Certain of What We Can't See, Politics = Religion

Today is November 1—a.k.a. 11/1—which reminds me of the scriptural passage in Hebrews 11:1 that reads, “Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Because my religion is skepticism and my legal training demands proof of matters asserted, not mere opinion and blind faith, I’ve long been amazed that people can be “sure” and “certain” of things for which there is no compelling evidence. [1]

Casey Anthony

Though it’s always simmering, faux certainty boiled to the surface when a recent dinner conversation touched on the Casey Anthony trial. Ms. Anthony, you may recall, is the Florida mom acquitted last July of killing her child because the government didn’t prove its case. Certain guests at the table absolutely knew that she’s guilty, and said so in no uncertain terms. When I probed them on how they could be sure, the answer boiled down to a gut feeling and Heb. 11:1.

     Never mind that they hadn’t been in the courtroom to hear the testimony. Never mind that they hadn’t seen one minute of the trial on Court TV. And never mind that the jurors who did hear all the evidence felt the prosecutors hadn’t proven guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. The self-appointed judges at the table were prepared to condemn a defendant they’d never seen on the strength of newspaper accounts, talk radio call-in shows, and commentaries by the likes of Nancy Grace (who, among others, ranted for ratings while the trial was underway).

     I understand my friends’ emotional, visceral reaction—and I must admit that something does seem fishy about the whole case—but my inner lawyer had to point out that “not guilty” is a technical term. It does not mean that the defendant did no wrong; it means there wasn’t enough evidence to convict her. We don’t send people to jail on the basis of intuition or a biblical faith in things not seen.

     Somehow the discussion then turned to politics, and one of the guests proclaimed proudly that she’s a Republican. How that was relevant to anything I don’t recall but it led to various opinions around the table about President Obama, healthcare reform, the state of the economy, and so forth. It was clear to me that we were on dangerous ground, and mercifully the Republican saw the quicksand too and changed the subject.

The Hebrews scripture

Only later that evening did I recall the passage from Hebrews and come to the realization that one could substitute opinion for faith in that scripture. One’s opinion—whether about a celebrity trial, a political candidate, or a given public policy issue—is rarely more than a matter of faith. Not being well versed in the facts, our opinions amount to little more than the assurance of things hoped for and the certainty of things not seen. I ask you:

• Who among us sat in the jury box and heard all the evidence in Casey Anthony’s trial? Not you, not my dinner companions, and not I. Who are we to judge?
• Who among us knows all the relevant details of the health reform law? Not I, even though I’ve read the whole thing, have given it serious study, and have written about it in my work. And certainly not the Breakfast Bloviator of whom I wrote in October of last year.
• Who among us will know what the political candidates really stand for when we go to the polls next year? None of us. All we’ll know is sound bites and the “spin” that gets reported in the media.

Unless we are experts on a particular subject, what most of us think we know about these and an infinite number of similar questions is what the media feed us. And the media—whether print or electronic, commercial or “public”—feed us what we want to hear. Local television, Fox News Channel, the New York Times, even NPR—all have to stay in business. And they know that their respective audiences suffer from the psychological flaw known as confirmation bias—a tendency to support the things one already believes or wants to be true while ignoring evidence to the contrary. In other words, “Smart people believe weird things because they are skilled at defending beliefs they arrived at for nonsmart reasons.”[2]

     Confirmation bias helps to explain “nonsmart” things like psychics, “birthers,” and Michelle Bachmann. It may be the reason for selective memory, conspiracy theories, and belief in UFOs. It may even help to explain Hebrews 11:1.

     Is confirmation bias why my Republican friends refuse to consider virtually anything Obama and the Democrats support? Is blind faith in Reaganomics the reason why the top 1% of wealthy Americans aren’t asked to kick in a bit more to solve the debt crisis? Is confirmation bias the reason Fox News and talk radio can stay on the air?

Politics = religion

Being “certain” of one’s beliefs in the face of—or while refusing to consider—contrary evidence is not especially harmful as a matter of religious preference. But when unjustified certainty begins to confirm prejudices and to affect public policy, it is malignant. If we are blind to evidence that refutes our preconceived hypotheses, we are in danger of crossing the line from reasonableness to closed-mindedness and bigotry.[3]  

     Hebrews 11:1 helps me remember that politics is a religion: a blind faith in things we hope for but cannot (or will not) see. I don’t discuss religion with others; henceforth I won’t discuss politics either. Confirmation bias makes either conversation futile and frustrating, and trying to influence someone’s political opinion is as likely to succeed as trying to persuade them that their religion is wrong.

     Exactly one year from Sunday—November 6, 2012—millions of U.S. citizens will march to the polls and exercise their religio-political right to vote, and they will do so based on little more than blind faith in their preconceived notions. My New Year’s resolution for 2012 will be to explain confirmation bias to any of them who will listen. Unfortunately, given the concepts expressed in Heb. 11:1, not many will.

# # #

Once again, my Personal Creed--
Don't believe everything you read or hear. Always be skeptical. Always doubt. Demand proof. Spread truth, not rumor.

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Sixth Edition cover

[Editor’s note: For the past two months the Hermit Philosopher has been preoccupied with the final stages of textbook publication. The book will go to the printer in a week or so, and then the HP will resume a more regular blogging schedule.]

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[1] See the blogs “Opinions are Not Facts,” parts I and II, Oct. 2010.

[2] M. Shermer, “Smart People Believe Weird Things,” Scientific American, Aug. 12, 2002.

[3] See, e.g., http://skepdic.com/confirmbias.html.

On Editors: An Apologia for Those Who Prepare Works for Publication

A few people have commented recently on how much I write: this blog, my forthcoming textbook,* regular articles for a healthcare association’s website, and editing projects undertaken for friends and family. On this last point they have a sense of wonder that I can take somebody’s garbled prose and make it read well. They seem to believe that writing and editing are gifts from the gods; that they’re genetic, like an ear for music; that you either have the language gene or you don’t.
 

But they’re wrong. Writing is simply a skill you can practice. You can tinker with your prose (or poetry), hone it, polish it; you can do it yourself or let an editor help, as I’m doing for a friend. He has written a 24-page book proposal, and I’m emending it (making suggestions for improvement). I prepared him for what is to come with the following commentary about the writing and editing process.  Perhaps this little essay will help salve some wounds when he sees his manuscript practically bleeding with my red-pen changes.

First, I love editors. Nothing I write is so good that it can’t be made better, so I always appreciate an editor’s suggestions. But they are suggestions only. Unless it’s a work done for hire, the final product is mine alone and I am free to accept or reject another’s opinion. Of course a publisher is free to accept or reject my MS too, so I give an editor’s or agent’s comments considerable weight.

Second, there is no such thing as good writing; there is only good rewriting. To make something an easy read involves a lot of rewriting. (“Easy reading is damned hard writing.” – Nathaniel Hawthorne.)

Third, it’s really, really hard to edit one’s own work—which is another reason I give serious consideration to the comments of others. When I am proofing and rewriting, I find it helpful to change the venue. If I composed the draft at my computer, I print it out and take the document to the living room or the pool or somewhere else. A change of scene helps me see the work with “new eyes.” So does setting the thing aside for a few days and returning to it afresh. Even changing the font or screen size on the computer helps.

Fourth, I never rely solely on the grammar checker on the word processing application. (Mine thinks "unforgiveable" is a correct spelling, for example.)

Fifth, I read my stuff aurally, so to speak. By that I mean: how something sounds to my “mind’s ear” is important. I “listen” to the words as I read them, and I often read out loud when editing to get the rhythm and emphasis correct. If it sounds awkward to my ear, it likely will be awkward to the reader’s eye as well.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we speak to be understood; but we write to make it impossible to be misunderstood. So I always write, edit, and rewrite with attention to how the reader will understand the words, not merely how I intend them. This is especially important for my friend's book. It is based on material he presents in a classroom: he lectures, students discuss, they ask questions, and he clarifies. Before class is over, he makes sure they understand. But with the written word an author has just one bite at the apple. The work has to be perfect from the get-go.  

_____

Perhaps these thoughts will help those of you who think you have no aptitude for writing.  Like trying to get to Carnegie Hall, all it takes is "practice, practice, practice."

And a good editor. :-)

______

*My book will make a great Christmas gift, by the way!  LOL

Happy Summer, Y'all!

The Summer Solstice is here again. Time to reflect on the change of seasons, summer fun, golf and what this guy at Stonehenge represents.

When I lived in San Diego I often heard friends in the Midwest ask, "Don't you miss the change of seasons?" My candid answer was: "Not in the least. When the weather's perfect, why would you want it to change?"

Now that I'm again in a clime that actually has changing seasons, I have come to welcome the transitions: from the heat of summer to the cooler (but usually not too cold) days of Atlanta's fall and winter, and back to springtime and the lazy time of July and August.

Having lived in Florida's perpetual summer for more than a decade, "Hotlanta's" seasons are a bit of a change. It gets both hot and cold here at various times; but it was worse in St. Louis where we counted the number of days with triple digit temps and the number of inches of snow and ice. In my ten years in Orlando, the temperature was never over 100 degrees. Never. And it never snowed.

Then there was Baton Rouge, where summer scenes like this one (at right) were enough to scare me right back to my air conditioning.

So it's good to be enjoying summer in Atlanta. Although we have no ocean, there's major league baseball, and golf, and my apartment's pool. What more could a fella want?

Speaking of golf ... didja hear about the controversy NBC stirred up with its opening vignette for the U.S. Open telecast on Sunday? It was a montage of golf and patriotism that included school children reciting the Pledge of Allegiance while footage of American flags, marching soldiers, the Washington Monument, etc., played on the screen. The problem was that the 30-second piece was edited in such a way that the words "under God" were omitted. Twice.

It was subtle, and I didn't notice it at the time, but the blogosphere noticed and went ballistic. People were all aTwitter with righteous indignation, having apparently taken personal offense at this "selective patriotism" and the supposed slight done to "our heritage, our ideals, and the sacrifice of those who have fought to protect our freedoms." (Washington Post, 6/20/2011)

NBC issued an on-air apology during the telecast and went even further on Monday saying, "We are aware of the distress this has caused many of our viewers and are taking the issue very seriously. ... This was a bad decision." 

I entirely agree, but not for the reason NBC and the Washington Post and others cite. It was a bad decision because the U.S. Open needn't be an occasion for patriotism. It's a golf tournament, by jingo! It's held on Father's Day weekend -- not Memorial Day, not Veterans Day, not the Fourth of July. Do we need always to be bombarded by chauvinistic patriotism and ceremonial deism? I know that the tourney was held near DC at Congressional Country Club, and obviously NBC thought the setting was appropriate for a little flag-waving. The PGA will be held in Atlanta this summer; maybe they'll play "Dixie" and show the battle flag of the Confederacy. 

The Washington Post and the red-blooded Americans who got their panties in a wad over this imagined insult need to remember that the Pledge of Allegiance is primarily a loyalty oath used in citizenship ceremonies. It's not something Jefferson brought down from a mountain top on stone tablets. Congress didn't adopt it until 1942, and "under God" wasn't added until 1954 during the Eisenhower administration and the Red Scare days of Joseph McCarthy. It's not exactly one of our founding documents.

So, let us return to the summer solstice and the picture at the very beginning of this post. If we want to pledge loyalty to something, how about to our First Amendment? To that part of our national heritage that lets people decide for themselves whether they are "under God" or not; that lets Wiccans or anyone else practice their religion here as if they were at Stonehenge; that lets patriots dress up and wave flags. Let us pledge loyalty to our freedom of speech and our ability to go crazy on Facebook and Twitter and blog spots like this one without fear of censorship. God bless the USA! 

And thank heaven for summer!

Curmudgeonly Musings

News Flash! Anthony Weiner is an Idiot.   

‘Nuff said. What’s interesting (to me at least) is to think about how different today’s news climate is compared to 50 or 75 years ago. The media didn’t excoriate Kennedy for his dalliances. They didn’t even photograph FDR in his wheelchair. But now anything salacious is considered “news.” 

And the media – the children of Hamelin – follow Sarah Palin’s huge ‘non-campaign’ bus everywhere waiting for the next dumb thing she’ll say so they can report it because that’s the kind of stuff people want to hear.

As a Forbes columnist wrote earlier this week, “Is anyone embarrassed by this?  Is anyone embarrassed that we now have a TV game show, Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader, where contestants let the world know what they don’t know?” 

It’s the dumbing-down of America. But whose fault is it? The media wouldn’t feed us this stuff if people didn’t eat it up. The media make us stupid. One author sums it up this way: 

The problem with the media has become a chicken-and-egg question. It delivers crap to us; the crap mesmerizes us (i.e. it generates high ratings); the media gives us more, and – oops – we’ve all become dazzled and distracted and unfocused. [Lisa Bloom, Think: Straight Talk for Women to Stay Smart in a Dumbed-Down World.]

I haven’t watched local news programs for at least 20 years, and I seldom watch national news any more either. With help from CNN, The Weather Channel gives a good review of current events at 6 a.m., and skimming the front section of the NYTimes or Wall Street Journal plus a few minutes of NPR or CNN at the top of any hour is about all the information one needs. Who cares about the rest of the stuff masquerading as news? Just move on to the sports page. (See my posts back in February and March about the media, Marshal McLuhan, the movie Blowup, etc.)

Speaking of Dumbing-Down

It was prom season recently. "Glee" had an entire episode on it, and the NYT had a story about proms for adults, of all things. The headline read, "Second Shot to Have the Best Night of Their Lives." Their best night! Really?

All over the country young couples like this one spent hundreds of dollars for clothes, corsages, limos, etc., in search of that elusive "best night." Gag me! I thought proms were stupid when I went to them (credit peer pressure for my going), and I feel even more so now. And proms for adults? Puh-leeze!

 

Ya Gets What Ya Pays For

Here's another curmudgeonly perspective: people who live in swamps shouldn't complain about water. Sure they got flooded out in Morgan City and Houma and other towns in the downstream parishes of Louisiana: that's what they get for living in a flood plain. They should be thankful they weren't washed away years ago, which they would have been but for government efforts at flood "control." (When will we ever learn that Nature always wins in the long run?)

And While I'm At It

All the folks who got flooded and hit by tornadoes or scorched by wild fires, and all those who will likely feel hurricanes' wrath this summer and fall ... where will they go to seek assistance? Washington of course. So much for the Reagan/Tea Party mantra, "Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."

“Snopester” Alert!

In the eternal battle of truth versus gossip, 

truth doesn’t stand a chance.

Introduction
My New Year’s resolution is that I won’t get all het up about politics. So far I’ve been pretty successful. I’m tuning it out, and I feel more serene as a result. But one thing I can’t stop obsessing about is urban legends—false stories, spread by gullible people, that you simply must forward immediately to everyone in your address book:

-Warning! Aspartame causes brain tumors!
-Freezing plastic water bottles releases carcinogens!
-So does leaving them in a hot car!
-Jesus will be portrayed as gay in an upcoming movie, so sign this protest to the Attorney General!
 
I got another one recently: a claim that U.S. criminals are using business cards soaked with “Burundanga” (a.k.a, scopolamine) to incapacitate their victims. The warning purports to be from a police sergeant in Louisville, Kentucky and it says, “If you are a female, take heed! If you are male and have a significant female in your life … pass this along! Always better safe than sorry!”*

It’s not clear why the author thought only women are susceptible, but this false—and sexist—message has been around for more than 3 years and has been forwarded over and over by presumably well-intentioned people who undoubtedly felt they were protecting their friends and relations.

The Misinformation Age
The Hermit Philosopher’s mission of course is to spread truth, not rumor, while musing on the human condition. In this case, there are two “human conditions” at work: (1) the phenomenon of these outrageous e-rumors; and (2) my habit of 0verreacting to them.

First, as I suggested in a recent 3-part series (see Feb. 23 & 25 and Mar. 1), an unintended consequence of better communication technologies (Internet, smart phones, etc.) is the ability to spread lies, untruths and deception ever more easily. Although we have at our fingertips more knowledge in one place than the world has ever known before, there is a staggering amount of misinformation: Nigerian bank fraud scams, get-rich-quick schemes, false claims about public figures, and the imagined dangers in the e-rumors that drive me crazy. It absolutely astounds me that intelligent people continually forward these emails. Are we so naive, or so mendacious, that we no longer care about veracity? 

I am told this phenomenon has to do with a parental (most often motherly) desire to demonstrate care and concern for loved ones. Forwarding the warning apparently brings the sender a degree of comfort in the off chance that the message might be true. But I cannot accept that the communication of rumor and falsehood—no matter how well motivated the one who broadcasts it may be—can ever be considered a caring and loving act.   

In some contexts, reckless disregard of the truth or falsity of a matter asserted is considered criminal. In my mind it is, at the very least, unethical. Furthermore, the proclivity to worry makes worriers of others, and when done unnecessarily it perpetuates the trait through generations. Prudence is one thing; pusillanimity quite another. 

I am reminded of a quote attributed to C.S. Lewis: 
 
If you look for truth you may find comfort in the end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair.**

All of which leads to my second point: that because I am addicted to truth, I overreact to the e-rumor cesspool and try to clean it up all by myself. In the process I raise my own blood pressure and offend some friends and acquaintances. I need to remember that I can control nobody but myself; I need to let this obsession go. Therefore I present...

My New Resolution
Henceforth I will respond, if at all, to stupid and outrageous chain emails with a simple question: "Did you check the facts before you sent this?" 

I will then point out that there are some well-respected websites dedicated to helping do just that:

• http://snopes.com/ ***
• http://truthorfiction.com/
• http://urbanlegends.about.com/
• http://www.nonprofit.net/hoax/

On these sites you can search a few key words and within seconds determine whether a claim is true, false, or undetermined. For the sake of us all, please do that before you hit "send" next time. Always verify information before forwarding it.

Three easy rules of thumb:
1. The more often something has been forwarded, the less likely it is to be true.
2. Except for jokes, any message that says it should be forwarded to everyone you know is either a scam or a lie.
3. If comes from a "friend of a friend" or some other indeterminate source, delete it.

Finally, My Personal Creed--
Don't believe everything you read. Always be skeptical. Always doubt. Demand proof. Spread truth, not rumor.

___
*Like many urban legends, there is a kernel of truth to this story; scopolamine is a drug, but it can’t be used the way the rumor says.
** http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/c/cslewis141015.html
***For some background on Snopes.com, see: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/05/technology/05snopes.html and http://www.rd.com/home/rumor-detectives-true-story-or-online-hoax/