“Outside perspective, this seems nuts and crazy and people are probably wondering what the hell we’re doing. And I feel the same way.” While these could be the regretful words of any American voter in the aftermath of November’s election, they originate from a more bewildering source, if you can believe it.

This is how “Temptation Island” participant Ashley Moore attempts to rationalize why letting her boyfriend of one and a half years join three other committed but not engaged men in a villa stacked with single women cavorting in bikinis is a fine idea.

Ashley's partner Grant Larson has cheated on her before, but this time will be different, he swears before the rolling cameras. “I love you. I want to be with you,” Grant tells Ashley, adding, “I hope that we get through this.”

In that moment, it looks like Ashley believes he means what he’s saying. Maybe she's forgotten which show she's on . . . and who she's with.

Shanté Glover, Tyler Breshears, Grant Larsen, Ashley Moore and Alexa Santamaria in "Temptation Island" (Courtesy of Netflix)

Much has been written about how our culture-wide demise of critical thinking skills accelerated the spread of disinformation and the fracturing of reality. Arm in arm with this, and less discussed, is the death of deductive logic, the ability to understand cause and effect by composing simple conditional arguments with an antecedent and a consequent.

One prevalent question never changes: Why on Earth would anyone agree to this?

We recognize this has the simple mapping tool of if/then. If a felonious politician tells you that he will be a dictator, then he will behave like one if you elect him. If his allies have a meticulous plan to consolidate power among the few to the detriment of the rest of the world, then we should assume they will follow it to the letter when given the chance.

"Temptation Island" shrinks disastrous outcomes to a manageable size, limiting the inhumanity to a few pairs of lovers stubbornly ignoring enough warning flares to turn the skies scarlet.

If a man confesses/brags in front of the woman he’s betrayed, “I’ve had multiple women in my life before. I’ve had threesomes. I’ve done it all,” then burying that man in boobs and........

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