Rationalism and American Politics

If your angry (the natural symptom of fear or pain) or afraid or hurt, you're going to have a really hard time seeing beyond the filters to clarity.

If you're invested in one side or the other, you're going to struggle to have unbiased thoughts regarding what you see, and are likely to either cherry pick your information (unconsciously or deliberately) to justify your position.

If you're not too bright, or if you're pretty ignorant (sometimes caused by anger or investment), you should be rightfully suspect of any opinions that form in your head.  Although those who aren't too bright are less apt to question their own judgment, and many people who are ignorant don't know grasp enough of the full breadth of the topic to even be aware how ignorant they are ("Who thought healthcare was so complicated?")*

So what's a person to do when you have a "no right answer" world and you want to really understand the big-picture circumstances, and then advocate or act accordingly?

1. Find someone who is totally not invested, who is learned about the topic at hand, who is really intelligent in systems analysis (in the system you're interested in), and has a very broad understanding of the world in general, and has kept skeptically informed about the issue, and ask what they think.  Have them give you a detailed analysis from both (or the several) sides of the issue, and from different perspectives (internal, outside, immediate and long term, and in technical details and broad scope of the scenario).  Then ask a few more people who fit the bill but with deep understanding of a different aspect of the topic.  These people are rare, and very valuable. But be careful to avoid people who have espoused their pet theory because they often are blind to evidence that doesn't support their preconceptions.

2. Triangulate: Get your information from your best sources, and listen to what a wide variety biased and mainstream sources are saying, evaluating their motives and what you know of their personality by their behavior and interests (never what they say, because they speak after their actions).  See below for some thoughts about best sources.

3.  Follow the money.  Rarely are people disinterested in financial reward. Even the meager will vote their pocketbook (or at least believe they are) against their principles most of the time.

Who you can never really trust to speak truth? Businessmen, Politicians, Idiots, Zealots, Ideologues (unless their ideology is "I just don't care."), the angry, the hungry, the scared, the vain, the ambitious, the overly polite (nice) people.

 Who does that leave?  How about people who are scientifically (show me verifiable/repeatable evidence) minded, socially aware agnostics, fiscally-stoic deep thinkers with a journalistic bent, and are experts in their fields.  If we can get the AI community going, and have them ensure their huge brain-machines are built without their emotion chip, and can feed them information like they do for IBM's Watson...  Use them to help best understand what's real and what the implications are, bounce the results off a few ethicists, and then support a decision maker who can understand their best conclusions but also has a heart.


*I just wanted to grab an example that everyone would be able to grasp, not being political.