John Berry <[email protected]> wrote: Jed, you sure can write a thoroughly depressing post. >
Maybe it is not so depressing. The human race has always been this way, and I suppose it will remain this way, yet we have made great progress in the past. Maybe we can get along okay with only a small number of logical people who do science. After all, we don't need many people capable of composing music, acting in movies or programming computers. Why should we need lots more scientists? It is a specialized profession. As long as the opposition to science is kept under control, I don't see a problem with it being a elite occupation, that attracts only a small number of people. A society composed mainly of logical people and scientists would be boring. > On the plus side if the world we have now is the result of a minority of > people being logical (jokes about women vastly underestimate the problem) > then it does give me hope for how great a society where the vast majority > actually grasps logic and truth and holds it above whatever the popular > belief might be. > It is not clear to me this would be a big improvement. It would probably increase funding for research, because more people would be sympathetic, instead of thinking science comes from "the pit of hell." But it is not clear to me that the world needs lots more logical thinking. Maybe just less emotional thinking, and more self-centered but enlightened self-interest type thinking. > But I never had any training in logic . . . > You probably have more exposure than you realize. People who gravitate to logic learn about it from examples in science, engineering, math and other fields, even if they do not study it explicitly. Experiments soon teach the folly of wishful thinking, for example. So does agriculture, but the link between logic and the task at hand may be more clearly delineated in technical disciplines such as experimental science or programming. > , so I assumed it was something that most people naturally had but chose > to reject (which we can all do as our right brain often wins out). > I doubt that people reject it. Most of them are never exposed to it in the first place. Try explaining to someone why it is a fallacy to appeal to the consequences of a belief: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-consequences.html You will see that in most cases, the thought that this might be invalid never crossed their mind. They will not be able to grasp what is wrong with it. This error may be even more common than ad hominem. You will find it everywhere, including New York Time op ed columns by distinguished politicians, businessmen, opinion makers and especially people who have appointed themselves in charge of the Public's Morality and Virtue, such as William J. Bennett. This particular fallacy closely resembles a true, logical assertion, which may be why so many people fall for it. I think most people have to be taught this kind of subtle distinction step by step. This fallacy in one form is: "X is true because if people did not accept X as being true then there would be negative consequences." Take the example of a town in which the crime rate is low because everyone thinks the police always catch criminals, whereas in fact the police seldom catch them. It is better if everyone (especially crooks!) mistakenly believes "our police are effective." Replace "X is true . . ." with: "It is better for society if people believe X is true . . ." ". . . because if people did not accept X as being true then there would be negative consequences." OR (in one formulation): "Sometimes delusions make things go better." Put that way, this is not an idea the New York Times wants in an op-ed, and it would go over like a lead balloon in a sermon, but this is the logical expression of the core idea. It is said that an elderly Victorian woman when she first heard of Darwin's theory expressed the logical version succinctly: "Let us hope that is not true, or if it is true, that it does not become generally known." - Jed
