ability to sense and measure plausibility, risk and probability, form the foundation of our ethical knowledge and knowledge development processes. This form of inference derives its basis from a solid background in inductive and deductive training and experience; however does not demand that every inference be based upon solely sources, epistemology or belief. Since philosophy derives (by necessity) many times from relatively intuition based inferences – it is rightfully thought of as a type of Ethical Intuitionism. It’s quality is proved out through the success of the science which employs methods adhering to its tenets.

Mathematical/Physical Intuitionism – an approach wherein mathematics (or alternately physics as well) is considered to be purely the result of the constructive mental activity of humans rather than inferred through our discovery of fundamental principles claimed to exist in a referenceless, objective and a priori reality. That is, logic and mathematics are not considered analytic activities wherein deep properties of objective reality are revealed; rather, are instead considered the application of internally consistent methods used to realize more complex mental constructs, regardless of their possible independent existence in an objective reality.

Metaphysical Selection/Faith – the philosophical theory that basic truths can be derived or are always known intuitively. The opposite of empirical and epistemological inference methods, often involving some degree of teleology. The philosophical basis of the idea that existence, cause, effect, purpose, being, origination of existence, theology or lack thereof, can all be derived through the foundationalism about moral knowledge: the view that some moral truths or views about god, existence, cause and purpose can be known non-inferentially (i.e., known without one needing to infer them from other sources, epistemology or beliefs). It revolves around three principles: 1. Objective moral truths do exist (and for some, objective moral and causal Agents do exist), 2. Fundamental moral truths (and moral and causal agents) have no precedent, nor can they be broken down into simpler or predicate components (this is parallel to the position of Philosophy – however extends to conclusions, rather than simply practices and disciplines), and 3. The belief that human beings are granted, can freely derive or have a past innate memory of such moral truths (and moral or causal agents).

Invalid Comparison – in which equivocating, inconsistent or errant information is provided to attempt a complete comparison of arguments between a disproved one, and a disfavored one an opponent is attempting to debunk.

Inverse Argument from Authority – because it says something in Breitbart, Fox News, ad absurdum, therefore it follows that it’s false. Inverse of Argument from Authority, possessing the same flaw.

Inverse Negation Fallacy (of Presumption) – the asymmetric strategy of promoting a desired idea through cancellation of all its antithetical concepts and competing ideas. A method which seeks to undermine and censor any communication, research, or construct which runs counter to a favored idea, often through framing such activity as ‘pseudoscience’ or ‘conspiracy theory’. A surreptitious effort to promote a favored idea without acknowledging it, nor appearing to be in advocacy for it, nor undertaking the risk of exposing that favored idea to the scientific method or critical scrutiny. This because the implicitly favored model itself, although promoted as Truth^TM, often is unethical or bears very little credibility when examined stand-alone.

Inverse Problem – to predict the result of a measurement requires (1) a model of the system under investigation, and (2) a physical theory linking the parameters of the model to the parameters being measured. This prediction of observations, given the values of the parameters defining the model constitutes the “normal problem,” or, in the jargon of inverse problem theory, the forward problem. The “inverse problem” consists in using the results of actual observations to infer the values of the parameters characterizing the system under investigation.

Inversion Effect – an opposite and compensating signal effect inside a research study which has filtered out sample data through invalid study design or an exclusion bias towards a specific observation. By offsetting a subset of the population being studied which bears a condition that is not desired for examination or detection, a study can introduce an opposite or contrapositive effect in its analytical results. Vaccines not only do not cause autism, but two major studies showed they actually cure autism. Persons vaccinated for Covid, die at 35% the rate of unvaccinated persons in terms of all non-Covid deaths (natural and non-natural). These are outcomes which are impossible, however show up statistically because of an invalid exclusion bias which served to produce the effect.

Irish Pennant – a term, language or definition which is non sequitur with, fails to reduce complicated-ness of, is equivocal in meaning inside or otherwise lacks integrity with either the philosophy or remaining set of definitions inside its contended context. A tattered, overlapping or incomplete definition which has been altered through the lens of an agenda, rendering it at least partly incoherent with broader philosophy, or leaving gaps in the Wittgenstein (Descriptive) sufficient understanding of a subject.

Is-Does Fallacy – a derivative of the philosophical principle that one does not have to framework what something is, in order to study what it does. The error of attempting to conform science and epistemology to the notion that one must a priori understand or hold a context as to what something is, before one can study what ‘it’ does. The error of intolerance resides in the assumption that in order to study a phenomenon, we must assume that its cause is ‘real’ first. When electromagnetic theory was posed, they conceived of the context of a ‘field’ as real (= IS), before conducting EMF experimentation. However not all science can be introduced in this manner. In a true Does/Is, a researcher does not conceive of the context of the cause as real in advance of study. This frees up scientists to study challenging phenomena without having to declare it or its context to be ‘real’ first. Is/Does is a problem of induction – as it forces us to to a highly constrained form of science called sciebam, which seeks to state a hypothesis as the first step of the scientific method. A corollary of this idea involves the condition when the ‘does’ involves some sort of prejudice or will on the part of the subject being studied. Does becomes more difficult to study in such instance, however this does not remove from us the responsibility to conduct such study.

Jackboot Consensus – a version of pluralistic ignorance where social justice activism, fake celebrity skepticism or corporate push activism works to threaten the careers or publication viability of concerned scientists – thereby precipitating a form of false consensus at the heel of a boot. Most scientists quietly dissent but do not offer their opinion, considering it to be career endangering and/or in the minority.

Jackboot Uncertainty – a society, group or culture having a vast, ill-defined, poorly enforced set of punishable offenses which allows institutional power, and particularly its unofficial militant wing, the ability to easily remove their enemies. Everyone’s guilty of something, you just need the Stasi to do the legwork.

Jackery – accusing a person of being a quack simply because they sell a treatment which is not billed through a big pharmaceutical chain or authorized healthcare plan channel, or is based upon a supplement or HPUS formulation.

Jamais l’a Fait – Never been there. Never done that. Someone pretending to the role of designer, manager or policy maker – when in fact they have never actually done the thing they are pretending to legislate, decide upon or design. A skeptic who teaches skepticism, but has never made a scientific discovery, nor produced an original thought for themself. Interest rate policy bureaucrats who have never themselves borrowed money to start a business nor been involved in anything but banks and policymaking. User manuals done by third parties, tax laws crafted by people who disfavor people unlike themselves more heavily, hotel rooms designed by people who do not travel much, cars designed by people who have never used bluetooth or a mobile device, etc.

JAQing (Just Asking Questions) – a form of rhetorical arguing wherein a person will game the discussion by:

1. Feigning lack of understanding (often to later belie this by showing they did understand all along),

2. Failing to address the critical path argument or obviating its context from being applied to the discussion,

3. Beginning discussion by means of condemning conclusions posed in the form of a question, and/or

4. Continuous searching for any possible interpretive minor flaw in an argument or data set, which can be spun as a ‘debunking’.

JAQing constitutes a warning flag of agency and dishonesty in the person who engages by means of it.

Joe Poser – when an activist is selected at random from an audience, or is foisted upon a viewing audience as being randomly selected from a crowd sentiment – when neither is the case. Any instance where a crowd or audience plant is used as a supposed random interview or question poser, whom has been planted for just such a role in an audience advertised to reflect the general public or average citizen.

Journalistic Hyperbole, The Principle of – when a journalist cites that an issue is the ‘most’, ‘worst’, ‘deadliest’, ‘open-shut’ or scientifically settled, you can safely discern that the journalist fears that the issue might not even be real and/or is attempting to escalate the language of the argument to intimidate opponents. Hyperbole betrays self doubt or a lack of real evidence.

Judgmental Language – insulting or pejorative language employed to influence the recipient’s judgment through stirring of emotion, especially anger, by intimidation or by implying the superior status or rationality of the claimant. This will many times be delivered in the form of a one liner, cliché or weapon word.

Just World Bias – the tendency for SSkeptics to want to believe that the world is fundamentally just and rational, causing them to rationalize an otherwise unconscionable injustice as deserved by the victim(s) for their being irrational.

Kabā Alternative – when a more highly embarrassing or deadly event looms, create a less embarrassing or deadly but more viral event, in advance – in order to obscure the presence of the former.

Kafka Trap – named for the works of novelist Franz Kafka, this defines a circumstance involving bizarre or surrealistic predicaments used to enforce socio-bureaucratic power. A circumstance where participants in a social discourse are coerced to either agree with a particular political view, or be cast into a pre-established set of bucket condemnations based upon familiar and unfair stereotypes. The trap usually leads with an implicit threat of condemnation, which then provides a fixed set of categorizations based upon the conversant’s response to that threat. The conversant’s disagreement with the final categorization is simply ex post facto confirmation that the categorization was indeed correct.

Käseglocke – German for ‘cheese dome’. A condition and/or place where nothing can get in, and nothing can get out. A society, culture or club where development has stultified and the organized group no longer provides benefit to themselves nor those around them or society at large. A group which has ceased learning and/or its ability to increase understanding. See anomie, with respect to the morals and ethics version of such a condition.

Kettle Logic – using multiple inconsistent arguments or discipline examples to defend a specific position or outcome at all costs.

Keystone Lie – a base or critical fabrication upon which an entire stack of lies or conspiracy is based. The lie which is so pivotal to an entire narrative that detecting its falsehood hints that every other assumption or ‘fact’ associated with it, is also a lie.

Kilkenny’s Law – final claims to expertise and evidence may be tendered inside established trade, transactional, technical and diagnostic disciplines. Therefore:

I. A conclusive claim to evidence inside a subject bearing a sufficiently unknown or risk-bearing horizon, is indistinguishable from an appeal to authority, and

II. Corber’s Burden: A sufficiently large or comprehensive set of claims to conclusive evidence in denial, is indistinguishable from an appeal to authority.

III. If you have brought me evidence based claims in the past which turned out to be premature and harmful/wrong, I will refuse to recognize your successive claims to be evidence based.

King of the Shill – resting idly on outdated only partly predictive studies while asking everyone else with any alternative idea to bring iron clad proof.

Kit Cynicism – a method of being a cynic, such as in the case of Carl Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit, which allows one to be a cynic while at the same time convincing yourself you are not one.

Klassing – when one offers payment of money or threatens the well being or career of a person in order to get them to recant, deny, keep silent on, or renounce a previously stated observation or finding. The work of a malicious fake investigator who seeks to completely destroy an idea being researched and to actively cast aspersion on a specific subject as part of a broader embargo policy. A high visibility reputation assassin hired to intimidate future witnesses or those who might consider conducting/supporting investigative work.

Klassing Recitation – when one cites or defers to an authority who is reputed to have used Klassing methods or coercion or deceit in obtaining justifications for their research position or claims. Also to authorities who have been convicted of crimes of dishonesty under other disciplines than the one in contention.

Knapp’s Axiom – a quip by Las Vegas based investigative reporter for KLAS-TV, George Knapp, “The purpose of science is to investigate the unexplained, not explain the uninvestigated.” Citing the fallacy of an appeal to ignorance especially as it pertains to the refusal to develop plurality around challenging and robust ‘paranormal’ observation sets.

Knowledge – an incrementally developed item of information (intelligence) awareness, which bears utility in thriving (which includes the set of survival).

Knowledge Equivocation – assigning beliefs, opinions, facts, information, ideas, claims, unvetted philosophy, orphan claims and pseudo-theory, status as knowledge or part of the process of knowledge development, when indeed this is false. The problem with declaring a philosophy that ‘all knowledge is uncertain’ – is that it allows a foothold for questionable or risk-bearing knowledge to be assigned status as ‘knowledge’ and further be crafted into a stack of risk which is not evaluated for such risk.

Kriging Leap – when an argument is touted as being supported by underpinning science or precision, when the contended conclusion is not in reality supported by or connected to the underpinning science or precision. Jumping from theoretical science, glossing over intermediate principles, and directly to immediate application, in order to falsely bolster a desired position.

krymméno akrasia – an akratic person goes against reason as a result of some pathos (“emotion,” “feeling”). The person who practices krymméno akrasia hides this pathos and develops it by means of methodically and cynically playing the boundaries of the three Aristotelian virtues, wisdom, morality and benevolence; this in order to present a façade of character, while at the same time, deriving a more esoteric and occult goal.

Kuhn Denialism – the pseudoscience of social and media bullying with the ultimate goal of controlling exposure to and blocking Science’s consideration of a condition of plurality or new paradigm or its supporting data on a given disliked subject.

Laches Scheme – any sequential process, logical argument or legal circumstance in which a position is rendered null because it was not pursued in time – ironically however, neither could it have validly been pursued in time to begin with. A laches argument is one involving an unreasonable delay in making an assertion or claim, such as asserting a right, claiming a privilege, or making an application for redress. The scheme arises in the circumstance by which the subject claim could also not have been technically pursued during the period in which such claim was supposed to have been made. A form of Catch-22 common in corrupt elections or funding/assistance programs.

Lacks Scientific Method Error – the malpractice of disqualifying a subject, study or researcher from science by citing that it has not followed the scientific method, through blocking its access to the scientific method, refusing peer review or misrepresenting its appropriate next steps or questions, and therefore citing that it has failed the methods of science.

La Rochefoucauld Pride – humility is not displayed in how one appears to regard self, rather in the subtleties of how one treats and regards others. It is very easy to cast and portray a humble person in a movie, but very difficult to cast and portray a genuine person. The reason is because the former can be play-acted, while the latter usually can not. Francois de La Rochefoucauld was noted to have said, ‘Humility is the worst form of conceit.’ La Rochefoucauld pride is therefore a form of play-acted humility, conducted under a miasma of non-genuineness, which is ironically worn as a necessary costume under the social burden to conceal an intense and socially unacceptable level of conceit.

The Last Contributor (Principle of the Critique) – a shallow person (often one who exploits this principle intentionally) who contributes the last $5 to a $100 fund, or provides a finishing element of critique to a long effort of creativity, conjecture, risk, work, faulure and success – often is tempted to believe that they provided the entire solution or set of value. Often believing that they provided the entire $100, and lording it over the other providers.

Latent Violation – a condition wherein a person is motivated to compliance through the lack of enforcement of a penalty concerning a violation which they, or most every one in their social group has committed. Each member knowing that if they dissent or act out of line with the group, the public humiliation and punishment for such violation could be called in at any time.

Latet Misandry – the deceptive employment of positions of skepticism or channels of skeptical media to promote ideas or ‘scientific evidence supporting the hatred of males or men. To conceal a hatred of males behind a pretense of rational thinking, social justice or science.

The Law of Colossal Numbers – when one is surrounded by people who have been affected or injured through incidents which are very ‘rare’.

Law of Large Numbers Fallacy – the Law of Large Numbers does not apply ex ante, nor in any other case where there is not a large number domain to sample from in the first place. Any instance where the wrong species of probability event is selected, there does not exist a suitable measure of what is ‘large’ or ‘probable’ or the event being described constitutes only the single opportunity for the improbable event to have occurred. An ad hoc denial tactic which dismisses by presupposing the idea that one holds statistical refutation evidence based on plenitude of a sample domain. The rigor-less assumption that mass statistics will prove out any strange or unlikely observation one chooses to dismiss. It is a form of the MiHoDeAL Fallacy. See also Appeal to Plenitude/Appeal to Lotto.

The Law of Paradox – a paradox is simply a falsehood begging to be exposed.

Law of Static Privation – the test of knowledge cites that for knowledge to be confirmed as true, it should be useful in underpinning or predicting further confirmed knowledge or in the process of alleviating suffering. The law of static privation therefore treats static ¡facts! which are held as authority by groups of privation, who do not apply the knowledge to better our understanding or alleviate suffering – to then be subordinated to best practices which have been broadly confirmed by victims or outside stakeholders. It is a “Use it, or lose it” challenge to a body claiming to represent scientific authority.

Layogenic – looks or sounds great when examined from a distance or described in concept, but reveals to be a horrid mess when inspected up close or to any kind of level of detail.

Lead-in Lie – deception by means of preamble. When someone introduces a point by first excusing themselves from a group related to that point, they are indeed a member of the group they have tried to distance themselves from. “I’m not a believer in psychic phenomena, but… when I was…”

Learned Helplessness – behavior exhibited by a subject inside a closed environment into which a negative stimulus is repeatedly introduced. After enduring repeated aversive stimuli beyond their control, eventually they resign themself to the reality of its negative presence. Possibly even introducing an amnesia about it – see Post Stockholm Syndrome.

Learned Helpfulness – in a choatic and open environment bearing a large set of both positive and negative stimuli, the brain’s default state is to assume that control is not present, and the presence of ‘helpfulness’ is what is actually must be learned.

The Left Pole – a political point held by fake skeptics, relative to which any differing opinion in any direction is considered therefore right wing, alt-right, anti-science, racist or phobic.

Lemming Inertia/Karen Train – the propensity for a syndicate, club, or advocacy group to be deluded by ad populum (appeal to club popularity of an idea) and ad virtutem (appeal to virtue of self and their ideas) in support of a notion – to the extent that even if they are found wrong, the movement can no longer be stopped. The belief that because one is acting as proxy in the name of some oppressed party, therefore they are now qualified to rule over others, silence speech, scream, attack, and harm in the name of that virtue costume – without any further circumspection or accountability from that point onward.

Less is Better Bias – the tendency to prefer a smaller set of data to a larger set of data judged separately, but not jointly, so as to capitalize off the increased variability of the small set of data as it supports an extreme or conforming opinion.

Axiom of the Lesson Learned – a lesson can only be learned if one is willing to examine and capable of learning.

Leveraged Duality (Mutual Coercion) – a condition wherein two people know each others’ less flattering secrets or history of error, or present a threat mutually to each other, to such an extent that each cites as authority, or praises the other publicly in order to maintain the good graces of the relationship and not spill the beans as to their mutual knowledge of their sins.

Lie Jerk Response – the psychological defense reaction a fake skeptic will employ, wherein they accuse a person who relates a challenging first hand observation or piece of evidence, of lying or exaggeration.

Lie of Allegiance – a core philosophy (such as Nihilism) which is masked by a differing but similar and more attractive cover philosophy (such as Atheism) because of the cover philosophy’s generally more acceptable nature. The core argument which binds together a group on one side in a false dilemma. A principle which is not fully regarded as truth by the members of a group of adherents, rather is employed only as the default, null hypothesis, or battle cry agenda around which to combat those on the other side of the false dilemma argument. The measure of adherence to the Lie of Allegiance principle is more a reflection of hate towards those of antithetical positions, than it is an expression of rational conclusion on the part of the participant. Many of the proponents in a Lie of Allegiance based organization, do not fully understand the Lie of Allegiance, nor perceive its contrast with the cover philosophy to which they in reality adhere.

Likeocracy – a society whose governing direction is determined by the number of ‘likes’ given to celebrity one-liners published over state-authorized-monopoly media channels.

Lindy Effect – the longer one can enforce an idea through the tactics and power protocols of proactive pluralistic ignorance, the greater future lifespan it will possess.

Linear Affirmation Bias – a primarily inductive methodology of deriving inference in which the researcher starts in advance with a premature question or assumed answer they are looking for. Thereafter, observations are made. Affirmation is a process which involves only positive confirmations of an a priori assumption or goal. Accordingly, under this method of deriving inference, observations are classified into three buckets:

Affirming
In need of reinterpretation
Dismissed because they are not ‘simple’ (conforming to the affirmation underway).

Under this method, the model is complicated by reinterpretations. Failing the test that a model should be elegant, not exclusively simple. By means of this method, necessity under Ockham’s Razor is assumed in advance and all observations thereafter are merely reconfigured to fit the assumed model. At the end of this process, the idea which was posed in the form of a question, or sought at the very start, is affirmed as valid. Most often this idea thereafter is held as an Omega Hypothesis (more important to protect than the integrity of science itself).

Loaded Language – discrediting, bias implying or pejorative language employed through leveraged equivocation and innuendo in an attempt to make self, or a topic of discourse appear superior to an opponent or opponent’s subject or contention.

Lob & Slam Ploy – a version of good cop/bad cop wherein a virtual partnership exists between well known fake news ‘satire’ news outlets, and so called ‘fact checkers’ media patrols. The fake news is generated and posed to the web as satire, subsequently stripped of its context by a third party, and then inserted into social media as true – whereupon it is virally circulated. Subsequently, ‘fact checking’ agencies are then alerted to this set up (the Lob), and then slam home the idea of the fake nature of the ‘news’, as well as the lack of credibility and gullible nature of those who passed it around through social media. This in itself is a fake ploy, a form a Fake-Hoaxing and Hoax Baiting practiced by social agenda forces seeking to artificially enhance the credibility of a news ‘fact checker’.

Logical Calculus – the quality of an argument or the ability of its objective features to commensurately lend support to its validity, which include:

Order – the structure and locution of an argument formulated in such a way as to provide a parsimonious deduction or induction critical path, which allows it to be followed or replicated by another party.

Clarity – the structure and locution of an argument formulated in such a way as to provide a relational path, which allows it to be followed or understood more easily by another party.

Completeness – the structure and locution of an argument formulated in such a way as to provide a parsimonious deduction or induction critical path, which precludes alternative deduction or induction critical paths along the same line of predicates and premises.

Consilience – this is the nature or characteristic of an argument wherein its underpinning premises or predicates provide for independent but mutual reinforcement of its conclusion. This is usually regarded as important in an argument which cannot be easily tested for falsification.

Consistency – this is the nature or characteristic of an argument wherein its conclusion or structure is in parallel with well-established premises or predicates. Also the instance where all portions of compound argument leverage to support each other.

Validity – an inductive argument is valid if its conclusion logically follows from its premises, and in parallel a deductive argument is valid if its predicates support its conclusions. Otherwise, an argument is said to be invalid. The descriptors valid and invalid apply only to arguments and not to propositions; which can be false, true or undetermined.

Structure – the logical formulation and relational structure of elements employed to array premises or predicates into a contention or extrapolation which is contended to be valid or sound.

Reducibility – the ability of an argument (as as the case in mathematics) to reduce the complexity of a question and focus in on the core argument instead – eliminating all irrelevant, dependent, unresolvable, unsolvable and incoherent ideas competing for resolution.

Deducibility – the effectiveness of an argument’s completeness in such a manner as to falsify, or through effective consilience in absence of possible falsification, render at least one other hypothesis along a critical path set as false or more highly unlikely and therefore no longer relevant.

Cogency – an inductive argument is cogent if it is high in quality and its premises provide swift consilience –that is, they all possess a common concordance with well-established truths and logic. Otherwise, it is said to be uncogent. Key inside such relation of consilience or alternately, deductive argument, is how efficiently it can be conveyed.

Falsifiability – an attribute of a proposition or argument that allows it to be refuted, or disproved, through observation or experiment. For example, the proposition, All crows are black, may be refuted by pointing to a crow that is not black. Falsifiability is a sign of an argument’s strength, rather than of its weakness.

Soundness – a deductive argument is sound if it is valid and its premises and predicates are true. If either of those conditions does not hold, then the argument is unsound. Truth is determined by looking at whether the argument’s premises, predicates and conclusions are in accordance with facts and logic in the real world.

Strength – an inductive argument is strong if in the case that its premises are true, then it is highly probable that its conclusion is also true or testable. Otherwise, if it is improbable or unknown/unknowable that its conclusion is true, then it is said to be weak. Inductive arguments are not truth-preserving; it is never the case that a true conclusion must follow from true premises.

Elegance – the effectiveness of an argument’s quality such that it accomplishes an outcome or multiple outcomes in the most propitious manner.

Logical Fallacy – an error in reasoning that results in an invalid argument. Errors are strictly to do with the reasoning used to transition from one proposition to the next, rather than with the facts. Put differently, an invalid argument for an issue does not necessarily mean that the issue is unreasonable. Logical fallacies are violations of one or more of the principles that make a good argument or deduction such as good structure, consistency, clarity, order, relevance and completeness.

Formal Fallacy – a logical fallacy whose form does not conform to the locution and rules of inference of a logical calculus. The argument’s validity can be determined just by analyzing its abstract structure without needing to evaluate its content.

Informal Fallacy – a logical fallacy that is due to its content and context rather than its form. The error in reasoning ought to be a commonly invoked one for the argument to be considered an informal fallacy.

Problem of Induction – a variety of forms of argument which either suffer from Popper’s problem of induction, demarcation or in some way imply or claim scientific completion or consensus, when such a standard has either not been attained in fact, or only exhibited inductive consilience.

The Logical Truth of Extraordinary Evidence – any claim which exposes a stakeholder to risk, ignorance or loss of value – regardless of how ordinary, virtuous or correct – demands extraordinary evidence. The correct version of Carl Sagan’s ‘extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence’.

Logical versus Semantic Truth – a logical truth is a statement which is true, and remains true under all reinterpretations of its components or in all contexts aside from simply that of its apperception and crafting. A semantic truth is only true in certain given circumstances.

Loosh – a lower spiritual form of value exchange. The opposite of faith. A spiritual intoxicant/currency derived from the acute suffering of higher sentience beings, including and especially those who are human or of an unblemished, young or innocent nature. The addictive essence which is derived from a blood sacrifice, broad scale destitution, war, pandemic, and/or sexual exploitation, which imparts a temporary rush in its abuser, mistakenly perceived as spiritual power. A currency or wage which is doled out among those who have unwisely addicted themselves to it, which is used to control and direct the actions of an addicted dark hierarchy.

An intoxicating and addictive spiritual ambrosia – distilled from tapping into the potential difference between two realms – by means of an abused and captive innocent. This intoxicant produces a spiritual insanity in its abuser, anesthetizing and blinding them to their own encroaching darkness.

Lotto Ticket Shuffle Scam – a scam wherein two persons pool money and buy 10 lottery tickets, however only one of them goes to the store and buys the lotto tickets; subsequently reporting back that all his tickets won and all his partner’s tickets lost. Or a business wherein one partner owns all the profitable aspects of the business, and his partners own all the non-profitable ones. The same is done with ‘reliable’ data being produced only by a authorized club – all my data is fact and all your data is anecdote.

Love – a reasoned commitment to serve.

Ludic Fallacy – a fallacy identified by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his book The Black Swan, wherein one favors a theoretical probability history of knowns and known unknowns, either exclusively or more heavily than unknown unknowns. Under this mistaken fascination with technology, mathematics and/or stochastics, one may assemble a simulation, model or game which introduces a probability constraint, or lack thereof, which fully exposes the model to unknown unknowns. This renders the gaming or simulation catastrophically misinforming.

Luftmensch – an impractical dreamer or someone who overestimates their expertise or ability in subjects they consider beneath their paygrade. Someone who dreams big, but does not really understand or cannot deliver the operations/business specifics necessary to make their dream a reality.

The Luxury of Obtuseness – one defining aspect of the luxury of obtuseness is the state wherein an obtuse person mistakes their opponent’s irritation with a discussion as constituting cognitive dissonance on their part.

Machiavelli Solution – a three stage ‘solution’, implemented through an often unseen or unappreciated agency’s manipulation of a population. This is what fake and celebrity skeptics are doing to us today – they work to foment conflict between the public and science/scientists – in order to exploit the self-sublation into their own power and enforcement of their own religion, sol-nihilism. There are three steps to this:

1. Hegelian Dialectic – three dialectical stages of development: a thesis, giving rise to its reaction; an antithesis, which contradicts or negates the thesis; and the tension between the two being resolved by means of a synthesis. In more simplistic terms, one can consider it thus: proposition → anti-proposition → solution.

However, the proposition and anti-proposition become stuck in a thing called self-sublation. A state in which both extremes have been falsified, however no one can give either extreme up, because of the perceived risk of a victory by the other side:

2. Self-Sublation (autoaufheben) – Hegelian principle of a dialectic which is stuck in stasis through an idea both canceling and sustaining itself at the same time. A doubled meaning: it means both to cancel (or negate) and to preserve at the same time.

The proposition/anti-proposition tension now stuck as its own perpetual argument, this gives rise to the surreptitiously played:

3. Machiavelli Solution – a third party creates and/or exploits the self-sublation condition of a Hegelian dialectic bifurcation at play, in order to sustain a conflict between two opposing ideas or groups, and eventually exploit those two groups’ losses into its own gain in power.

Machinated Doubt – tendering the appearance of applying skeptical Cartesian Doubt to every observation except for those which happen to support one’s favored idea, belief or Omega Hypothesis.

Magician’s Ruse – when implying or contending that because one has done table and cards tricks, that they are therefore now a stage magician and cannot subsequently be fooled; or that as a result one carries some special ability to be insightful, apply critical thinking or the scientific method.

Magician’s Sleeve – the critical twist in logical calculus, equivocation, soundness, or context/salience, which allows one ostensible conclusion to be surreptitiously converted into a differing, more desirable conclusion on the part of the magician. A formal fallacy in logical calculus which is hidden inside the complexity of the argument context itself.

Maleduction – an argument must be reduced before it can be approached by induction or deduction – failure to reduce an argument or verify that the next appropriate question under the scientific method is being indeed addressed, is a sign of pseudoscience at play. The non rectum agitur fallacy of attempting to proceed under or derive conclusions from science when the question being addressed is agenda driven, non-reductive or misleading in its formulation or sequencing.

Malevolence – a dark triad of psychological traits, which is concealed by the dark triad participant’s tandem virtue signaling actions, which target exploiting harm to specific parties for one’s benefit. Malevolence (or the Dark Triad), according to the Handbook of interpersonal theory and research, by Jones and Paulhus, comprises three personality traits:

1) Narcissism, characterized by grandiosity, self-pride, egotism, celebrity-seeking and a lack of empathy,

2) Machiavellianism, characterized by sleight-of-hand, manipulation and exploitation of others, a cynical disregard for ethics or morality, and a focus on self-interest and deception and

3) Psychopathy, characterized by highly visible compensation for antisocial behavior, impulsivity, selfishness, callousness, and obdurate remorselessness.

Manager’s Error – from Nassim Taleb’s tome Fooled by Randomness (2001). The principle of forcing an argument into an artificial binary or bifurcated outcome set, examining only that which is a priori deemed to be the more probable or simple outcome, and not that choice which can serve to produce the largest net effect or ‘payoff’. Only researching the most likely, framework compliant or simple alternative, will only serve to confirm what we already know, and bears a much lower payoff in terms of information which might be garnered through a black swan, less likely or ‘complex’ alternative turning out to bear any form of credence or final veracity.

Manipulative Rational Ignorance – a form of rhetoric wherein an arguer contends rational ignorance applies inside an argument, or the ignoring of a pathway of science because the cost or effort entailed is too high versus the results or lack thereof to be obtained from the effort. When in fact the arguer in reality fears the cost or penalty which would be incurred should the outcome of the scientific effort result in an observation or conclusion which he fears.

Margold’s Law – the observed level of integrity which a fake skeptic applies regarding one subject in which an external observer is an expert, will extrapolate reliably to constitute the level of integrity the fake skeptic applies in all subjects the fake skeptic debunks.

Masked Man Fallacy – the contention that an opponent cannot be scientific or rational because the skeptic knows a good scientist or rational thinker when they see one; and the opponent is not one.

Masquerade of the Middle – an arguer who cites that there are persons on one side of an argument encouraging him to be more fervent in his position/substantiation, and on the other side those who contend he is an idiot or completely wrong. Then employing this as a false indicator that he/she is practicing some kind of objective neutrality or middle ground. A fake sleuth will employ this in almost every publicly visible scenario. Alternately, any form of desperate search for a proponent to the more extreme than one’s self, in order to foist the appearance of neutrality or reasonableness.

McCulloch’s Axiom – it is often possible to extrapolate the truth solely from what is banned. Named for physicist Mike McCulloch, key proponent of QI theory alternatives to Dark Matter.

McLuhan’s Axiom – “Only small secrets need to be protected. The large ones are kept secret by the public’s incredulity.” A quip attributed to philosopher on media theory, Herbert Marshall McLuhan.

McMurphy – code word for patients who emerge from a social skeptic indoctrination process in a vegetative state, their minds having been captured into the bullshit science enthusiast and overused one-liner matrix. A play on the authority intolerance-imposed vegetative state in which Patrick R McMurphy ended up in the movie One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

McNamara Fallacy – named for Robert McNamara, the US Secretary of Defense from 1961 to 1968, involves making a decision based solely on quantitative observations or ‘metrics’ and ignoring all other factors. Often the rationale behind this is that other forms of observations cannot be proven. But the reality is often that metrics obsession stems from mostly laziness, cost avoidance or the fact that metrics tend toward certain answers. See phantasiae vectis.

mea mensura – by my own measure. The false method of evaluating others by judging whether or not you did or could have also attained what they did. If you attained it or could have attained their accomplishment, then they are telling the truth. However, if you are threatened by the fact that you did or could not accomplish what they did, then of course they are lying. Because you regard self as the pinnacle of all that a talented person can accomplish or understand inside humanity. It is a form of proactive jealously, by denying credibility to persons whom we have evaluated as not being up to our social, tenure or intellectual level. This mismatch most often makes a socially intelligent (power focused) person mad, therefore they attack a logically intelligent person or accomplished STEMM professional, whom they regard as beneath them on the social ranking, by accusing them of lying or hyperbole, or treating them with disdain or mocking with regard to their accomplishments.

Medical Proxy Abuse – two species of abuse in terms of human rights, child, or caretaker, in which a caregiver is pathologically negligent in their duties towards their patient or care recipient.

Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy (MSBP) – a form of child or care-recipient abuse. It is an intentional fabrication or physical production of illness in another, usually children by mothers, to assume a role of being sick by proxy on the part of the one in their care.

Sarscov Syndrome by Proxy (SSBP) – a form of pathological human rights abuse. A form of hero syndrome or megalomania expressed through establishing exclusivity or intentional withholding of access to a physiological necessity or treatment. This is conducted with the intent of only administering such a necessity, cure, or treatment of related symptoms under the most dire, sensational, attention-garnering, or expensive conditions.

medium fallax (see Gaussian Blindness) – the tendency to regard or promote the mean (μ) or other easily derived or comprehensive statistic as constituting an equivalent descriptive of the whole body of a set of data or a closely related issue – assuming immunity from the burden of identifying a causal critical path or developing testable mechanism to prove out the contention made (critical elements of scientific theory); or the process of misleading with statistical indications as to the makeup and nature of a body of data. I’ve got my head in the oven, and my ass in the fridge, so I’m OK.

Meet God Argument/Doubtcasting – a form of rhetorical critique in which a person casts inexpert doubt upon (while adding no value) or quibbles with each assumption in their opponent’s argument, reducing it continually to the point of winnowing it down to essential challenges such as ‘prove energy exists’, or ‘prove there is such a thing as entropy’, or ‘prove that the universe is quantum’, etc. A circumstance in which the arguer employs Herculean burdens of proof or opportunistic-as-is-favorable deep or wide questioning with their conversant, and is not interested in anything other than dispute or appearing to win an argument.

melochi kupets (Russian: мелочи купец) – trivia merchant. One who feigns competence or intimidates curious outsiders through display of detailed mundane knowledge of the industry in which they operate. One who cannot differentiate the distinction between a peripheral or irrelevant detail and a critical path element or principle.

The Mendoza Line – is an expression which originates from in baseball in the United States, derived from the name of shortstop Mario Mendoza, whose poor .200 batting average is taken to define the threshold standard of incompetent performance. When a skeptic or someone who purports to possess skill at deriving the most likely answer or the truth, is so bad at those purported skills that they are regarded as performing ‘Below the Mendoza Line’ in accuracy or competence. Alternately applying the same principle to claimed skills in understanding, prediction, economic forecasts, business success, relationships, science, etc.

mésa éxo Prose or Communication– (from Greek: μέσα έξω; mésa éxo – ‘inside out’) – when one employs sophisticated style in communication as a substitution for competence. Communication is achieved by means of two elements: style and logical delivery. Mésa éxo prose is that writing or speech which is delivered in a compliant and user friendly style (a grammar, flow, idiom, and sentence structure with which the reader will most likely be familiar and view as culturally sophisticated), however is convoluted in terms of its inference, logical structure, integrity or ability to deliver actual intelligence. Just because its style may appear elite or comfortable does not mean that a piece of communication has been skillfully delivered. A common deception applied in journalism. See also ‘Bridgman Point’.

Meta-Awareness Deficiency – a lack of awareness of the motivation or value systems of others. The tendency to make assumptions regarding “right thinking” which fail to take into account the unique circumstances or social structure in which other people live.

metánoia – Greek μετάνοια, meaning ‘contrition’. The state of mind or action when one suddenly realizes that they are not, nor ever have been ‘The Resistance’ – but rather have been a soldier in The Evil Empire all along. The chagrin over having been duped over a period of time, into committing or supporting harmful or heinous actions as part of a larger group.

The Method of Scientific Propaganda – The common deeper hallmarks of scientific propaganda in this regard therefore proceed according to this method:

To conflate and promote consilience as consensus. Consilience is not a ‘unity of knowledge’ as Edward O. Wilson contends – as only diligent investigation of all compelling alternatives can serve to unify knowledge.
To imply or default that a null hypothesis is ‘true‘ until proved otherwise, knowing that proof is a seldom attained standard in science.
To employ as null hypothesis, that which cannot be approached by Popper demarcation and falsification, and then further demonize all competing ideas.
To investigate only one hypothesis, and deem the social pressure and pluralistic ignorance around this bad habit as consensus or even consilience.
To proscribe investigation into any alternative or deviation from consilience and give a moniker (anti-science or pseudoscience) to those who do so.
To fail to conduct followup or safety confirmation studies, or sufficient parsimonious or precautionary study, in a circumstance where a risk has been adopted in the name of science.
To tamper with or conflate, the three forms of consensus into a falsely (through vulnerability exploitation) derived claim to scientific consensus of an Omega Hypothesis.
To alter scientific paradigms or questions in a sleight-of-hand manner in order to establish a false basis for a completely separate but disguised contention.
To teach simpleton (simplest answer) or black and white delineations of scientific arguments as settled science, through channels of journalism which cannot differentiate good science from bad.
To employ explanitude based disciplines, bullying, celebrity, journalism and false forms of philosophy and skepticism, as a means to enforce an agenda, dressed up as science.

Methodical Cynicism – the cultivation of ignorance through the exploitation of denial. A method of cultivating ignorance through corruption of the process which regulates our social and scientific understanding. The exploitation of denial mandating a personal religious belief set while at the same time tendering an affectation of science.

Methodical Deescalation – employing abductive inference in lieu of inductive inference when inductive inference could have, and under the scientific method should have, been employed. In similar fashion employing inductive inference in lieu of deductive inference when deductive inference could have, and under the scientific method should have, been employed. One of the hallmarks of skepticism is grasping the distinction between a ‘consilience of inductions’ and a ‘convergence of deductions’. All things being equal, a convergence of deductions is superior to a consilience of inductions. When science employs a consilience of inductions, when a convergence of deductions was available, yet was not pursued – then we have an ethical dilemma called methodical deescalation.

Methodical Doubt – doubt employed as a skulptur mechanism, to slice away disliked observations until one is left with the data set they favored before coming to an argument. The first is the questionable method of denying that something exists or is true simply because it defies a certain a priori stacked provisional knowledge. This is nothing but a belief expressed in the negative, packaged in such a fashion as to exploit the knowledge that claims to denial are afforded immediate acceptance over claims to the affirmative. This is a religious game of manipulating the process of knowledge development into a whipsaw effect supporting a given conclusion set

MiHoDeAL Bias – the made or implied assumption that all case examples of a subject domain are Misidentifications, Hoaxes, Delusions, Anecdotes, Lies (MiHoDeAL). A MiHoDeAL claim most often involves a false Appeal to Skepticism, and more specifically most often constitutes a Truzzi Fallacy.

MiHoDeAL Fallacy – the invalid made or implied claim to knowledge that all case examples of a subject domain are Misidentifications, Hoaxes, Delusions, Anecdotes, Lies (MiHoDeAL). When evidence involves falsification observations, a countering MiHoDeAL claim cannot be asserted by an opponent without a sufficiently robust array of predictive evidence. A MiHoDeAL claim most often involves a false Appeal to Skepticism, and more specifically most often constitutes a Truzzi Fallacy.

Miller’s Law of Communication – in order to understand what another person is saying, you must assume that it is true and try to imagine what it could be true of. Anything short of this is impersonation of a listener.

Misinformation Selectiveness – cherry picking of eyewitness data through the belief that memory becomes less accurate because of interference from post-event information, except for information which a claimant happens to favor.

missam singuli – a shortfall in scientific study wherein two factors are evaluated by non equivalent statistical means. For instance, risk which is evaluated by individual measures, compared to benefit which is evaluated as a function of the whole – at the ignorance of risk as a whole. Conversely, risk being measured as an effect on the whole, while benefit is only evaluated in terms of how it benefits the individual or a single person.

Mission Directed Blindness – when one believes from being told, that they serve a greater cause or fight an evil enemy, or that some necessary actions must be taken to avoid a specific disaster. Once assumed, this renders the participant unable to handle evidence adeptly under Ockham’s Razor.

Mobsensus – the inferential will of media, club, mafia, cabal or cartel – in which a specific conclusion is enforced upon the rest of society, by means of threat, violence, social excoriation or professional penalty; further then the boasting of or posing such insistence as ‘scientific consensus’.

Mode Median Mean Manipulation – choosing from the statistical mean, mode or median as needed to obtain the most favorable sounding statistic for your argument.

modus ponens – the necessity that an argument follow a form of claim such that its soundness and formal structure can be followed by others. A discipline featuring the formal structure ‘If P then Q’ premise in its expression such that claims may not be slipped by surreptitiously inside a condition of poor scientific method, fallacy or little or no actual study or supporting fact whatsoever.

modus tollens – the necessity of an argument following the form of claim such that its soundness and formal structure can be followed by others. A discipline featuring the formal predicate of ‘If P then Q’ in its underpinning such that claims may not be slipped by surreptitiously inside a condition of poor scientific method, fallacy or little or no actual study or supporting fact whatsoever. In the case of Modus Tollens however, the form of the argument takes the contra-positive in each case: Given ‘if P then Q’, then the contra-positive is also valid, ‘if not P then not Q’.

Mona Lisa Effect – the misconception on the part of a person pushing their celebrity or narcissism by means of an agenda, or even agenda of convenience or virtue (about which they care nothing in reality), that every evolution of a conversation is about them or contains some schemed affront to their virtue or truth. Named after the effect (mistakenly attributed to the Leonardo da Vinci painting the Mona Lisa) wherein a painting’s eyes will present the illusion of following one about the room as they move by it.

Monkey Suit Fallacy – the dismissal of an entire field of data simply by abusing a position of authority or citing an authority declaring the data to all to be the result of hoaxes.

Mooers’ Law – a information source will tend not to be used by a faking skeptic whenever it is more painful and troublesome for the skeptic to have its information than for him not to have it.

Moral Credential Effect – the tendency of a track record of non-prejudice to increase subsequent prejudice.

Moral Overlay – when using the moral principle embedded or supplanted onto a virtuous recount or story to obscure or divert attention away from a less emphasized but even more important shortfall in integrity. For instance, relating a tale of a drug dealer who refuses to harm kids or mom’s by his own hand, yet regularly supplies drugs which harm millions of kids and moms.

Moral Recourse – an appeal to morality wherein a faking arguer who actually bears no interest in the science behind an issue, is outflanked, and actual science is no longer on his side. He will shift to moral arguments and attempt to make his opponents appear to be bad or immoral for their stance. This is the shift we see underway now in vaccine science for instance, now that early immune activation and injected aluminum are linked in numerous studies to autism, the argument is no longer scientific, rather a moral appeal.

Motte-and-Bailey Fallacy – named after Motte-and-Bailey Castle, this informal fallacy is a tactic of argument wherein the arguer conflates two forms of contention which are similar in concept or semantics, but differ in overall acceptability. One concept will be reasonable-sounding and easy to defend, while the other similar one will bear much more controversy. The former being a costume (often virtuous) the arguer is wearing, while the latter constituting the actual objective of malicious intent on the part of a deceptive arguer. When attacked, the arguer will contend that his opponent opposes the more reasonable version of his position, and drop discussion of the less reasonable one.

Moving the Goalposts – argument in which evidence successfully presented in response to a specific demand for proof of an observation is dismissed and some other (often greater) evidence is then demanded.

MPUC – Maximize profits until the collapse. The prevailing strategy of extraction-minded cronies and elites. A prevailing strategy on the part of crooks, super salesmen, Ponzi and Pyramid schemers and Wall Street exploitation specialists.

Multiplicity Fallacy – the presumption that adding more skeptics to an argument or to support a specific conclusion increases the believability or accuracy of that argument or position. Several excuses are less believable than one. Several skeptics are less believable than one.

Münchhausen Axiomatic Argument – argument which rests on accepted precepts, or tenders the appearance of doing so through Kriging leap (i.e. we reach some bedrock assumption or certainty).

Münchhausen Circular Argument – argument in which theory and proof wind up supporting each other through logical association (i.e. we arrive back logically where we started).

Münchhausen Regressive Argument – argument in which each proof requires underpinning by a further proof, possibly even a replication of itself, ad infinitum (i.e. we just keep requiring proofs, presumably forever).

Muphry’s Law – if you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a flaw of some kind in what you have written.

Musk’s Law – if a domain is exponentially exploitable, and is observed to be increasingly exploited now, then it already has been exploited.

Must-Explain Observation – (in contrast with ‘it would be nice if it could explain’) a specific observation inside a domain of science which cannot be brushed off as anecdote and is critical path to the argument being evaluated. In this circumstance a scientific argument or theory must explain the observation, or have its credibility be eroded. Most theoretical explanations of observed phenomena are linear inductive in their inferential strength. Must-explain observations provide a deductive lever for strong theories to emerge as superior from the field of linear inductive theories. Never accept a theory which can only explain convenient observations. You have no claim to science, if you cannot explain even a basic must-explain observation.

Muta-Analysis – the most unreliable of scientific studies. Often a badly developed meta-analysis, which cannot be easily replicated or peer reviewed, contains a high degree of unacknowledged risk, or was executed based upon a poor study plan. An appeal to authority based upon faulty statistical knowledge development processes. Processes which alter or do not employ full scientific methodology, in favor of a premature claim to consensus or rigor implied by the popularity of a statistical study type. A method which does not directly observe, nor directly test, rather employs statistical procedures to answer a faulty inclusion criteria selected, asked, agenda bearing or peripherally addressed scientific question.

Mutual Coercion – a condition wherein two people know each others’ less flattering secrets or history of error, or present a threat mutually to each other, to such an extent that each cites as authority, or praises the other publicly in order to maintain the good graces of the relationship and not spill the beans as to their mutual knowledge of their sins.

Mystery Monger – an individual who gatekeeps and wallows in the ignorance and mystique surrounding a fringe subject; who habitually dismisses any reductive, deductive or falsifying scientific study regarding that topic. Often purporting to (breaking from their normal habit) hold final scientific authority, ‘peer review’ or proof that the reductive, deductive or falsifying evidence can be completely dismissed (suddenly there is no mystery). Exploits the general public’s lack of knowledge about the subject they represent, in order to perpetuate and market the mystery and their central ‘investigator’ role therein. This type of smoke and mirrors professional is usually making a living from the mysterious subject under consideration.

Myth of Certainty/Myth of Proof – based upon the wisdom elicited by the Leon Wieseltier quote ‘No great deed private or public has ever been undertaken in a bliss of certainty’.

Myth of the Excited Scientists – the mythical, dis-informative and/or Pollyanna contention on the part of fake skeptics wherein they will claim that if any evidence whatsoever for a disliked subject were actually found, then scientists surely would be excited about it and then dedicate their lives to study of the subject from then on.

The Ethical Skeptic

Challenging Pseudo-Skepticism, its Agency and Cultivated Ignorance

Glossary G – M

For a comprehensive categorical listing of both formal and informal logical fallacies, cognitive biases, statistical broaches and styles of crooked thinking on the part of those in the Social Skepticism movement, click here, or on the Tree of Knowledge Obfuscation icon to the left.

The Ethical Skeptic Site Glossary (and Lexicon)

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The Ethical Skeptic

Challenging Pseudo-Skepticism, its Agency and Cultivated Ignorance

For a comprehensive categorical listing of both formal and informal logical fallacies, cognitive biases, statistical broaches and styles of crooked thinking on the part of those in the Social Skepticism movement, click here, or on the Tree of Knowledge Obfuscation icon to the left.

The Ethical Skeptic Site Glossary (and Lexicon)

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