MASTERING INTELLECTUAL SELF-DEFENSE
Are You Reasonable?
Asking ourselves the hard-hitting questions that get us to think about reason on our quest to obtain intellectual self-defense part 2.
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Reason:
1. A cause, explanation, or justification for an action or event.
2. The power of the mind to think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic.
Reasonable:
1. (of a person) having sound judgment; fair and sensible.
2. As much as is appropriate or fair; moderate.
I would like to think I’m a reasonable person. I think everyone would like to think that they are. In our culture of over-the-top toxic positivity, I think it’s safe to say that no one wants to think ill of themselves or see themselves as a potential problem. Our egos simply cannot or will not accept criticism or stand to see others point out our faults and inconsistencies. It just doesn’t feel good.
Strong beliefs
We feel personally attacked when our beliefs are challenged because we’ve allowed our beliefs to be who and what we are as a person, thus, any challenge or attack of a personally held belief is perceived as an attack against our person. Am I reasonable? Was I ever a reasonable person? I look back and see all of my past beliefs of 9–11 trutherism and anti-vaxxerism to say nothing of my toxic Christian beliefs and I cannot find any evidence of reason. I was not reasoned with facts and data into any of these beliefs so I cannot claim to have been reasonable.
Familial example
Have you ever been gathered around the dinner table with family and friends during a holiday or birthday? Everyone seems to be talking at once and all together as children run screaming from one room to another oblivious to the chaos they leave in their wake. Picture in your mind’s eye as you go around the table observing the speakers as they attempt to get their points across while the quiet ones are content to let the others do most of the talking while adding an occasional noise or grunt of affirmation to notify the speaker they are still following along. Can you think back and remember what was talked about and what the main topic was? Was the topic controversial? Was the speaker reasonable? Was the speaker articulate and convincing? Were they logical in their reasoning? What might you find is that certain topics are intentionally avoided like the plague such as religion, politics, and reasons for civil unrest?
And why?
Because people have taken these issues and personalized them in such a way that no amount of reason or facts presented will encourage thoughtful and meaningful discussion. There’s always that firebrand within any group who never misses an opportunity to throw the occasional Molotov cocktail into the middle of the group and there’s no question as to what they think or feel about any given topic or idea. Peaceful dialogue rarely works unless the others in the group are mature enough to know how to handle this person without allowing the conversation to spiral out of control. Some people handle these situations as an art form and are rarely riled. Keep those people close.
Thought thinkers of old
As we discussed in my last article, philosophers of old like Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and David Hume used various reasoning skills to reveal ideas that were faulty and useless to human flourishing and wellbeing. That is not to say that all these great thinkers were above falling for or originating bad ideas themselves but what they did was establish a framework and criteria to help us build up our intellectual self-defense. One of the methods they established was direct observation and asking questions about how the world works. You would think that direct observation would be a no-brainer, but you would be amazed at how many bad ideas were accepted without question sight unseen even though observation would have ruled out and directly contradicted the bad idea.
Yay, science
This gave birth to what we have today known as the scientific method. This method allows and encourages scientists to gather facts and data through observation which enables them to build a consensus of tested findings which are the building blocks of our scientific theories and models. This eventually led to the Enlightenment Period which resulted in technological advancements and, the determination of human rights and liberties. Living in today’s world, humans seem to have regressed severely as a species. We are more prone to irrational thinking and beliefs now more than ever. Instead of a reasoned rationale, we seem to fall into tribes and cliques of ideology that mostly resemble ourselves. We succumb to bad ideas regardless of counter-evidence and facts because of peer pressure and our social standing within our group. This is quite sad and startling.
Mental roadblocks
What prevents us from changing our minds on certain strong-held beliefs? One of the many reasons is confirmation bias which leads to belief persistence even when we’ve been presented with evidence that contradicts our strongly held beliefs. We cherry-pick the data field to select only evidence that confirms our beliefs. I’ve decided I no longer want to be part of the problem. I’m working my way to unfucking myself and here is my chronicled journey. Glad you came along.
Make America Scientifically Literate Again.
Now, there’s a campaign slogan I can get behind.
Thank you for reading.🌺
For further reading:
Mental Immunity By Andy Normon
