Diary of an Epistemological Nazi

“You’re the best dad in the whole wide world!”

I cringed. Like Adam who likely had a flurry of compulsions simultaneously hit him for the first time after eating the forbidden fruit, the strong compulsion to respond in a logical manner hit me. See, I have an aversion to statistical and philosophical inadequacies that I tend to want to correct every so often.

I looked at her bright face, waiting in anticipation for my response. I could follow my compulsions and explain, “That is a very unreliable statement”. 

This would likely draw a quizzical look from her. The quick transition from excitement to confusion would undoubtedly be comical.

“You see, given your very limited experience with other fathers, or what we statistical theorists call the sample size, and given that there are billions of fathers, your sample size is too small, thereby making the margin of error for that statement substantially high. Therefore, sweetie, me being the best dad in the world is highly statistically unreliable.”

I would feel the tension subside, my muscles relax, my heartbeat normalize, and perhaps some dopamine would spurt around my brain, providing me with a sense of satisfaction and happiness. Like a cocaine addict having his fix after a period of delay, I would feel the world dissipate around me, leaving me floating in the abyss of ecstasy.

On the other hand, my sweetie-pie – of course, metaphorically speaking, she is closer in character to a honey-flavoured biscuit, if a rigourous technical metaphorical analysis were to be conducted. But it is apparently unconventional and ‘not fun’ to refer to my daughter as honey-flavoured biscuit, or even just HFB – would have held her hand to her face and heave a sigh of frustration. Even a “thank you sweetie” would have sufficed for her.

“The less controversial statement would be to say that I am a good dad.”

“Okay dad, you’re a good dad.”

Yet I was not completely satisfied.

“Even that is not without its ambiguities.”

“Argh!” She would yell.

“A good dad would have to be rigidly defined and possibly indexed, and my performance as a father would then be compared to this ideal.”

Satisfaction complete. 

She’s just six years old, I would think. I need to ignore my compulsion and do the right thing.

 

“You’re the best daughter in the universe!”

“Provided there are other intelligent societies on other planets, else it is more efficient to simply use earth as the comparative boundary.”

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Blames Excess Liquidity on Supernatural Forces

In conventional monetary economics, theories explaining the phenomenon of inflation (that is, the rise in prices of goods and services over time) are the monetarist theory and the structural inflation theory, but last week the Nigerian central bank, CBN, proposed a supernatural theory of inflation.

In its analysis of inflation trends over past decades, the bank identified witch doctors, particularly operating in Benin, Edo, and some Southeastern states, for artificially increasing the money supply and causing inflation. The bank referred to the practice whereby clients seeking wealth and riches visit these witch doctors. They in turn provide the client with some container (typically a pot) from which they could 'withdraw' money contingent upon certain rituals and sacrifices being made; because the money given is not from existing money in circulation, this amounts to artificial increases in money supply. Moreover, because the client typically has to pay in terms of years of life and/or human sacrifice, this is also contributing to low life expectancy and high violent crime rate in the country. 

The bank has expressed frustration over its inability to get a hold of inflation, first due to the expansive use of cash in the country in the informal economy and shadow economy, and now due to practices in the supernatural economy. Its cashless policy and BVN (Biometric Verification Number) drives were aimed at overcoming some of these challenges, but there is concern over whether the witch doctors can adapt to technology. There is already evidence suggesting that due to the pressures of globalization and competition from India, the Caribbean islands, and other supernatural powerhouses, Nigerian witch doctors are finding new ways to stay competitive - one of which is embracing the fourth industrial revolution and becoming more technology savvy by investing in ICT and digital shrines, as well as computerized ritual processes that are still acceptable to the gods. Such trends may spillover into the supernatural economy. 

Sources suggest that there is already a rising fad among witch doctors to change their titles from 'baba' and 'native doctor' to divine consultants or spiritual analysts, demonstrating the increasing professionalism of the sector. Some have formally registered their shrines as legal businesses, adopting names such as "Power for Nada Ltd" and "Ogbanje and Sons".

However, an economist of the supernatural economy says that a cashless supernatural economy would make it much easier to detect supernatural increases in the money supply, as it would involve money appearing in the client's bank account from nowhere. Yet this optimism may be threatened by some observations that deities are advising witch doctors to hire yahoo boys as technology consultants in order to bypass banking security and digital accounting systems and mask digital money appearances in bank accounts. Even within the supernatural realm, sources say there are discussions of appointing a deity of technological capacity (given that there are deities for almost every aspect of reality), in an obvious attempt to catch up to the 21st century.

The bank has organized stakeholder meetings with the Association of Nigerian Wizards and Witches in an attempt to facilitate discussions about possible regulation of the supernatural economy.

Globalization Hits Nigerian Witchdoctors Hard

In an era of declining transportation and information costs, Nigerian witch doctors are increasingly struggling to adapt to the pressures of globalization. Nigerians seeking spiritual solutions can now more easily seek them from neighboring countries like Benin Republic and Togo, and distant countries like India and the Caribbean Islands. This is as a result of the expansion of the global village through technology. Yet, academics and journalists of the spiritual economy have largely neglected to assess the impacts of this trend on Nigerian witch doctors.

Even the deities are feeling the effects of globalization. Just a few years ago they were very selective in demanding high prices for their interventions, now the prices have dropped significantly. One deity in Akwa Ibom that used to demand the blood of a fair-skinned young female virgin for a money ritual now requests pubic hair of a virgin goat for the same ritual. "Situation is critical," laments a witch doctor who was interviewed, "my deities are pressurizing me to upgrade my business model and update my equipment to attract customers. I am currently working on different promos, such as give two of your enemies elephantiasis for the price of one."

The desperation of Nigerian witch doctors can also be seen by spatial changes. Whereas, decades ago most of them situated their shrines deep inside forests and bushes such that seekers of their powers would incur heavy transportation costs, today most have moved to the fringes of the forest, putting up signs to notify and direct passers by, and organizing flash mobs (featuring the sacred dance of the gods) as a marketing strategy; others have moved into urban residences in residential areas, while many have gone fully digital, attracting clients through the internet without the clients needing to make a physical journey. 

In order to compete, some witch doctors have begun investing in research and development. Many are competing with foreign deities they know nothing about, hence they are trying to understand their competition's methods (catching up to the technology frontier), emulate such methods, and/or modify them. 

For those unable to survive the increased competition, exiting the business is the only option. The number of practitioners in the sector has thus been declining steadily since 2000. The winners have been the consumers of supernatural powers/services and Christians, who have long been opposed to the practices of witch doctors. "God is using the mechanism of market competition to crush the forces of evil and to send demonic forces out of business," said one Christian minister, enthusiastically.