A New Way of Knowing

I know the things I know through a combination of life experiences, my education, and the various forms of media I consume on a daily basis. I would differentiate between things "I do know," due to their being corroborated by multiple sources/experiences, and things "I think I know" by virtue of the fact that I have not yet come across an additional source or had an experience that can be used to confirm or deny their validity. However, irrespective of what I know or just think I know, I am a believer in the Socratic principle that true wisdom/knowledge can only be gained if I operate under the assumption that I know nothing, and I do my best to approach life in that way.

One new thing I learned from social media today was how sugar activates the same receptors in the brain as cocaine and how the excess sugar in American foods is creating an epidemic health crisis. This information came from a movie trailer for a documentary called "Fed Up," that one of my Facebook Friends had posted. Although there were limited details on the production of the documentary and the sources/methodology that was used, the information presented seemed to be credible owing to the various subject matter experts in the field as well as health conscious public figures such as former President Bill Clinton who were seen giving interviews throughout the trailer. The professional backgrounds of these individuals seemed to allude to the documentary's credibility as a viable source of information regarding America's poor nutrition practices and the impending health ramifications.

While there is certainly a great deal of misinformation that easily gets circulated on social media sites, social media can be a reliable source of information if we use it as our means to connect to credible news sites and well-established organizations and companies. We may not be able to completely control the information we receive through social media sites, but we can at least tailor our use of these sites to make sure that they can work to our advantage. Taking measures to filter what information we allow to populate on our social media pages can make social media sites not only a valuable source of accurate information, but a highly efficient one as well.