prepaciously

I must admit I didn't know about the feral cats wandering around farms. But I do imagine that farmers wash their produce more consistently than home growers do, and that feline density is higher in the suburbs.

What would it mean to trust or believe in a theory? What finishing line in our minds does it cross beyond which we accept it as proven or regard it as confirmed?

I don't think there is one. We are fallible and even our best theories are tentative and provisional. When we do rely on ideas it only because we know no better alternatives.

It makes one wonder how healthy those home-grown salad vegetables might really be, given that a garden plot makes a convenient litter tray for roaming felines.