Just going after the title, &quot;folk aphorisms&quot; are such pseudoscience, it&#x27;s not even funny.<p>Not that they don&#x27;t apply, they do. But &quot;many&quot; of the times, not &quot;most&quot;, let alone &quot;all of the times&quot;.<p>And you have aphorisms that are exact opposites of each other, like &quot;birds of a feather flock together&quot; and &quot;opposites attract&quot;.<p>The end result? people use them more to support their opinions or gut feelings rather than uttering them after a careful analysis of the situation.<p>In terms of rigor, they stand at the same level as anecdotal evidence, meaning something that adds practically zero information to an ongoing situation.