Life as a game of golf

https://newslit.org/

Before you go on, an article in the May 8 & May 22, 2021 issue of Science News ran with a cover "Awash in Deception:  How science can help us avoid being duped by misinformation."  In the lead article titled: "The Battle Against Fake News," Alexandra Witze presents five suggestions on how to debunk bad information.  They come from the News Literacy Project (see the above link).

How to Debunk:

1.  Arm yourself with media literacy skills, at sites such as the News Literacy Project (newslit.org), to better understand how to spot hoax videos and stories.

2.  Don't stigmatize people for holding inaccurate beliefs.  Show empathy and respect, or you're more likely to alienate your audience than successfully share accurate information.

3.  Translate complicated but true ideas into simple messages that are easy to grasp.  Videos, graphics and other visual aids can help.

4.  When possible, once you provide a factual alternative to the misinformation, explain the underlying fallacies (such as cherry- picking information, a common tactic of climate change deniers.

5.  Mobilize when you see misinformation being shared on social media as soon as possible. If you see something, say something.

"Misinformation is any information that is incorrect, whether due to error or fake news.  

"Disinformation is deliberately intended to deceive."

"Propaganda is disinformation with a political agenda."

Sander van der Linden
Social Psychologist
University of Cambridge

Source:  Science News/May 8, 2021 & May 22, 2021

While my wife Meredy navigates the care and transition of her aunt, mother and father, I stroll merely along with the occasional blog post, middle school track coaching and even the luxury of an every-other-week-or-so golf game, she is the ever on call care giver/organizer/planner.

Just now, she was called by a paramedic at Belmont Gardens to sign off that a trip to the hospital for her Mom was unnecessary. She had taken two falls out of bed over the course of the evening and they suspected that she had hit her head. But, she was currently sitting up and playing her ukulele. So, Meredy got dressed, hopped in the car and drove five minutes over to Belmont to sign a waiver saying that Barby had been offered the cursury trip to the hospital to get checked out by a doctor, but no thanks. Considering that her POLST form has a “do not resuscitate ” provision in it, there isn’t much that the doctor or the hospital could do to provide care.

This is her world right now. Our neighbor and friend suggested a few months ago that we hire an agency that specializes in elder care to help with the myriad of doctor contacts, coordination of care at Belmont and the dozens of decisions being made each day for Barby and her husband Carl, Meredy’s Dad. That has been a Godsend.

Meredy is ever the problem solver, but the range, scope and sheer number of problems was becoming overwhelming even for her. Thank goodness for SAGE and Craig.

I started with the intention of using my experience as a golfer (hacker?) as a metaphor for life. One day you feel like you’ve got the game figured out and the next time you play like you’ve never had a club in your hand. Such was the story with my game yesterday.

I’m a person that believes that everything is connected in all facets of humanity and nature and that even shooting a 104 on the golf course has meaning in the greater sphere of the human experience.

We will never have anything totally figured out as my golf game clearly exemplifies. Yet, just because we are destined to not “figure it out,” we need to be willing to share our ongoing attempts to “f.i.o.” and hope that in so doing that we can reach out and touch each other in the tenderest and sincerest of ways. The world comes down to simply that.