Oracle Of Truthiness
As Halloween rapidly approaches I thought it would be appropriate to post a picture of something I’ve made which I call the Oracle of Truthiness. It’s basically a take-off on the standard Ouija Board, but instead of contacting demon spirits, like in the classic horror film, The Exorcist (see picture below), the Oracle of Truthiness is designed to establish contact with the gut (scroll down to the end of the post for the definition of “truthiness”).
The idea is that instead of trying to cull accurate information from newspapers, the internet and other sources that are potentially teeming with confusing “facts,” the Oracle of Truthiness gives the user a direct line to their own gut so that they can get the skinny on the 411 from a truly reliable source.
The instructions for using the Oracle of Truthiness are roughly the same as using a Ouija Board with a few minor modifications:
1st – Place the board upon the knees of two persons, lady and gentleman preferred. Place hand-shaped WristSTRONG pointer in the center of the board, resting fingers lightly upon the table so as to allow it to move freely and easily. The gut may be asked a question, and in one to five minutes the WristSTRONG pointer will commence to move, at first slowly, and then faster.
2nd – Care should be taken that only one person ask questions at a time so as to avoid confusing the gut.
3rd – To obtain the best results it is important that the person present should concentrate their gut upon the matter in question and avoid other topics. Have no one at the table who will not sit seriously and respectfully. If you use it in a frivolous spirit, asking ridiculous questions, laughing over it, you naturally get undeveloped influences around you.
4th – The Oracle of Truthiness is a great mystery, and none claim to give exact directions for it’s management and use, and the Oracle of Truthiness will not work equally well under all circumstances. With reasonable patience and judgment the Oracle of Truthiness will satisfy your greatest expectations.
5th – NEVER allow the WristSTRONG pointer to fall from the board when you are asking your gut a question or your gut may escape from the board.
Here’s a video of the board in action. I asked it where to look for all the anwers and this is the miraculous response that I got. Its mystical powers are mighty.
For anyone who is not familiar with the term “truthiness” here is the definition of the word according to wikipedia:
Truthiness is a term that television comedian Stephen Colbert popularized in 2005 when he used it to describe things that a person claims to know intuitively or “from the gut” without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination, or actual facts. Colbert popularized this definition of the word during the inaugural episode (October 17, 2005) of his satirical television program The Colbert Report, as the subject of a segment called “The Wørd”. It was named Word of the Year for 2005 by the America Dialect Society and for 2006 by Merriam-Webster.
By using the term as part of his satirical routine, Colbert sought to criticize the use of “truthiness” as an appeal to emotion and tool of rhetoric in contemporary socio-political discourse.He particularly applied it to U.S. President George W. Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court and decision to invade Iraq in 2003. Colbert later ascribed truthiness to other institutions and organizations, such as Wikipedia.
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hey, thats looks good! the video would not work for me doh, its the internet conection prob, you know how it is…..
[…] Andrew Salomone sent me a link to a recent creation of his, and it amused me, so I decided to share it with everyone: Oracle Of Truthiness […]
well done mr salomone! I couldn’t see the video tho… quite like the board design and the guts aspect of the whole thing! do you think the place where you’re consulting the oracle influences the answers? if you’re in china, for instance, do you think the oracle would answer in chinese?
hey, i’ve always wondering what a metaphor for a gut looked like, good job!
i’m going to start visualizing my gut on regular basis. it’s the only way out of this mess.
I love your video, it was mesmerizing. But what does “I am a meqica” mean? After Googling it for awhile, I decided to come right out and ask. Nice board, by the way.
Well it’s supposed to spell out, “I Am America.” It’s just a reference to the title of Stephen Colbert’s new book, “I Am America (And So Can You).” This is supposed to be evidence that the “Oracle of Truthiness” really works and since he is the leading authority on “truthiness” and he knows what “the gut” is thinking, and I’m assuming he channeled some of that info into the book. Thanks though.
Oh, okay, I get it now. I was afraid this would happen, that it actually spelled something simple and I would be out in left field. But that’s cool, I’m used to it. I really do like the board, and I hope that’s you in the turbin.
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