Quote of the Week...from Philip K. Dick

Each of us assumes everyone else knows what he is doing. They all assume we know what we are doing.  We don't.                                               Philip K. Dick

I think one of the major blunders that people make, both when they are assessing the behavior and intentions of others in their lives as well as judging and ascribing motives to those in the public limelight...especially politicians...is that they assume that everyone else is always competent and sure-minded about what they are trying to accomplish...and have their reasons all laid out in a perfectly logical pattern.  I for one disagree with this notion, as apparently did the great twentieth century science fiction author Philip K. Dick, who said with the above quote what I'd been thinking for years.  Many, many years, in fact...

One of my most vivid memories was when I was a thirteen-year old eighth-grade student sitting in a drafting class.  I was very awkward then, especially when it came to being around others.  I was sitting there quietly, pretending to be working...I'm sure the others around me thought this was what I was doing...but I was actually observing several of my fellow students interacting around me.  I got the impression...a strong impression...that they all either were supremely confident and showed it as they talked with one another showing such apparent poise...or that they were all putting on a monumental collective act of deception.  I came away from that experience realizing that when people grew up, they learned to wrap themselves up in images they want to project to others about themselves, images that don't necessarily reflect their own realities...especially their uncertainties, confusion, and self-doubts...

I have a tendency to be skeptical about conspiracy theories of all kinds because of this awareness of peoples' generally muddled and mixed-up inner natures, their outward presentation of themselves notwithstanding.  We're not robots capable of creating and implementing exorbitantly complicated algorithms that require so many things to go "right" in order for some of the so-called conspiracies I've heard to be real and successful.  Neither are our political leaders all that deliberately evil as whoever happens to be their opposition likes to portray them.  If you're going to say some bad things about the last three presidents...Trump, Obama, and Bush...I say that calling them on their lapses and failings in the end is probably much closer to the truth than saying that any of them were (or are) part of some coordinated, convoluted scheme to "take over".  It might behoove some of us who are entrenched in an "our side vs. their side" mindset to try to recognize that most folks...and politicians...like my old eighth-grade classmates...are largely concocted images on the outside and disarray and conflict within...