Perfectly Plausible

In the final comment on my most recent CT post, John Q strategically grants a premise from an earlier comment by poster Matt: John Q grants that “it’s perfectly plausible that the number of US golfers exceeds the population of Australia.” This was not a concession to Matt’s main point, as John Q goes on to point out that it’s “highly unlikely that this fact contributes much in way of meeting people from very different social networks.” Rather than bringing us back into the substance of this disagreement, I want to go off about something entirely different. As you’ll soon see, I’m far out of my depths on this one. Call the claim as formulated by John Q, that “it’s perfectly plausible that the number of US golfers exceeds the population of Australia,” “PERFECTLY PLAUSIBLE.” PERFECTLY PLAUSIBLE is under my skin. Let me try to explain why. First, PERFERCLY PLAUSIBLE may be true. That would be interesting, just on the substance. Second, PERFECTLY PLAUSIBLE could be true even if the thing…