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Comment by mlmonkey

You probably meant "I'm taking this with a tiny pinch of salt". The amount of salt is directly proportional to how much of the claim you are willing to accept.

Edit: I stand corrected. According to Gemini:

Me: Does using more salt mean accepting more of that claim?

Gemini: No, it actually means the exact opposite. If you say you need to take a claim with a huge pile of salt (or a shovel of salt), it means you believe the claim is highly unbelievable and you need an immense amount of skepticism to accept it. How the Metaphor Scales

• A single grain of salt: "I am slightly skeptical, but it could be true."

• A pinch of salt: "I have a healthy amount of doubt about this."

• A grain of sand / A truckload of salt: "This sounds completely made up, and I barely believe a single word of it."

The salt represents your skepticism, not your belief. Therefore, the more unbelievable the claim, the more "salt" you need to swallow it.

parent mlmonkey 26 days ago

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