Don’t Let Covid Make You Stupid
“Clearly, we have not succeeded in getting the public as a whole to uniformly respond in a way that is a sound scientific, public health and medical situation,” Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases said, “And it’s unfortunate. And it’s frustrating.”
And it’s pretty dumb. The way many of us are responding to this pandemic is pretty dumb. Believe it or not, this kind of dumb has less to do with our intelligence, and more to do with how our brains are wired. Let’s explore how our minds and hearts can get us into avoidable trouble.
As infection and death rates rise on cue to our trickle-y forays into “It’s Over-land”, one might think news of spiking infection curves should be enough to make everyone take a long PPE-protected breath. But that’s not what’s happening. The pandemic has wreaked havoc with immune systems, for sure, but it has also taken advantage of some distinctly weak spots in our brains — even smart brains — as we have learned from recent studies in psychology and neuroscience.
God, we love science in this little corner of the world. It’s the scripture that can make most liberal-thinking folks’ hearts go aflutter. But it is downright unscientific to think of ourselves as rational beings. We can think, and even act, rationally, but that does not a rational being make. Taking stock of how irrational you are may help save a life, including your own.
President Trump said: “When you test, you have a case. When you test, you find something is wrong with people. If we didn’t do any testing, we would have very few cases.” And: “The more you test for Covid, the more cases you will detect. If you want to detect fewer cases, do fewer tests”.
Ok, it may sound nuts, but It has a measure of logical reasoning to it. The fact that it is irrational — that is, wrong — would be merely incidental, if the stakes weren’t so high. Most of us, it’s humbling to realize, do a version of similarly flawed thinking every day.
But first — is there such a thing as a rational being or even a rational entity? Forget cyborgs, Mr. Spock, and computers, even though they could mostly meet the criteria for rational “thinking”. Mr. Spock, you’ll no doubt recall, was half human, which was a great plot device, but gummed up his chance of being purely rational (or “logical”, as he liked to refer to it). Spock didn’t dwell on it, but there is a difference between rational and logical. Understanding that difference may save some lives.
Logic is the simpler of the two, since many statements can be logically “valid”, but still wrong in the larger scheme of things. To be valid, it is not required for an argument’s premises to be actually “true”. The premises are usually presented as a syllogism — a form of deductive reasoning where you arrive at a specific conclusion by examining two other premises or ideas. Validity requires premises that, if they were true, would guarantee the truth of the argument’s conclusion. For example, “all Zots have 8 Yips. Lak is a Zot. Therefore, Lak has 8 Yips” is valid argument. That “Zots” are an imaginary creature doesn’t matter. Think of it as thinking practice, a kind of cognitive batting cage.
However, consider this logical reasoning of species classification: “All spiders have eight legs. A Brown Recluse is a type of spider. Therefore, a Brown Recluse has eight legs. This is both valid and “sound” (the logistician’s term for “correct”).
Refreshing, isn’t it? It hints of a world that could make sense, all the time.
A logical joke: A cop sees a drunk searching for something under a streetlight and asks what he is looking for. The drunk says he lost his keys and they both look under the streetlight together. After a few minutes the policeman asks if he is sure he lost them here, and the drunk replies, no, and that he lost them in the park. The policeman asks why he is searching here, and the drunk replies, “Well, for one, the light is so much better”
But like everything human, it’s more complicated than that. Statements can sound logical and be dead wrong: “All crows are black. This bird in my bush is black. Therefore, this bird is a crow.” Well, maybe, maybe not. It could be a raven or blackbird. Or it could be a goldfinch who slipped into a pan of motor oil.
This crow statement would be true if you altered it to “this bird might be a crow”, but that takes more careful attention. If the goal is to quickly come up with an identity for the bird in the bush, ‘it’s a crow” may be acceptable to many, or “close enough for jazz”, as an old expression goes, implying a situation where discriminating between such differences is not that important. For example, casual birdwatchers will refer to any number of different sparrows as “LBJs”- “Little Brown Jobs”- identifying the specific type of sparrow is not highly valued.
Another example: If you are worried that the pandemic is causing you to gain weight, and you would like to avoid the distress of finding out that, “yes, I have added a bit of quarantine muscle”, the best course of action is to diligently avoid getting on a scale. If my strongest preference is to avoid stress, if being calm is a greater value to me than identifying a potential health concern, then why open a can of worms? We “open a can of worms” when we attempt to solve one problem, and inadvertently create an even bigger problem. Simply put, if you want to avoid the disappointment of learning you gained weight, don’t look!
Trump responded to the news of his staffer, Katie Miller’s positive Covid19 test by claiming it served as evidence of “why the whole concept of tests aren’t necessarily great” because “she tested very good for a long period of time, and then all of the sudden she tested positive.” If the goal is to avoid news of new cases occurring, it is therefore logical, then, not to test. It is not, however, rational, by any stretch of the imagination.
“You are not thinking. You are merely being logical” — Nobel Laureate physicist Niels Bohr to Albert Einstein, apparently countering Einstein’s difficulty accepting quantum theory.
What makes some thinking rational? We are being rational when we think and act in ways that best achieve our goals, particularly those goals that align with our enduring values (as opposed to our transient whims). “Values”-the worth, usefulness, or importance attached to something- are thoughts powered by feelings, those thoughts that influence choices to do things that feel both desirable and worthwhile. That fourth slice of pizza may be desirable, but less likely to check the “worthwhile” box. Rational behavior, believe it or not, depends a lot on feelings.
Values are what you believe to be true in your bones, but values do not always align. In fact, values can, and do, compete with each other. Getting up early (as I value avoiding the stress of rushing) competes with hitting the snooze button (as I value the opportunity to sleep longer) which may result in having to shave or apply makeup in the car. The key ingredient of being rational is knowing which priority or value is dominating your emotions at the moment a decision to act is to be made. Discriminating what value is in play takes mental effort, but that is one way we can better manage ambivalence, those seemingly contradictory feelings toward the same person or situation (e.g., wanting more pizza vs. wanting to continue to fit into your clothes).
Trump is an easy target for making inane proclamations — he is the Old Faithful of them. They sometimes are camouflaged in a veneer of logic (e.g. the Covid19 virus kills people, Clorox kills viruses, let’s try injecting people with Clorox to kill their viruses). It is sobering to realize, though, that people, some very smart people, like you and me, can usually think in a logical manner (“I believe that driving under the influence is bad”) and then still behave in irrational and dumb ways (“It’s only a few miles home and I will drive slowly”). Sad. Intelligence is part of it, but less a part than you may think. With most human endeavors, feelings wag the dog.
We tend to use as little effort as possible to solve a problem — humans will tend to conserve energy over using our brain — it is easier. In a word, our thinking, the way we process information, is often “lazy”, even if it is rapid. Psychologists have learned that by exploiting this inherent laziness, social media platforms, governments, media in general, and populist leaders, are able to exercise a form of collective mind control. Kind of like: “We’ll do the thinking so you don’t have to”. This conservation of energy tendency seems to have been goosed by the current prolonged quarantine. If one is not diligent in thinking through all the information that inundates us, we are likely to make more irrational choices, that is, act in ways that are counter to our best interest, acting in accord with the angels of our higher values.
In these Quaran-times, most of us value avoiding a potentially deadly disease and not infecting our loved ones. We also value our social ties, our routines, stimulation and novelty. When values collide, the one most recently experienced may hold the most influence — “Those people are enjoying dinner together in that restaurant, I miss the pleasure of sharing a dinner with friends” may surge in motivational importance. It commands our attention, suspends our attention to the higher value (safety), and thus lowers our guard. Seeking gratification — the promise of a reward, overrides anxiety — that unpleasant feeling that alerts us to threats. Avoiding or lowering anxiety is a cherished popular pursuit. Note that liquor stores were deemed to provide an “essential service” — anxiety reduction being on alcohol’s short list of potential benefits.
Yet, a little anxiety can be a good thing, it gets you to pay attention to things that can hurt you. Anxiety is a decent motivator, but in a prolonged quarantine, it is not enough, it fades over time, while the value of connections endures, and the thirst for being closer, being with others, intensifies. Recognizing how feeling the assertion of one’s values (“Closeness, good!”) influences our behavioral choices can help us keep fighting the good fight, even with months of quarantine fatigue setting in.
Our task may have been easier if our leaders framed our responsibility for social distancing as a necessary collective sacrifice for the common good. If our leaders had a message consistent with a strong value, for example, “every action you take to reduce the spread of Covid19 is downright American — it is our duty to protect each other” — there would likely be less resistance or rejection of those steps. Instead it got weirdly framed as a silly competing values contest between safety and liberty. Unfortunately, adhering to the recommendations of pandemic experts has been dismissed by many political and cultural influencers as unpatriotic, sheepish and unmanly.
Imagine if there was broad leadership that asserted that sacrificing a little and tolerating the inconvenience of wearing a mask for the common good is “masculine”, in the tradition of men using their God-given upper body strength to protect others. Instead, wearing a mask came to signal subordinating to nefarious forces of political correctness, the “nanny-state” or worse.
Reopening schools creates opportunity to invest in the education, well-being, and future of one of America’s greatest assets — our children — while taking every precaution to protect students, teachers, staff and all their families.- The Importance of Reopening America’s Schools this Fall”- Centers for Disease Control, July 23, 2020.
The president of Brown University, Christina Paxson recently asserted: “The reopening of college and university campuses in the fall should be a national priority….Traditional aspects of collegiate life — athletic competitions, concerts and yes, parties — may occur, but in much different fashions”. It is remarkable that this was written by someone who has been to college, let alone a university president. The developmental psychology literature is replete with empirical evidence that there are significant increases in mortality from childhood to adolescence due to preventable causes such as risk taking, and that the “highest level of risk taking often occurs among emerging adults, that is, college students”. Opening campuses during a raging pandemic seems destined to render dormitories the new nursing homes: inhabitable petri dishes of contagion. President Paxson’s thinking appears mostly organized by the fear of students abandoning college: “If they can’t come back to campus, some students may choose — or be forced by circumstances — to forgo starting college or delay completing their degrees”. Delay completing their degrees? Oh, the horror! Rational reflection may come to bear and lead us to make different choices; as my father-in-law often reminds a speeding driver: “Better late than dead”.
I believe we are all subject to making more quick, irrational behavioral choices as this pandemic continues. Most of us crave a return to some semblance of “normal”. That intense desire is understandable, but likely to cause us to mis-prioritize our values. Ocean water will become increasingly tempting to a castaway the thirstier she becomes. (“It’s cold and it’s wet. I’ll just take a sip”).
If we are in a war against this guerilla virus, then we are called to a guard-duty of eternal vigilance, to viral threats from the outside and to behavioral threats from within. To stay safe from the outside threats, wear a mask, keep your social distance and wash your hands early and often. To run a tighter psychological ship, here are some battle strategies:
- See the failure of our leaders to be coherent about what to do as a vacuum that requires you to assume a leadership role for yourself, for your loved ones, and the larger community. What’s your leadership style? Will you be a Churchill, who had the courage and temperament to truthfully describe reality: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning”. Or, will you be more a rabid optimist: “If we stop testing right now, we’d have very few cases, actually”? As Dr. Anthony Fauci recently put it: “We are still knee-deep in the first wave of this. And I would say, this would not be considered a wave. It was a surge, or a resurgence of infections superimposed upon a baseline”.
2. Be aware of our mind’s blind spots- being sick of the quarantine is not a good reason to take fewer precautions. The threat the virus poses has not gone down one iota from its initial appearance. Our desire for relief and social contact does not diminish its threat to us, it merely reduces some of the earlier helpful anxiety we felt and exaggerates the perceived value of making impulsive and unwise choices — the proverbial fourth slice of pizza.
3. Help enlighten others that the precautions (or regulations, like wearing a mask) are not constraints of freedom, they are collective measures that will protect freedom: You and your loved ones will stay free of a nasty, unrelenting and heartless disease.
4. Sift through contradictory messaging and discern what is ultimately rational. For practice, try untangling President Trump’s newfound concern about the safety of convention-goers in Jacksonville, Florida, while, during the same briefing, arguing that parents should not be worried about sending their children back to school or bringing the virus home.
5. Remember that rationality has a higher bar than logic, and necessarily involves tapping into our emotions. (logic does not need much help from feelings- recall, “all spiders have eight legs” “all Zots have 8 Yips”). Deliberately reflect on which values you want to elevate above the rest. If my higher value is helping my team win, I may need to suppress a lower ranked value of my need to be right. The “need to be right” value may compel me to argue a bad call with a referee and hurt my team’s chances of winning. The value of helping my team win hopefully compels me to keep my mouth shut. Sacrificing some “freedom” (wearing a mask, not congregating in bars, waiting for truly flattened curves to open schools) is worthwhile if I hold to the higher value of protecting life, both others, and my own.
How might we successfully manage our emotions in the service of helping us make a greater number of rational choices, i.e., choices that are in our larger, longer term, best interest? I suggest periodic tune-ins to our ranked or competing values. We do this all the time without realizing it, for example when we get up early to exercise. The values involved are 1. Sleep and 2. Exercise Benefits — physical and emotional. Both are desirable, acting in accord with one means inhibiting the other. Purely logical choices are easy (don’t stick the paper clip in an electrical socket again). Rational choices are difficult, we may need to identify the values competing against each other and tap into emotions to guide our behavior.
We may not always be successful in acting in accord with the higher ranked value, but reminding ourselves of the reasons we do that can help. A picture of a road bike you plan to use to traverse Route 66, hanging that little black dress in front of your sweat pants, putting up pictures of grandparents you don’t want infected on the fridge are just a few ways to steer your attention to the goal that is more meaningful to you.
