I've become very discouraged by the state of discourse on the internet over the past few years. I am not a perfectly rational or infallibly reasonable person, you know, because I'm human. And we humans, as walking water sacks of sentient chemicals, tend to not do "rational" or "reasonable" particularly well without some significant effort. I try, and I hope you do as well, to be as reasonable and understanding as I possibly can, but none of us is perfect. However, everywhere I go online I see that very few conversations are even trying to be reasonable.
I haven't experienced absolutely everything in life. As an aforementioned water sack of sentient chemicals, corporeal form and mortality make it fairly difficult to experience everything. But what I have learned, through the limited experiences I've had, is that very little in this life is black and white. This is especially true where groups or populations are concerned. It's pretty easy to look at a situation and say "Jim shouldn't be sleeping with every alien he sees." That's potentially verifiable, considering it's just the one guy and all the interactions are thoroughly documented. But to say "people named Jim shouldn't be sleeping with every alien they see" is a little harder to come to terms with. How are you gathering that information? What's the statistical error? What do you mean by "every alien"? Are we only talking about Jims who's names are actually James?
This is also affected by how our personal experiences color the way we perceive events we see. Because whether Jim should or should not be sleeping with possibly every alien he sees can depend on whether you think that's a good or a bad thing. That's probably based on your upbringing, education, family, local culture, etc. Maybe it was a conscious thing you decided, that's possible. But it's very hard to know exactly how those things will affect the picture we form of the world around us, so it's important, when trying to have a reasonable discussion, that we account for those things as best we can.
Now, this brings me to the reason I'm discouraged. Everywhere I look, everywhere I communicate on the internet, everywhere arguments turn ugly, I see the world painted in harsh tones of black and white without any acknowledgement for the wide variety of life we actually deal with. Was Hitler, in general, a bad person? Pretty much all available information would indicate he was. And if you only look at that information, especially primary information from when WWII was on, you might come to the conclusion that all Germans are just like him.
Which is patently ridiculous. Were there Germans that thought like he did and were kinda horrible people? Sure. Were there American's alive at the time who were the exact same way? Almost certainly. When you talk about any situation that involves a large population, it can almost never be summarized in a quick or brief way. It will almost always require some study across several sources in order to become well informed. And I think that if you have come to a conclusion without that study and without being well informed, you have sold yourself short on the joy that is richly understanding the lives of your fellow sentient chemical factories.
Because life is complicated. We're all different from everybody else, and I'm not really any more different from a Nepalese woman living in abject poverty than I am from my own family. So if we don't put in some effort, we are never going to fully understand anything we experience. Why would you do that to yourself? Why would you limit yourself so severely?
In the title of this post it might have looked like I promised you some advice on becoming well informed. Turns out I actually have some, and this is it: never only look at one perspective. So you found a source that shows you a perspective that seems well organized, clearly stated, and informationally complete. Problem solved, right? Form opinion, move on.
Except no. Don't do that. Because if you do, you are dismissing the very real perspectives of potentially millions of other humans. Doesn't that seem a little, well, dehumanizing? Sort of how you might feel if I continued to refer to you as a sentient carbon-based meat slurry? So don't do that to other people, because you don't want them to do it to you. Go seek out their perspective. Hear what they have to say. Is everything they say full of logical fallacies and utterly unsupported by reasoned studies or considered rhetoric? Good deal, you're informed, and NOW you can move along.
But I think you'll find that in many, many cases, both sides of whatever argument this is have valid points. And both sides also are filled with holes. The first source you looked at left out a half dozen statistics that didn't support their point. The opposing side included those statistics, but used them to construct an irrelevant point. A third perspective focuses on a few subjective experiences you can really relate to, but doesn't say anything helpful from a widely framed point of view.
And as you keep going, you'll slowly start to notice a picture coming into relief. It's populated by individuals interacting with each other to form larger trends. Will it change your mind? Maybe not. But it will help you understand the other humans you're sharing this planet with. That understanding helps you broaden yourself and ultimately become more rational, more reasonable.
Though if you don't want that... Well, let me know so I can avoid the corners of the internet where you live.
I haven't experienced absolutely everything in life. As an aforementioned water sack of sentient chemicals, corporeal form and mortality make it fairly difficult to experience everything. But what I have learned, through the limited experiences I've had, is that very little in this life is black and white. This is especially true where groups or populations are concerned. It's pretty easy to look at a situation and say "Jim shouldn't be sleeping with every alien he sees." That's potentially verifiable, considering it's just the one guy and all the interactions are thoroughly documented. But to say "people named Jim shouldn't be sleeping with every alien they see" is a little harder to come to terms with. How are you gathering that information? What's the statistical error? What do you mean by "every alien"? Are we only talking about Jims who's names are actually James?
This is also affected by how our personal experiences color the way we perceive events we see. Because whether Jim should or should not be sleeping with possibly every alien he sees can depend on whether you think that's a good or a bad thing. That's probably based on your upbringing, education, family, local culture, etc. Maybe it was a conscious thing you decided, that's possible. But it's very hard to know exactly how those things will affect the picture we form of the world around us, so it's important, when trying to have a reasonable discussion, that we account for those things as best we can.
Now, this brings me to the reason I'm discouraged. Everywhere I look, everywhere I communicate on the internet, everywhere arguments turn ugly, I see the world painted in harsh tones of black and white without any acknowledgement for the wide variety of life we actually deal with. Was Hitler, in general, a bad person? Pretty much all available information would indicate he was. And if you only look at that information, especially primary information from when WWII was on, you might come to the conclusion that all Germans are just like him.
Which is patently ridiculous. Were there Germans that thought like he did and were kinda horrible people? Sure. Were there American's alive at the time who were the exact same way? Almost certainly. When you talk about any situation that involves a large population, it can almost never be summarized in a quick or brief way. It will almost always require some study across several sources in order to become well informed. And I think that if you have come to a conclusion without that study and without being well informed, you have sold yourself short on the joy that is richly understanding the lives of your fellow sentient chemical factories.
Because life is complicated. We're all different from everybody else, and I'm not really any more different from a Nepalese woman living in abject poverty than I am from my own family. So if we don't put in some effort, we are never going to fully understand anything we experience. Why would you do that to yourself? Why would you limit yourself so severely?
In the title of this post it might have looked like I promised you some advice on becoming well informed. Turns out I actually have some, and this is it: never only look at one perspective. So you found a source that shows you a perspective that seems well organized, clearly stated, and informationally complete. Problem solved, right? Form opinion, move on.
Except no. Don't do that. Because if you do, you are dismissing the very real perspectives of potentially millions of other humans. Doesn't that seem a little, well, dehumanizing? Sort of how you might feel if I continued to refer to you as a sentient carbon-based meat slurry? So don't do that to other people, because you don't want them to do it to you. Go seek out their perspective. Hear what they have to say. Is everything they say full of logical fallacies and utterly unsupported by reasoned studies or considered rhetoric? Good deal, you're informed, and NOW you can move along.
But I think you'll find that in many, many cases, both sides of whatever argument this is have valid points. And both sides also are filled with holes. The first source you looked at left out a half dozen statistics that didn't support their point. The opposing side included those statistics, but used them to construct an irrelevant point. A third perspective focuses on a few subjective experiences you can really relate to, but doesn't say anything helpful from a widely framed point of view.
And as you keep going, you'll slowly start to notice a picture coming into relief. It's populated by individuals interacting with each other to form larger trends. Will it change your mind? Maybe not. But it will help you understand the other humans you're sharing this planet with. That understanding helps you broaden yourself and ultimately become more rational, more reasonable.
Though if you don't want that... Well, let me know so I can avoid the corners of the internet where you live.
Interesting you posted this today. This morning I messaged a long time very liberal friend and asked what there is about liberalism that is so appealing to her. I told her I had no intention of aging, but that as a life long social and economic conservative, I wanted to understand her POV. Thanks for supporting my inclination.
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