ona li toki e toki la, ni li pona taso tan ni: ona li sona ala e ijo.

Here follows a relaxed translation:

Sikala runs to Tipi and screams: “The world is flat!” Tipi responds: “I never said otherwise. Tell me more.” Sikala explains why. Tipi says: “Tell me more.” This goes on until Sikala is exhausted and says: “It just is!” Tipi says: Even a snake becomes round when it eats its own tail.

Associative musings:

Language is our ticker-tape mechanism. We can output internal goings on as a pattern of words. You or someone else can ingest this data again to form or reinforce an internal respresentation. As we all know, this data transfer is lossy and noisy. It is relatively stable when the input and output person are the same. After a while he is no longer the same internally and the text may be interpreted differently also. Keeping a longer string of language coherent is increasingly difficult. When it succeeds, an addictive story is born.

One way to dispell conspiracy talkers is to let them explain, and again, and more, and more elaborately. If they get stuck on a small argumentative cycle, try to let them break free and expand more. In the end, the story will break. This does not mean the person is wrong per se and that the conspiracy is false. It merely means there is not enough understanding yet to make the story work. Don’t stop too soon though, short stories tend to really stick with like minded people and that is how conspiracies propagate. If a story explains too much with too few underlying causes it might be best to dive deeper.

Read a newer koan (The patience with which adults can speak to children with, you should use with other adults.)

Read an older koan (Everyone is a hypocrite and that is fine.)