Category Archives: Fact-Based Thinking

The Traits that Spawn Conservatism

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There are a large number of important personal and social policy issues upon which liberals and conservatives completely disagree. I have to consider whether all of these seemingly unrelated positions are merely symptomatic of more fundamental underlying personality differences.

I submit that conservative worldviews arise from three primary character traits: dogmatism, selfishness, and fearfulness.

The first basic personality trait is the degree to which you are a situational or a dogmatic thinker. Liberals tend to be situational, weighing and balancing the nuanced competing ethics of a given situation. Conservatives tend to be dogmatic, enforcing strict, simplistic rules in accordance with their moral beliefs. Liberals are frightened by what they regard as mindless dogmatism, while conservatives view situational ethics as a dangerous lack of moral principles.

The second fundamental trait that influences our worldview is selfishness. Conservatives are essentially selfish in putting their self-interest and their beliefs first, whereas liberals tend to more strongly respect differences and emphasize the public good with the view that “it takes a village.”

Their third important trait is fearfulness. It is fearfulness that drives the conservative need for guns, for an insanely large military arm, and fear of immigrants and those unlike them.

Since the real motivations for conservative positions (dogmatism, selfishness, and fear) are not things that conservatives can acknowledge in themselves, they must come up with other rationales for their positions. This causes conservatives to vilify intellectualism and ridicule facts. It forces smart conservatives to defend their dogmatic, selfish, and fearful positions with stupid arguments. Smart people put forth stupid arguments to defend a selfish, anti-social culture of guns. Smart people put forth stupid arguments to defend a belief in god, to defend pro-life legislation, rampant militarism, economic Darwinism, and trickle-down economics.

Smart Christians like Ken Ham make stupid arguments to support their creationist beliefs. Ham insists that everything in the bible he agrees with is literal, while everything he disagrees with is figurative only (see here). Similarly, smart conservative supreme court justices claim that the Constitution must be interpreted literally when it supports them, but when it doesn’t support them they insist in an “original intent” interpretation that always happens to support their conservative views (see here).

The result is that we hear a lot of falsehoods and specious arguments in defense of a wide range of conservative positions that are all really rationalizations of dogmatism, selfishness, and fear.

Now wait a second, you may say. While conservatives may disagree with us liberals, they are simply good, well-intentioned people with sincere differences of opinion as to what is best for everyone. They sincerely believe their pro-life activism saves lives, that more guns are the solution to gun violence, and that a strong military prevents wars. You shouldn’t disparage them with negative characterizations of dogmatism, selfishness, and fear.

I would be inclined to believe that as well. However, we have a disturbing “tell” that suggests otherwise. The fact that conservatives deny global climate changes signals to us that they have not simply reached a differing conclusion on this issue. The facts are so overwhelming on this, that their denial can only be driven by strong underlying traits, particularly selfishness. They simply care more about being able to burn all the fossil fuels they want, make all the money they want today, and heck with tomorrow for the entire world. Since few are willing to claim that CO2 is actually good for the planet, the others simply deny, deny, deny.

The fact that conservatives can deny facts and rationalize their denial of climate change makes it likely that all their other arguments are similarly driven by underlying traits including dogmatism, selfishness, and fear. Their denial of climate change suggests that conservatives do not merely reach different conclusions given the information they are exposed to, rather they limit their information and formulate rationalizations to defend their dogmatism, selfishness, and fear. Climate change tells us that these traits are strong in conservatives, and those traits cannot help but drive their positions on other important issues as well.

If we liberals wish to push back on these critical issues, we need to stop debating specious and shifting secondary arguments and start to deal more directly with these fundamental character drivers.

 

Anecdotal Evidence Shows

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The titular phrase “anecdotal evidence shows that…” is very familiar to us – with good reason. Not only is it very commonly used, but it is subject to a great deal of misuse. It generally makes an assertion that something is probably true because there is some observed evidence to support it. While that evidence does not rise to the level of proof, it does at least create some factual basis for wishful thinking.

Anecdotal evidence is important. It is often the only evidence we can obtain. In many areas, scientists cannot practically conduct a formal study, or it would be ethically wrong to do so. It may simply be an area of study that no one is willing to fund. Therefore, even scientists often have no alternative but to base conclusions upon the best anecdotal data they have.

Anecdotal evidence is essential to making everyday decisions as well. We don’t normally conduct formal studies to see if our friend Julie is a thief. But if ear rings disappear each time she visits, we have enough anecdotal evidence to at least watch her closely. Likewise, even court proceedings must often rely upon anecdotal evidence, which is slightly different than circumstantial evidence.

Knowing when anecdotal evidence is telling, when it is simply a rationalization for wishful thinking, and when it is the basis for an outright con job is not always easy. The fact that sometimes all we have to work with is anecdotal evidence makes it all that much more dangerous and subject to misuse and abuse.

All too often, anecdotal evidence is simply poor evidence. I once presented anecdotal evidence of ghosts by relating a harrowing close encounter that I had. The thing was, I totally made it up (see here). People don’t always intentionally lie when they share an anecdote, but those people who in good faith repeated my story to others were nevertheless sharing bad anecdotal information.

Testimonials are a form of anecdotal claim. Back in the 1800’s a Snake Oil Salesman would trot out an accomplice to support his claims of a miracle cure. Today we see everyone from television preachers to herbal medicine companies use the same technique of providing anecdotal evidence through testimonials. Most of these claims are no more legitimate than my ghost story.

We also see anecdote by testimony performed almost daily in political theatre. The President points to the crowd to identify a person who has benefitted greatly from his policies. In Congressional hearings, supposedly wronged parties are trotted out to give testimony about how badly they were harmed by the actions of the targeted party. Both of these individuals are put forth as typical examples yet they may be exceedingly unusual.

So here’s the situation. We need anecdotal evidence as it is often all we have to work with to make important decisions that must be made. However, basing decisions on anecdotal information is also fraught with risk and uncertainty. How do we make the wisest use of the anecdotal information that we must rely upon?

First, consider the source and the motive of the anecdote. If the motive is to try to persuade you to do something, to support something, to accept something, or to part with your cash, be particularly suspect of anecdotal claims or testimonials. One great example are the Deal Dash commercials. You hear a woman claim that she “won” a large screen television for only $49. Sounds great, until you realize that the anecdote doesn’t tell how many bids she purchased to get it for $49, how much she wasted on other failed auctions, and how much was spent in total by the hundreds of people bidding on that item. Anecdotal evidence are not always an outright lies, but they can still tell huge lies by omission and by cherry-picking.

Second, consider the plausibility of the anecdote. If the anecdote claims to prove that ghosts exist, someone made it up. Likewise with god or miracles or angels or Big Foot. Just because someone reports something incredible, no matter how credible that person may be, demand credible evidence. As Carl Sagan pointed out, “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.”

Third, consider the scope of the anecdotal claim. Does it make sweeping generalizations or is it very limited in scope? If the claim is that all Mexicans are rapists because one Mexican was arrested for rape, we end up with a Fallacy of Extrapolation which is often the result of the misuse of anecdotal information.

Finally, consider the cost/benefit of the response to the anecdotal claim. If the anecdote is that eating yoghurt cured Sam’s cancer, then maybe it’s reasonable to eat more yoghurt. But if the anecdote is that Ed cured his cancer by ceasing all treatments, then perhaps that should be considered a far more risky anecdote to act upon.

Anecdotal information is essential. Many diseases such as AIDS have been uncovered by paying attention to one “anecdotal” case report. In fact, many of the important breakthroughs in science have only been possible because a keen-eyed scientist followed up on what everyone else dismissed as merely anecdotal or anomalous data.

Anecdotes are best used to simply make the claim that something may be possible, but without any claims as to how likely it is. For example, it may be that a second blow to the head has seemed to cure amnesia. However, this cannot be studied clinically and it is not likely to occur often enough to recommend it as a treatment. Still, sometimes it is extremely important to know that something has been thought to happen, no matter how uncertain and infrequent. If a severe blow to the head MAY have cured amnesia at least once, this can help to inform further research into it.

Don’t start feeling overwhelmed. We don’t actually need to stop and consciously analyze every anecdote in detail. Our subconscious pattern-recognition machines are quite capable of performing these fuzzy assessments for us. We only need to be sure to consciously internalize these general program parameters into our pattern recognition machines so that they produce sound conclusions when presented with claims that “anecdotal evidence shows.”

 

Time To Dump Linda

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You have probably read articles that reference the famous Linda Study conducted by researchers Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky back in the early 1970’s. In it, the researchers describe an outspoken person named Linda who is and smart and politically active and who has participated in anti-nuclear demonstrations. They then ask the subject to indicate whether Linda is more likely to be a) a bank teller or b) a bank teller who is also an active feminist.

No direct evidence is given to indicate that Linda is either a bank teller or a feminist. She is smart so she might be a bank teller, and since she has been socially active she might be a feminist. But logically it is far more likely that Linda is only one of these things than that she is both. Yet most people, given the choices presented and regardless of education, answer that Linda is probably both a bank teller and a feminist. This is an example of the Conjunction Fallacy (see here), in which a person mistakenly believes that multiple conditions are more likely than a single one.

Although this study is frequently cited in popular science articles, the conclusions drawn from it have been strongly criticized or at least given more nuanced analysis (see here). Few popular ideas from science since the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle have been so misused and overextended as the Linda Study. We really should stop reading so much into this study and cease abusing it so badly.

irrationalAn example of one such popular science article describes research by Professor Keith Stanovich (see here). In his work he used the Linda Study methodology along with other tests to measure rationality. Although I do not know how well this popular science article represents the actual research by Stanovich, it suggests that the Linda Test is a strong indicator of rationality. I find that assertion very troubling.

First off, while the Linda Test does expose the Conjunction Fallacy, we are all are susceptible to a huge number of logical fallacies. I document dozens of these in my book, “Belief in Science and the Science of Belief” (see here). While everyone should be taught to do better at recognizing and avoiding logical fallacies, failing to do so probably does not adequately correlate to irrational thinking.

If subjects were made aware that this was intended as an SAT-style logic gotcha, many would answer it in a more literal context. But we normally assume a broader scope of inference when answering this sort of question and the pattern-recognition machines we call our brains are capable of all sorts of fuzzy logic that is completely independent of, and much broader than, strict mathematical logic. In the real world, it might well turn out that women like Linda are in fact more likely to be both bankers and feminists.  Moreover “both” is a far richer answer in the context of most real-world interactions. The more logically correct answer is less insightful and interesting.

This is not to suggest that we should become lax about adhering to principles of logic, but only to suggest that a simple “brain teaser” logic question is not a very powerful indicator of overall rationality. Furthermore, equating rationality to a fallacy recognition test diminishes the profound complexity and importance of rationality.

I suggest that there are far stronger indicators of rationality. Does the subject believe in God? Do they deny climate-change? Do they subscribe to pseudoscientific nonsense? Is their thinking muddled by irrational New Age rationalizations? Do they insist the world is only 6 million years old and that humans coexisted with dinosaurs (cough) Ken Ham see here (cough).

Here’s the problem. All of these direct indicators are too entrenched and widespread to be overtly linked to irrationality. So instead we use safe, bland, non-confrontational indicators like the Linda Test that are at best weak and at worst undermine important and frank questions about rationality.

So dump Linda already in favor of far more meaningful measures of rationality!

 

Aborting the Lies

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Is it any surprise that there are many more fake pro-life “abortion clinics” than there are actual abortion clinics? Is it any surprise that if you try to Google anything related to abortion services, you will get many, many more hits for fake pro-life Trojan-Horse sites than actual legitimate abortion service sites?

Frankly this should come as no surprise to anyone. This is what these fanatical pro-life activists do. As documented in the excellent HBO film “12th and Delaware” (see here) and others, Christians set up fake abortion clinics to lure in distressed, vulnerable pregnant women under false pretenses. Like any good confidence operation, they are warm and welcoming and sprinkle in as many facts as they can so that they can manipulate these women.

However, once lured into these “abortion counseling services,” the women find that the pressure on them will build and build, becoming more manipulative as these pro-life fanatics try to persuade or coerce or even trick the woman into delivering her baby. This manipulation is not merely limited to appeals to emotion, but includes many outright distortions and lies. One such tactic is to intentionally under-report the gestational age of the baby to make the client believe she has much more time than she actually has to perform the abortion. They outright lie to trick the women into delaying their abortion until it is too late. In fact, they feel justified to lie about anything and everything necessary to “save” the baby.

Clinics and web sites make the women watch “informational videos” to help in this coercion. Many are produced by an infamous anti-abortion doctor named Dr. Anthony Levitano. He has one such propaganda video on medical abortion (see here), which is an extremely safe and effective procedure. I encourage you to watch this because it provides a great crash course in how to manipulate others and what to watch for to avoid being manipulated. It starts out for the first minute or so as a fairly straight-forward description of medical abortion. The manipulation kicks in by pointing out that the medical abortion can be “reversed.” This is factually inaccurate, but pro-life advocates like to say it anyway to plant the seed of doubt – the doubt that many women “come to their senses” too late to save their baby.

At about a 90 seconds in, the video starts to turn palpably darker, emphasizing ominous words like “severe” and “heavy” and introducing phrases intended to appeal to emotion like “force the dead baby out.” Notice that they intentionally call it a baby, not a fetus or embryo, because they use every possible ploy to make the mother feel emotionally connected. After that, Levitano proceeds to up the temperature by warning that the process can be “very intense and painful.” From there it gets quickly worse, gratuitously pointing out that the woman could “loose her baby” at any time, then following up with images of a woman on a toilet “expelling her baby down the toilet which she will then flush.” The repulsive imagery that Levitano fully intends to invoke is masked under a transparently thin veil of clinical detachment.

And this is only half-way through the thing! The video goes on to repulse the viewer with increasingly horrific and increasingly blatant appeals to fear, guilt, and revulsion. He points out, for example, how [if the woman were to sift through the tissue in the toilet] she might be able to detect fingers and toes. Levitano claims that 1% of women require hospitalization after a medical abortion, but this is at least a hundred-fold exaggeration and in the extremely rare case when there is hospitalization, it is rarely serious or even the result of the abortion drug. Levitano closes his manipulation by sharing his own personal realization that “all abortions are wrong.”

Let me be perfectly clear. This is factual and emotional manipulation with no tactic too subtle or too blatant. Whatever true facts are presented are only included to establish enough credibility to sell the big lies and manipulations to come. It is sad that so many women fall prey to this kind of hateful and harmful manipulation dressed up and rationalized as Christian morality and charity. Whether they are in front of abortion clinics or hosting their Trojan-Horse web sites, in their minds no tactic is out of bounds, no lie is a lie to them if it advances their cause.

liesBut this should come as no surprise. After all, all of religion is nothing but selling lies. It can be nothing else because it has nothing but lies to offer. Scriptures, angels, salvation, afterlife, god, devils… its all lies and Christians spend all their energy believing or convincing others to believe these lies. Is it any wonder then that Christians should have no trouble believing and spreading lies about abortion as well? Religion is not benign. Becoming comfortable rationalizing religious nonsense directly impacts our capacity to rationalize equally crazy thinking in consequential matters like abortion.

And as with religious fantasy, it is immaterial whether they sincerely, devoutly, fervently believe the nonsense they spread about abortion or how selfless their intentions might be. Their lies, deceits, manipulations, misinformation, and misguided efforts do great harm to a great many people regardless of their motivation – harm to the women directly affected as well as to the men and families in their lives.

If you are seeking an abortion, ask the clinic early and directly if they provide abortions on their premises. If you do not receive a clear and unambiguous yes, hang up. Ask again the minute you walk in the door. If they begin to use any of these tactics on you, leave immediately because their only goal is to do whatever it takes to prevent you from obtaining a legal and safe abortion.

 

Ethical Fallacies

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A fallacy is a mistaken belief, particularly those based on invalid arguments. There are many general forms that fallacious arguments take, and they are almost always an indicator of faulty reasoning, incorrect conclusions, and even outright manipulation. Familiar examples of these include the Straw Man, Appeal to Authority, Ad Hominem, Circular Reasoning, and False Choice. If you learn to recognize the general patterns of fallacious logic, you can see through disingenuous or manipulative arguments far more quickly and clearly. I discuss these and many other logical fallacies in my book “Belief in Science and the Science of Belief (see here).

But in addition to logical fallacies, I’d like to suggest that there is also such a thing as ethical fallacies that we encounter just as often. In fact, in this 2016 election cycle we have been ceaselessly deluged by ethical fallacies. Note that it is with deliberate intent that I speak of ethical fallacies and not moral fallacies. Morality is itself a form of ethical fallacy. For a discussion of the difference, see here.

The reason I make that distinction is because moral thinking is typically based on ethical fallacies including “Appeal to the Bible.” Note that a related and no less dogmatic form of ethical fallacy is “Appeal to the Constitution.” In fact, many of the same people who would like to bind us to their interpretation of the Bible would also like to turn the Constitution into another Bible, binding even secular individuals to their particular religiously-based interpretation of yet another literal and unassailable scripture.

Two related ethical fallacies are “Appeal to the Majority” and “Appeal to Individual Rights.” Sometimes these are valid arguments, but often they are not. When some argue that “a majority of Americans support the death penalty,” that does not constitute a valid ethical argument. Likewise when some argue that we should not restrict any gun sales because it is an individual right, clearly this is insufficient ethical justification. Politicians and advocates often similarly appeal to Federal versus State Rights inconsistently and arbitrarily when it serves their narrow interests.

Another set of ethical arguments that are often invoked are fallacies of “Time and Space.” Just because something may have been accepted or considered ethical in Biblical times or even in Revolutionary War days, does not mean it is ethical today. And just because something may be ethical in one place, does not ensure that it is ethical in another. Note that religious people have great trouble with this concept. It is too complicated and messy for them. It requires too much thought. They disparagingly call this kind of ethical thinking “situational” and therefore immoral. They prefer immutable dogma.

Note that just because something is lawful does not make it ethical either. “Invoking the Law” is therefore another possible fallacy. Of course we do our best to create ethical laws, but just because something is law does not make it ethical in all situations. Laws should be fluid enough to ensure fairness in individual situations. This concept is antithetical to some religious thinkers who have trouble with anything beyond simple dogmatic thinking. Ironically, they are most likely to insist the law be adhered to by others, but allow themselves to override the law when they can rationalize that it is in contradiction to their faith.

There are other fallacies related to belief. Many of the same people are most likely to invoke the “Fallacy of Sincerity.” Just because a belief is “sincere or heartfelt” does not make it any more or less ethical. Similarly, there is sometimes an “Appeal to Intent or Ignorance.” These may be extenuating factors, but neither of them make an action any more or less ethical.

In my last article I talked about two other ethical fallacies (see here). The first is the “Ethical Proximity” fallacy. This is the fallacy used grab all benefits for those in closest proximity to us while shifting all blame away to those farthest from ourselves or our group. The second is the “Personal Responsibility” fallacy. This version of ethical proximity is used to argue that those farthest away or least powerful must take personal responsibility for their actions while those closest to us or in the most powerful positions in our society are merely victims of “the system.”

And then there is the “Character versus Issues” fallacy. When we are talking about the flaws in an opposing politician, pundits focus on their basic character failings. But when forced to respond to character flaws in their own candidate, advocates insist that we should instead focus exclusively on “the issues.”

Another ethical fallacy that is constantly used, particularly during elections or during the aftermath of a ginned up march to war, is the “Water Under the Bridge” fallacy. This is frequently invoked by those guilty of past failures or even crimes, to insist that all of that is simply water under the bridge, that we must instead look forward. However, when an opponent has similar past failures, they insist that we must never, ever forget.

shieldoffaithProbably the most hypocritical ethical fallacy that incenses my sensibilities is the “Forgiveness Fallacy.” This is typically invoked by Christians, particularly Evangelical Christians, to serve as both a shield and a sword. Whenever one of their own is guilty of wrongdoing, they insist that we must forgive and that only God can judge. However, when the guilty party is not one of them, they insist that only God can forgive and that we must never forget nor forgive. Seems to me that it is those who most need forgiveness are the ones to advocate for it most strongly, but only when it benefits them.

There is a theme here. We tend to selectively use one set of ethical arguments to rationalize away problems with those in closest proximity to us, and a different and entirely contradictory set of ethical arguments to attack those we disagree with, often for completely unrelated reasons. This is called spin by some, advocacy or good debate tactics by others, and bald-faced hypocrisy by most objective observers. Yet we see and hear these and other fallacious ethical argument all the time.

But this is the thing. Just because almost every line of rhetorical attack or defense in our public discourse is some manifestation of these basic tactics, doesn’t mean we should just tune out. That is simply not an option. However, just as with logical fallacies, by learning to quickly recognize the general forms of ethical fallacies, we can quickly “tune past” all the nonsense intended to obscure and deflect and see through to the heart of contentious issues that are critically important to all of us.

Can you think of any other ethical fallacies? If so, add to this list through your comments!

 

Swarm Stupidity in Humans

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swarmI am eternally fascinated by swarm intelligence and emergent behaviors. These terms describe the phenomenon by which individual organisms, following only simple local logic without any wider intent or awareness, contribute to highly complex and far-reaching behaviors that “emerge” or arise out of their collective activity.

The most observable examples include bird flocking, animal herding, fish schooling, bacterial growth, and ant colonies. Ants, as the most dramatic example, collectively create extremely complex bridges and nests, even though no particular individual organizes that activity or is even aware of it.

The amazingly complex creations of ants emerge from very simple individual logic such as “if another ant is on top of me, stop moving.” From this kind of deceptively simple behavior, ants collectively exhibit astounding feats of mass migration, swarming, tactical warfare, nest construction, and engineering. If however, a significant number of ants were to abandon their “belief” that it is their responsibility to hold still while another ant is felt upon their back, then their ability to create bridges and nests could collapse, and perhaps their species would as well.

What intrigues me most about this sort of swarm intelligence is the intriguing certainty that we humans collectively exhibit our own highly complex emergent behaviors. Even though none of us intend it, each of us nevertheless contributes to the emergent behaviors of our collective population, just as if we were merely cells in some greater human super-organism.

Therefore, the basic rules of logic that we live by as individuals likely do contribute rather more directly than we imagine to the large scale behavior of our species. For example, if we base our everyday logic on the assumption that god does or does not exist, we profoundly alter our collective behavior accordingly. Belief is not then merely some personal thing. It has profound consequence. Religious believers intrinsically know this to be true, that their belief fundamentally shapes the world we live in, and that is why it is so important to them to internalize, express, and evangelize it.

While Christians inherently believe that their religion produces what they feel are desirable emergent behaviors, many atheists conclude that they are wrong. We conclude rather that a personal religious worldview results in highly damaging emergent behaviors like bigotry and intolerance, gullibility, susceptibility to manipulation, disregard for the planet, and even warfare. We conclude that a personal belief in god is, in significant part at least, responsible for swarm behaviors like gun violence, terrorism, torture (see here), and jihad.

Therefore, we atheists should trust that there are no “benign” religious beliefs. We should never doubt that our simple rule of logic, that we believe in facts and reason not in gods, serves our species far better moving forward. We must trust that our personal atheist thinking, when expressed through a sufficiently large number of individuals, will indeed result in emergent behaviors that are more ethical than dogmatic, more fact than fantasy based, and more focused on our lives and our planet right now rather than life ever after. We must trust that atheism will better give rise to the more enlightened swarm intelligence that we so desperately need if we are to survive as a species.

Religion is a prime example of “swarm stupidity” in humans.

 

 

 

 

 

But I Know What I Saw!

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A while back I wrote a blog about the likelihood (or unlikelihood rather) that we could ever meet aliens from another planet (see here). Even though it is highly unlikely we’ll ever meet them, I also wrote another article about what aliens probably look like (see here). In response to the latter article, I received the following comment and question. I thought it might be useful to respond in some detail.

Hi my name is Mark. 2 days ago around 1pm I had a encounter. It almost brought tears to my eyes and my emotional state was altered with unknown feelings. I was sitting on my patio when I noticed something watching me. I looked up at it. And it was aware of me spoting it and its prescense. The alien was a pure white flame/orb??? It flew down wards looked towards me and dissapered. I wrote all I could down about it and what and how I thought it worked or functioned. Some ppl wait there whole life to see what I saw. It was real!!!!!!!! It was so different. The light was extremly bright yet it had no glow to it. It was alive. (It somehow uses the golden ration to dissaper. Such as folding our perpective dimension. Only my theory ) Help Me………. I wanna let the world know how beautiful diffrent strange and awe strucking it was. The scariest part was it was spying on me. It came close and vanished??? Into nothing. Thank you this is no joke please let me know of what u think.

Let’s consider the rational way to respond to such an incident. First, I cannot completely accept this report as is. It could be, Mark, that you are just profoundly delusional. Or it could be that you simply cooked this up to troll and get a response. Or it could be that this was not actually your experience, but something someone told you that you are representing as a first-hand account. Crazy stories like this get started all the time (see here).

But Mark, let’s assume that you are not insane and are not pulling a joke but that you truly believe this experience happened to you. There are still many, many ways of intellectually and emotionally responding to such an incident that do not require you to suspend all of your rationality and accept incredible explanations.

Indeed, such an incident happened to me. I write about it in my book, Belief in Science and the Science of Belief (see here). I highly recommend you read it as it goes into far greater depth about how one should interpret unexplainable experiences. Indeed, it is not particularly rational to acknowledge that you have five fingers. Only when our rationality is sorely tested can we truly discover whether we are really rational thinkers. It is only when  we refuse to accept easy explanations, when we reject the ridiculous beliefs of others, that we can claim to be rational. If we believe ridiculous propositions like alien visitations, psychic powers, ghosts, or even gods – no matter how many other people may believe these things – then we are not truly rational.

As to your particular experience Mark, there are many explanations that are far more likely than that you were visited by aliens. First, you may be remembering a dream. I have difficulty differentiating some dream memories from actual memories. You may have had a waking dream. And realize that none of us are either fully sane or insane. None of us are immune to an occasional delusion. It is only when these episodes become profoundly persistent that they become a mental illness. We are all somewhat susceptible to paranoid delusions (see here), and frankly your report has elements of paranoia.

I’m sure, Mark, that you’ll insist that none of those things apply to you, and they may not. But that doesn’t mean that therefore you are at liberty to believe that you were spied upon by aliens. When we don’t understand something, the truly rational response is to suspend any judgement, forestall any conclusions, until if and when we learn more. A rational person, as does any good scientist, accepts not knowing what happened rather than accept some implausibly easy fantasy as a substitute for knowing.

My ghost-encounter happened 30 years ago Mark, and I still am far happier not knowing what happened than to accept that I actually saw a ghost. By remaining in the dark with my eyes open, I leave open the possibility of one day seeing the real truth, even if that truth turns out to be that I simply had a momentary brain-fart.

 

 

Data, Data Everywhere…

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In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge lamented “Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.” There seems to be no better way to describe our situation today with regard to information. We sail upon a vast ocean of data and yet we die of thirst. Indeed, we are too often deluged by great waves of facts that batter us relentlessly to and fro upon treacherous seas of data.

It feels particularly disconcerting for me to write this article. In my book, Belief in Science and the Science of Belief (see here), I promote the importance of elevating facts above beliefs. After all, facts should reflect reality. They should be the basis upon which truth is known. Today however, data seems to be used far more effectively to support beliefs, fantasies, and lies than it is used to reveal truths. Indeed, those who wish to sell us nonsense don’t often bother to invoke the bible or faith anymore – they invoke their own “facts” instead.

One reason that facts have become the new champions of beliefs and cons is the sheer amount of it. We now have so much data that one can mine anything they want from the endless mountains of the stuff that we have produced. Misrepresented facts can now be dredged up to fabricate lies far easier than spinning magical stories of gods and devils.

Nowhere is this new perversion of facts more true than in politics. Today politicians like Donald Trump incessantly cite completely misleading facts to support their beliefs and positions and to outright lie. Even if the majority of people do not believe their “trumped up” facts, they nevertheless conclude that all facts are suspect and that no facts can be trusted. This tangibly undermines the level of rational thinking of our entire culture and leaves us without any sound basis for making good decisions as a society.

In his excellent Op-Ed (see here), William Davies points out that “they [facts] seem to be losing their ability to support consensus.” According to Davies, there is clear agreement that “We have entered an age of post-truth politics.” This new age of bullshit is fueled not by assertions of faith, but by assertions of facts. As Davies further points out, “Rather than sit coolly outside the fray of political argument, facts are now one of the main rhetorical weapons within it.”

So facts have become the new bullshit. We claim to care about facts, but only because, as with the bible, we can always find something in them to support our beliefs and prejudices and self-interest. Our abundance of data seems to be only serving to diminish and undervalue it; to make it increasingly vulnerable to manipulation, misrepresentation, and lies by half-truth. The sheer volume of it makes it far more difficult to say anything with certainty without some other bit of data seeming to contradict it.

And this perversion and misuse of facts is not just true in politics but has become the new normal in all walks of life. All too often journalists and pundits do not pursue facts to reveal truth, but rather invoke them to advocate for opposing sides of an issue. This makes great theatre, but does little to advance the important questions that we face. It instigates and perpetuates conflict rather than help reach a sound fact-based consensus.

Even scientists, our gatekeepers and guardians of fact, all too often emphasize only those facts that advocate for their positions rather than serving the far greater goal of advancing science as a quest for truth.

Abandoning facts is simply not an option. Allowing the manipulators to turn all fact-based thinking into rationalization games and data manipulation exercises is not an option because without sound facts good decisions simply cannot be made. If we allow facts to be coopted by magical thinkers, by self-serving politicians, or even by well-meaning advocates, we might as well put the psychic hotline staff in charge of our fates.

What is the answer? We must reclaim facts. We must become smarter consumers of facts who are no more likely to be fooled by the bogus facts cited by manipulative politicians or corporations any more than we are by laughably ambiguous bible citations and interpretations. We must learn to recognize valid data and sound conclusions amidst all the cherry-picking and false claims. We must learn to treasure and respect fairly presented facts as diamonds amongst all the heaps of rubble and fool’s gold that we have to sift through every day.

Our overabundance of data should make us value – and demand – sound analysis and conclusions based on that data all that much more.

 

Studies Show That…

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One of the most compelling arguments in support of religion is the totally pragmatic one. What does it matter if religion is false, if god is totally made up, if faith is only a placebo effect, or even if it’s all ultimately just a scam to separate you from your hard-earned money? In the end isn’t all that matters that it makes you happier and more successful?

Reporters and opinion writers propagate this pragmatic justification of religion every day. It is actually difficult to get through any newspaper issue without encountering yet another article or op-ed touting the benefits of religion and faith. Here is an example of the typical kind of happiness claims put out there most every day in popular media:

Research suggests that children who attend church perform better in school, divorce less as adults and commit fewer crimes. Regular church attendees even exhibit less racial prejudice than their nonreligious peers. (see here).

happinessThese articles invariably cite scientific studies and statistics to support their claims. But those claims frequently go far beyond study design or the conclusions made by the scientists involved.

There are many ways that studies are misused by advocates to advance their causes or market their products. So we must all be very savvy when we see broad, sweeping conclusions being supported by narrow scientific studies, particularly by social science studies.

To help you to recognize these manipulations, following are some of the typical falsehoods and distortions used by advocates to misrepresent science or to promote bad science.

Failing to Mention the Negatives
Studies show that chocolate supplies 11 grams of fiber! Wow, maybe we should all eat chocolate to get our fiber! But to get that 11 grams of fiber from chocolate you have to consume a whopping 600 calories. Likewise, studies tout selected admirable ethical qualities of religious people, but fail to mention other studies that show, for example, that religious people are far more likely to support torture, guns, violence, and drone attacks.

Failing to Mention Better Alternatives
Another way advocates misuse studies is by failing to mention far better alternatives. For example, the chocolate industry fails to mention that practically any fruit, vegetable, or grain is a far healthier source of fiber. That may not be their responsibility, but if they are implying that you should eat chocolate in order to get your fiber, they are lying. Likewise, advocates often tout the morality of religious people, implying that religion is the only way to achieve these values. But you don’t need to consume 600 calories to get your fiber and you do not need religion along with all its negative characteristics to be a good person.

Failing to Quantify the Benefits
Advocates will often claim a benefit without quantifying it, thereby giving a false impression of how important it is. For example, religion advocates may cite studies showing that fewer religious people go to prison, without mentioning that this difference is inconsequentially tiny.

Misrepresenting Statistics
Advocates often misrepresent statistics. If they are trying to magnify a small difference they report it as a percentage or ratio. If they are trying to exaggerate a tiny difference in a huge population, they cite the numerical difference.  For example, religion advocates might claim that “secular people are twice as likely to commit suicide as religious ones.” Sounds fantastic right? But this could very well mean that out of a population of 10,000 people, 1 religious person committed suicide and 2 non-religious people committed suicide. Not quite as alarmingly persuasive when presented that way.

Using Bad Indicators
In epidemiology, an indicator is a specific test that can be used to measure a more general condition. But a bad indicator tells one little or nothing about the general trait being evaluated. For example, religious advocates typically conclude that believers are “happier” based upon highly questionable measurements such as divorce rate which have little to do with happiness. As we all know, married people can be far more miserable than divorced ones.

Failing to Prove Causation
Most clinical studies are observational, or association studies. That is, they simply show that two variables are both observed in or associated with a given population. This is valuable information. But proving that those two variables are directly related to each other is quite difficult. Proving causality between one and the other is even more difficult. Even if two things seem to be related, they may be indirectly associated through some third thing called a confounding factor. For example, a study may show that church-goers cheat less on their spouses. That is merely an association. But advocates use that observed association to claim that church attendance promotes ethical behavior even though the researchers themselves never made that claim. However, it may well be that church attendance and marital fidelity are not directly related at all, let alone that church attendance causes fidelity as advocates claim. The most we could say based on the research is that, for whatever reason, people who go to church are also more likely to be people who have fewer affairs. Maybe the reality is that unattractive people tend to go to church in a desperate and futile attempt to start an affair. Attractiveness may the just one confounding factor here. That we cannot determine or even imagine what the confounding factors may be is not proof of causality.

Failing to Consider Reporting Bias
Many of the narrow social studies used to make sweeping claims rely upon self-reporting. However, self-reporting is incredibly unreliable. People intentionally or unintentionally report all kinds of things in all kinds of ways for all kinds of reasons. For example, men are likely to brag about their infidelity while women are likely to conceal it. Self-reports are poor measures of the relative level of infidelity between the sexes. Likewise, religious people are deeply invested in the fiction that religion makes them happier and are very likely to report that they are even if they are totally miserable.

Failure to Mention Study Limitations
Years ago, upon reading commonly cited statistics that “98% of women report incidents of sexual abuse,” radio host Dr. Laura Schlessigner did what a good consumer of information should do. On-air, she called the scientist who conducted the study being referenced to support this claim. The researcher was eager to express her frustration with all of the advocacy groups citing her research without mentioning that her study narrowly targeted an extremely at-risk population. Dr. Laura then called the head of one of those women’s advocacy groups employing this scare-tactic and asked her why she knowingly misrepresented this research. When confronted, the head of the organization stood firm, saying that anything is justified if it raises awareness of real issues faced by women.

Choosing the Wrong Measurement
Even if we could measure happiness, it should not be assumed that happiness is the best or only goal. Believing that  global warming is a hoax probably does make one sleep sounder. Allowing your kids to eat pizza at every meal will probably result in fewer observed food-related tantrums. But clearly these measures of happiness do not justify accepting those positions. Likewise with religion.

Selective Skepticism
We tend to do pretty good at being skeptical about things we disagree with. But when it’s something we’re predispositioned to like and want, like chocolate or religion, we tend to set all skepticism aside and whole-heartedly embrace any arguments in favor, no matter how much of a stretch they may be. The happiness-arguments supporting religion are definitely one area in which our society demonstrates far too little critical scrutiny, as evidenced by the huge number of happiness claims repeated in major publications with virtually no skeptical analysis.

Baby With the Bath Water
Please, please, please don’t conclude from this that you can never trust social studies and that these studies never have any value at all. Association studies are very valuable. We need to know when things are observed together in a given population. However, you should be a smart consumer of these studies and understand the ways that advocates misuse study results to contrive claims that advance their cause. This is particularly important when we are predisposed to believe those claims. When in doubt, look past the claims made by advocates or even by seemingly objective “science reporters” and read the typically more careful and restrained conclusions reported by the scientists who conducted the studies. With the Internet at our fingertips today that is not usually very difficult to do.

Agnosticism Just Won’t Die

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I know I run the risk of beating a dead zombie with my blog, but I feel compelled to write yet one more article about the rotting abomination that just won’t die – agnosticism.

The reason I simply must respond yet again is because news articles and opinion pieces touting the intellectual purity of agnosticism just keep getting published everywhere you look. And these aren’t written only by religious proponents, but by scientific and academic intellectuals as well (here’s one). Like most of these agnostics, this author contends that agnosticism is misunderstood. Being agnostic is not merely being undecided or ambivalent or apathetic, but rather it’s a highly principled position that upholds sound scientific skepticism and empiricism.

The author gleefully notes, as do all agnostics as their go-to-proof-by-authority, that even Richard Dawkins admitted he is agnostic! This well-intentioned but misguided and tactically disastrous statement of philosophical agnosticism by Richard Dawkins, given who he is, has caused incredible harm to reason and rationality. Don’t follow his lead on this one.

Skepticism is indeed a hallmark of the scientific method. But skepticism is not synonymous with gullibility and science does not require you to abdicate logic and reason and common sense. Good scientists can and do reject an infinite number of ridiculous propositions out-of-hand every day. Healthy scientific skepticism does not require you to doubt everything. It merely requires that you withhold drawing conclusions regarding plausible assertions until sufficient evidence is obtained.

This is where the agnostics think they have an iron-clad argument. Since supposedly science cannot prove a negative (e.g. god does not exist), then despite the lack of positive evidence, any good scientist must be agnostic regarding anything and everything! Gotcha!!

First, scientific rigor does not require that scientists disprove every possible ridiculous statement. Imagine anything that is clearly untrue. Take for example, my claim that my banana is actually a sentient life-form named Ned from planet Zorcon that just happens to exactly resemble a banana right down to the molecular level. Ned is in a coma right now and cannot respond or do anything un-banana-like but he deserves the rights of personhood. Healthy scientific skepticism simply does not require scientists to admit that my assertion might be true. It certainly does not require that they perform studies to try to prove or disprove this claim. Scientists have no burden whatsoever of disproving my absurd claim about Ned the comatose alien banana. It is entirely my burden to prove it and until I do good scientists can and should simply reject it out of hand.

And keep in mind, these agnostics do not claim god is a plausible belief, they rather claim that regardless of how implausible it may be we must allow that it may be true nevertheless.

Next these agnostics will – cleverly they think – point out that science cannot prove a negative. This fallacy is typically summed up by quoting Martin Rees who famously pointed out that “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.“ What this correctly points out is that just because we see no evidence of something doesn’t necessarily mean it does not exist. In fact, this quotation would be far more accurate and less misused if stated as “absence of evidence is not always evidence of absence.“ When this phrase is quoted by agnostics they fail to recognize that a sufficiently conclusive lack of evidence absolutely can prove a negative.

Let’s contrive an example for fun.

I do not need to even look in my bedroom to assert with 100% certainty that there is no dragon in it. There is no such thing as dragons and no reason to even consider that possibility, so therefore I can dismiss this proposition out of hand. Further, as a good scientist it is my obligation to dismiss such claims with prejudice.

elephant-in-roomBut what if the claim is not a dragon but an elephant. Well, elephants do exist and while I cannot imagine how one would get into my house, I can easily prove or disprove this claim just by glancing around my bedroom. Having done so, I can legitimately conclude with 100% certainty that there is no elephant in my bedroom. If there were an elephant hiding under the bed or behind the curtains, I would reasonably expect to have seen at least some evidence of it. Therefore, I do not need to remain agnostic with regard to the sincere heart-felt beliefs of the elephant-in-every-bedroom cult to prove I am a good scientist. I have sufficient proof to conclude with certainty that my bedroom is elephant-free and that all claims of an elephant in my bedroom are delusional.

God is like that elephant. He is SO huge that if He existed we would certainly have seen evidence. There is none.

But let’s argue that god is more elusive and secretive – like bedbugs. Let’s say that the bedbug cult claims that I have bedbugs in my bedroom. Even though I don’t see any bedbugs just by glancing around, it is still possible they may exist and as a good scientist I take the advice of Martin Rees to heart and withhold conclusion pending further evidence, positive or negative. So, I bring in trained dogs and bedbug residue detectors. I carefully examine all the places where they would be found if they were there. If, after that, I find no evidence of bedbugs I can conclude beyond any reasonable doubt that my bedroom is bedbug free. I do not have to remain agnostic about whether dragons or elephants or even bedbugs are in my room to prove I am a good scientist. Such agnosticism would only prove that a fool exists my bedroom.

Similarly no legitimate evidence of god, however secretive he may be, has ever been found, despite the fact that believers make extravagant claims about his tremendous influence over our world. 

In fact, unhealthy agnostic skepticism is the exact opposite of good science. Science, unlike mysticism, relies upon the certainty that our cosmos is knowable; that it follows rules. Not just anything is possible. If it were, the cosmos would not be knowable at all and science would be meaningless. In science, things are true, observable and logical, or they simply do not exist and are untrue, period. To say that good scientists cannot know anything for certain is to turn science into mysticism.

To be frank, agnostics are not the champions of science and reason they imagine themselves to be. Ultimately their position renders science and reason invalid. If they insist that we cannot disprove things for which there is no proof, then they are necessarily saying we cannot positively assert anything at all. For anything you could assert as true, you could simply make up any story to cause all that evidence to be in doubt. Agnostics are required by their dogma to accept that.

You can have fun with agnostics. Make up some unprovable reason to claim something silly. Agnostics will be forced to admit you might be correct because they cannot disprove your un-disprovable fantasy. This exposes how bereft of any meaning their position really is. Truth and falsity, science and mysticism, evidence and belief all collapse upon themselves into a meaningless jumble of pseudo-intellectual nonsense if you accept the agnostic view of reality.

So agnostics have a huge problem. They think they are purists in being “open-minded” enough to admit that god might exist by making a philosophical claim that we cannot really disprove (or thereby even prove) anything whatsoever. But they don’t actually apply their intellectual purity to every possible ridiculous proposition. They only selectively apply it to this particular ridiculous god assertion. Though they might stubbornly claim to apply this thinking to everything universally, clearly they do not do so in practice. In the end either these are just smart people applying convoluted logic to rationalize a particular ridiculous proposition that they want to believe or they are misguided atheists who mistakenly believe that agnosticism demonstrates their sophisticated and superior intellectual standing.

What harm does agnosticism cause? It undermines logic and reason and moves us toward a pseudo-scientific kind of mystical thinking in which anything is possible. Moreover, if we accept the agnostic argument, if we give it any credibility whatsoever, then we accept that god might exist. And if we accept that god might exist, then we must accept Pascal’s Wager and concede that it makes some sense to assume he does. And if we assume he does, then it only makes sense that believers proselytize and fight to shape government and public policy in accordance with their delusional religious thinking.

Agnosticism is the brain-eating zombie of philosophical nonsense that just won’t die. Accepting agnostic arguments is to follow them down their rabbit hole into Wonderland where the ridiculous is accepted as the norm and crazy ideas are rationalized with insanely inescapable logic.