A Short Course in Rumsfeldian Philosophy

Rumsfeldian Philosophy
Rumsfeldian Semanthics (Semantical Mathematics)

Coagulated by H. Richard Doigt, Emeritus
Funded by a grant from the Gruff Ducks Loquacious Society

(We are moving quickly to make this web-friendly, but we feel it is more important that you have this knowledge now in its raw form than not at all.)

Rumsfeldian Philosophy arises from several hypotheses, a la carte priori, and uncommon sense.

Here is a primary fundamental (quoted from several news sources):

"The United States Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, has baffled journalists in Brussels by explaining the greatest threat to Western civilization may lurk in what he has termed "unknown unknowns".

This is how he explained it at a media conference. "There are no knowns," Mr Rumsfeld. "There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns - that is to say, there are things that we now know we don't know but there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don't know," Mr Rumsfeld said.

"So when we do the best we can and we pull all this information together, and we then say well that's basically what we see as the situation, that is really only the known knowns and the known unknowns. "And each year we discover a few more of those unknown unknowns.""

Let us proceed.

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Part Two (which in Rumsfeldian Philosophy allows two to precede part one, because this is philosophy not logic)

Is Donald Rumsfeld real? Is Donald Rumsfeld dead?

First let us define what we know.

The known known is that the press reports him as being alive.
What is a known unknown is whether they are reporting the truth or whether there is a coverup.

The unknown unknown is that the press may not know if he is dead or alive.

Also we do not know if Donald Rumsfeld ever was a real person.

Clearly such a fantastical person is more likely to be a virtual being rather than a real being, since real beings rarely can achieve the ludicrousness of his apparentness.

Note, for example, he mocked people for reporting all of the looting in Iraq by referring to a rerunning of a piece of tape showing the same person stealing a vase time after time.

Note that this 'interview' itself was run time after time, lending credence, using virtual Don's own statement that not only 'how many vases are there to steal?' is virtual nonsense, but also how many Donald Rumsfelds are there to keep restating this is also virtual nonsense?

Personal experience is the best way to verify the existence of anything. This does not mean seeing something or someone in a video format.

Trusted friends and acquaintances can not be trusted, since they may think they have met someone, when in fact their perceptions are incorrect. They could have been hypnotized or drugged or overcaffeinated or covering up for national security purposes.

Indeed, even our own personal experiences can be called into doubt.
How do we know what we think we experience is real?

In other words, are we ourselves a known known? Is what we think we know, a known?

If we can not be certain of what we know, then we have a known unknown. And we can say that Donald Rumsfeld is also a known unknown.

What we have is a known unknown attempting to know a known unknown.

So, is a known unknown real or unreal? This is unknown: an unknown known unknown.

But each of us lives based on the premise that what we know is reality or as close as we can get to it.

There can be little doubt then that the unknown known unknown is not known and therefore Donald Rumsfeld is proven to be unreal.

And since he is unreal, he cannot be dead. Ergo, Donald Rumsfeld is the undead!

Some would say that has always been evident, but it's always worth the effort to prove someone's nonexistence using their own logic.

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Part One

The Rule Of Four

The most commonly used method of confirming the unknown, which is often known to us as a rumor.

Confirmation of rumors is irrelevant, since we can deduce their validity easily using Rumsfeldian philosophy.

Let us state up front that we like Melanie Griffith.
It is also apparent she is a student of Rumsfeldian philosophy,
noted by this observation of her husband, Antonio Banderas:

"How complicated and mysterious he is.
He's also a pseudo-intellectual, which is really interesting."

RUMOR: Melanie Griffith's has had facial 'adjustments' and has a facial disaster

If we could confirm it, it would be a known known, But because we know we don't know, we know the unknown. Consequently, further confirmation isn't required. It would be redundant to our knowing part, and irrelevant to the unknown part.

Now, let's say the statement had been less specific, not mentioning Melanie Griffith, but just an actress, unnamed.

Note this Rumsfeldian basic:
it is easier to prove generically than it is to prove specifically.

Rather than a singular layer of knowns and/or unknowns, we now have to deal with at least two layers of knowing and unknowing.

A)
We know it's an actress: known
We don't know who the actress is: unknown.

B)
We don't know if she's has a facial disaster: unknown
But many people think she has: known unknown
Some people think she's fine: known unknown
Some people don't care: unknown unknown

This interpolates (check reference manual on interpolation and progressive addition) into:

1) know unknown
2) unknown unknown
3) unknown known unknown
4) another unknown known unknown
5) unknown unknown unknown

10 unknowns, 3 knowns

In this case, with such a large preponderous of unknowns, and with part A being split, we would initially classify this generically under unknown unknowns.

Since we don't know unknown unknowns, the only safe course of action is to invade a country, or, in this case, it being a single person, incarcerate her at Guantanamo. Unfortunately, we don't know who she is. Remember, we've genericized her.

If in part A, we know who the actress is, then we have 100% known, and the totals of A and B is 9 unknowns and 4 knowns. This is known as the rule of 4.

Now someone might ask why there isn't a rule of 3. An excellent question for which we have no answer. It's unknown, except we could postulate that with the rule of 4, the rule of the 3 is redundant and unnecessary.

The rule of 4 is: if 4 times the number of knowns in part A plus the number of knowns in part B is equal to or greater than the total number of unknowns, then the knowns win.

Ergo, since we do know who the actress is, it is clear that she does have a facial disaster.

We don't know the exact nature of it, but we don't care. She'll eventually tell us after spending some months at Guantanamo.

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Other Parts

Does God exist?

Most people have not met, talked to, heard, seen or had lunch with God.
This makes the chances of his existence extremely high.

Proof of nothing

If something's existence is proved by lack of evidence, then shouldn't something that doesn't exist be proved by its existence?

First, evidence and existence are two separate things.
a) If we were to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, then of course they exist.
b) If we don't find them, then that is proof of their existence.

It's the difference between knowing and reality.
You can know something, or you can be real, but you can't be both.

A and B are mutually exclusive. If A then B is irrelevant.
If B, then A is irrelevant. The proof is in the proof.

Further Misunderstandings

Rumsfeldian philosophy is not logic.
Logic makes logical sense, but philosophy only must abide by its own rules.

If you do not accept the rules, then the philosophy may not agree with you. However, Rumsfeldian philosophy, by its very nature, must agree with everyone, because to disagree with any of the hypotheses, rules, or expositions would be contrary to what you know.

And so the question becomes: what do you know?

Answer: Please return to the top and start over.

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