The Drawing That Explains Political Divides
Vložit
- čas přidán 5. 04. 2022
- A simple explanation of partisan psychology.
If you want to support the channel, here are the best ways to do it:
1) Watch the full video
2) Subscribe if you haven't
3) Share with a friend
4) Support me with a small donation on Patreon: / rchapman
Sources:
The Righteous Mind: Jonathan Haidt
The Oxford Handbook Of Political Psychology: Edited by Huddy, Sears & Levy
Hivemind: Sarah Rose Cavanagh
Thinking, Fast And Slow: Daniel Kahneman
The Spiral Of Conflict: Naïve Realism: Sammut, Bezzina & Sartawi
Thank you to everyone who supports these projects on Patreon. I wouldn't be able to devote so much time and so many resources to one video otherwise. I'm trying to make the best work I can, and the donations really do make it possible. If you'd like to chip in and support me, check out www.patreon.com/rchapman. Video notes below.
Notes:
I saw this as being a quick introduction to the psychology of political division. If you want something that covers it in more depth, I'd recommend The Righteous Mind. Haidt reads the audiobook himself and does a fantastic job, if that's appealing to you. I'm obviously not being paid to say that. I just think it's a great book.
Edit: It also seems a lot of people misunderstood what I said in the video. To clarify, I didn't say that everyone is partially right about everything, or that we need to find a middle ground on all subjects. I said: try to consider the other person's point of view and the possibility that opinions besides ours might actually be right, and be aware that we have our own biases that tend to make that process difficult, narrowing our perspective.
- Ryan
Well done!
There is a Haidt lecture where he talks about solvable problems vs wicked problems. I'll try to find it and link it.
You alluded to this (inadvertently?) in the beginning with the science of H2O vs global warming.
The distinction that Haidt makes is that (due to complexity) we attempt to understand (and solve) wicked problems with narratives.
(He then goes on to discuss the narratives of Capitalism and Socialism)
The righteous mind is a great book that truly made me re think my attitude and begin the process of trying to understand others. I highly recommend it to all, its a fairly easy read and is very worth it.
Thanks Ryan as a layman I really enjoy your videos and how well you Shed light on so many hard to understand topics
Haidt= Captain Pickard.
Peterson = Captain Kirk.
Thank you.
I always like to ask, what was the evolutionary advantage to something.
99% of humanity was spent as Hunter Gatherer.
Thank you for confirming that the rabbit people possess superior intelligence, unlike those duck people.
But both are being exploited by humans...
Agreed. Those people that see a duck are quackers.
Those dumb grass nibblers! They think they're _so_ smart, scratching their long ears and noses!
The only correct form is that of the long beaks and wings!! Quack quack quack
Damn straight!
He never said that. And it would appear that people who see both are the intelligent ones.
The most frustrating part of this is when you try to acknowledge your own biases in a discussion, only for the other person to then use that against you, while refusing to acknowledge their biases.
Bingo!
@@chancellor500 Ya, this happens a lot.
Oh. I just realize it's a pointless non discussion at that point and try to mentally move on. Probably also think less of them, but that's just something that happens.
That's something super interesting, happens a lot
Bruh, I feel this.
I saw the rabbit first, didnt even think there was a duck until you pointed it out
I saw the rabbit, then the duck, but then I realized it's a picture of the Starship Enterprise carrying a gigantic sack beneath it. Doesn't matter.
BTW, I read Johnathan Haidt's book a few years ago, and it's written exactly as I'd expect a former Obama Campaign Psychologist to have written it. There's a very sly metaphor of the elephant and the rider. Note: it's not a donkey and a rider. It's a subtle inception that implies that the elephant (GOP) is the emotional mind, not the rider. It's subconscious trickery.
Johnathan Haidt is very clever, but he's not that good.
Thank you for that, and for being a fellow rabbit-visioner.
This is why media bias has become such a problem. It was their job to try to combat their own biases to provide us with both the duck and the rabbit. But they eventually fell into thinking their duck was the objective point of view and grew comfortable in that position. They began distorting their reporting to create an image that is clearly a duck and not remotely ambiguous.
The rabbit is obviously on the wrong side of history.
@@enjerth78 elaborate pls
Experts say people who see a rabbit have less IQ than those who see a duck.
The link between rabbits and racists.
Those would be the type of headline today.
@@Ryknfjor i think he's joking. Its usually a left wing slogan.
@@enjerth78 The rabbit just wanted to be left alone and not have to pay 80% taxes
I just thought of something... We are trained to answer fast and intuitively in class. If you take too long, you're wrong. If you answer differently, you're wrong. You should be quick and be able to recall what you memorized than rationalizing it or analyzing it and what is it about.
Yes, diversity of thought or finding different ways to solve issues seem to be frowned upon, glad you managed to wake up on that.
Well, that's true for learning our times tables, and basic history, etc, but not every subject is like that, at least I hope your school encouraged rational thought, analysis, inquiry etc when you started learning more than the bare basics. A good school should teach the process of understanding the world, epistemology, the importance of falsification etc. rather then how to recite trivia.
I do agree that school can teach some bad habits, though, such as that feeling of "if I'm wrong, I'm stupid" which encourages people to defend their opinions well past what is reasonable rather than seeing that- learning we are wrong is an important part of the learning process.
Yes this is said in many classes when there is an objectively right or wrong answer, & this might work if you go with your first instinct or a subconscious memory for an answer you've known before- or can conclude based on prior knowledge. But for complex social issues, it's completely damaging to truth. It can take a long time to examine all the info that's available, differing views, studies that might or might not have been completed...or great amounts of even anecdotal or counter-intuitive evidence in public knowledge that isn't featured prominently because of publishers' biases.
..Whereas the ignorance of quick, seemingly simple answers can cause boatloads of trouble when applied socially.
That being said, there is also a lot of moral relativism- not in the religious sense but in the idea of right and wrong not even existing, that is permeating classrooms today, pronounced by people who would doubtless scream for justice if it was them who were being assaulted, deceived or stolen from.
It does people wrong to try to erase their ability to foster a moral compass through knowledge of self, psychology & humanity, & it REALLY does a society wrong to raise people without conscience.
Mark Passio's work on the Science of Natural Law is a great place to investigate the idea of First Principles, though his presentation style might not be everybody's cup of tea..
There's truth to your statement. I'd hope that we've seen/will see the evidence of the efforts of educators like myself to foster critical thinking and creative problem solving in our students. It is a challenge, though. This type of teaching requires student engagement, as well as more complex assessments. Meaning more teacher student interaction, which means lower student teacher ratios. It also means trained, supported, gifted teachers. By gifted, I mean individuals who intuitively comprehend the learning process, who can understand and appreciate different students abilities...people who have that difficult to quantify grouping of traits that makes the difference between someone who "checks the boxes" and someone who can engage and motivate students.
Politics should not be a factor in this process. Funding should be allocated with the goal in mind of students learning what they need to function in our dynamic 21st century society. Our students and teachers need support in these challenges, not grandstanding politics.
"I was gratified to be able to answer promptly and I did. I said I didn't know."
Mark Twain.
I definitely saw the rabbit first, and only after you pointed which way the duck was looking did I see the duck.
The opening 40 seconds NAILED it, man! Such a good video, thank you.
Another important thing to know is that you’ll never get to a state where you are completely “unbiased”. You will always have certain cognitive tendencies. The point is to stay in the habit of questioning yourself.
Exactly, and this constant self scrutinization depends on other people to give wider perspective on yourself, but also through using Cognitive Dissonance as a sort of guide. If you never do things outside your comfort zone let alone if you never think things outside your comfort zone then you'll never change. It's only though the emotional feedback of cognitive dissonance that we can be sure the thoughts and ideas we're being faced with do challenge us to significant degree. No pain. No gain. And that applies to far more than just our physical strength and conditioning.
I disagree.
It’s not that I disagree, but when the subject of “political divide” is your human rights, the process of questioning yourself becomes extremely exhausting, and I don’t even think it’s very productive at that point.
I think this comment is very interesting.
@@esobelisk3110 Thats a very interesting argument.
I mean, it’s also absurd to think that the answer is always in the middle.
But taking the opposing sides arguments seriously and sincerely engaging with them is important.
There should really be a fallacy matching that.
@selenite. Is the extreme always bad though? Compared to the vast majority of human history, we are on the extreme end of the spectrum when it comes to personal liberty and participation in government. Compared to 200 years ago, we are radical proponents of civil rights. When programs like social security came out, they were extreme. Reagan's tax plan was at one point extreme. I'd argue that a political position's value comes from it's real world application and effects, not it's position in relation to other political proposals
@selenite. Not strictly true either. the extremes can be correct or at least as valid as the other answers.
a couple centuries back emancipation was extreme, and yet it wasn't bad. Enlightened centrism just isn't a thing
Sometimes it’s not the middle. Sometimes someone is just objectively wrong and you can’t meet them in the middle without being wrong.
I love these kind of impartial discussions on how we all develop our opinions on things, especially things as divisive as politics. With how divided the US has gotten in past few years more moderate discussions like this are sorely needed, especially when people and especially the media are denying basic facts that don't suit the Narrative they're pushing
Decades ago, I was in an AP American history classs. After reading about a historical controvery, we were tasked with writing A persuasive essay for one of the sides. After we submitted the assignment, we were tasked to write a persuasive essay for the other side.
I would have cringed so hard when the prof assigned the second essay 🤢
Debate clubs teach similar mental flexibility.
I would also venture to say that it's important to understand that "not being divided" doesn't necessary means reaching the same conclusion, but understanding and accepting different opinions could also be valid.
Edit: since this seems to be a common critique, I don't believe ANY opinion is valid, just that generally there isn't only ONE valid opinion.
I think people can have the very same understanding of a same topic and still be divide about how important it is, what we should or if we should stop doing whatever we were doing because it was making things worst.
When it comes to politics, beggars of a sit in the table are willing to forget every moral and intellectual base that they use to have for the sake of conserving their power.
The ignorance is the last of the problems about divisions
@@rustybucket7323 I'm coming from a scientific mindset, therefore I'm inclined to try to stick with objective/verifiable facts and weed out subjective opinions, but that said, outside scientific experiments, the more complex an issue is, the more subjectivity and uncertainty is introduced. And while I do think that it is best to start any discussion by agreeing on basic "facts", usually the issue is that what to do with those facts is always going to be subjective. E.g.: we can agree that there are two sandwiches in the fridge (agreeing on this should be the starting point of a discussion at least), but then you could conclude that "and therefore, dinner is taken care of" while I conclude the opposite. So my point is that we SHOULD try to agree on verifiable facts, but we also have to accept that different valid conclusions might exist.
So everyone thinking the same thing is not possible, but also thinking that ANY opinion is valid is also equally worrisome. Entering a discussion with the mindset that "everybody can think what they want" basically kills democracy because then there is no point in having a discussion in the first place. If any opinion is valid, then nothing someone says will change your mind and therefore there is no point in talking. So I do believe that yes, anyone is free to have their own opinion, but the moment you decide to participate in a discussion you have to put your opinion into question. And if someone proves your arguments wrong, you either shut up and keep your opinion to yourself until you have new arguments or change your mind.
In conclusion, I don't think you can find a single "correct answer" to complex issues, but at least we could start by removing "wrong answers".
valid only so far as having good solid arguments to back up their claim...
for example, the claim men can give birth is a different opinion than most people.... the claim itself has zero solid argumentation because of biological realities which can not simply be argued against therefore I do no need to accept that claim as valid or reasonable....
but
for example, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki there are two general claims either the bombing it was a "good" or it was a "bad"... both sides present their evidence which is reasonably valid based on different data sets, conclusions etc. which can be argued for and against using generally the same/similar data etc... therefore, I should accept a different opinion as possible though I would disagree.
@@FireFlanker1 When I was younger I remember to be amazed when I saw the documentary of a pregnant man, "how much science has progress!", and then it turned out to be just a trans man...
And I can tell you that this is the solely argument in which all those articles about men being able to bare children are base on: "self-perception".
The 'not being divided' point I found a bit useless at best as it was presented. There are matters of religion for instance that there will always be a division...at one point the solution was in polite society never to talk to others (unless you were sure it would not cause offense) about matters of religion or politics.
Though alot of folks mix up acceptance and tolerance. You can tolerate something without accepting something. Considering there would always be clear division on some items, acceptance is impossible.
However, tolerance became unacceptable for one side. Silence is Violence after all. And if you did not conform to their standards, not only are you stupid but also evil. People don't realize George Orwell wasn't talking about where things were headed but about his friends and colleagues he worked with in the 1930s & 40s. Occasionally bouts of 'Political Correctness' would hit the main culture (largely escaping from 'fellow traveler' subculture that were allowed to metastasize in academia and in other institutions) but be pushed down again but now there are new weapons to advance it.
Granted even before this the primary way that side used to argue its points were to rely on arguments over a century old (contrary to the bloody evidence of the 20th century that these were really bad ideas) or to rely on the tactic of "Shut Up! They explained'. Cancel culture is just the incarnation of the latter of course but if one side cannot even engage the other to even discuss matters 'not being divided' just seems to me an alternative tack to 'just do what your new aristocrats say and maybe you'll be allowed to keep your job/live your life.
I saw the rabbit first and the duck second. Perhaps this is because of reading from left to right. If would be interesting to know whether being left handed or right handed has anything to do with your immediate perception of what the drawing represents. This reminds me of what is called a Rorschach test, somewhat akin as to different individuals seeing different things in the formation of clouds.
I am left handed and saw the rabbit first too, probably for the same reason of reading from left to right. On another note, it would be nice if English was written from right to left so I could see my hand writing immediately and not smudge my writing, but that would screw over the other 80% of right handed people so idk.
I think you see the rabbit first because who wants to look at a duck with a fat lip?
Psychos, that's who.
Southpaw as well. I saw an anemic rabbit first and clearly before he pointed out the duck.
That’s actually how left handed people would be naturally inclined to write, try it sometime, right to left. Also, try starting at the back of a notebook or journal and write from back to front, turning the pages from right to left feels… right. I have a left handed book/journal, blew my mind..
I think it's just because of the composition of the thumbnail. Usually in an image you want to place things so that they lead into the middle, not towards the edge. If the duckrabbit was placed on the left side and slightly low, it might've very well been seen as a duck first by way more people, but since it's placed on the right side we expect the thing to look to our left
I love how real you are! You actually speak to your audience as if you are a friend in our homes visiting and having conversation as a down to earth person.. So in around about way, I’m saying is, you relate to people and you are not a fake personality to be around..
"... so we don't tend to fight over things that are purely physical..."
Clearly someone who hasn't witnessed the fight over climate change.
The argument is that humanity will inevitably find a way to solve it. Like how in the past people predicted the world would be covered in manure from everyone riding horses but the car was invented.
He also clearly hasn't witnessed people denying basic biology and pretending life doesn't begin at conception.
Tbf, he did say we "tend" to not fight over physical matters. Climate change and embryology just so happen to be the exceptions.
This tendency of human psychology can definitely be "weaponized" and in many cases, has been to great effect.
My first reaction when watching the video was extreme discomfort, knowing the right's tendencies. They usually evoke scientific research in an effort to "talk down" to the opposition.
@@PanagiotisLafkaridis Well, I think you missed the point. The discomfort is meant for you and your perceptions (regardless of political affiliation), understanding our own perceptual flaws and biases is a bitch, and a constant effort, it's much easier to project that outwards on our detractors. That takes me to his closing statement: "We're not trying not to be divided", I think that's a bit why, we can't be honest about our own blind spots instead we look at everyone else's.
it already is.
@@PanagiotisLafkaridis -.-
@@ZasarLeNoir Essentially it requires everyone to be humble and mature... Which is never going to happen, this is the human race we are talking about here...
I spent most of my adult career as an Intelligence Analyst, and what you're describing here is a HUGE problem in the Intel Analyst profession, and a very dangerous one. Like a muscle, you have to always practice your mental flexibility lest it becomes tight and unyielding. It's a good idea to at least quickly and internally question any opinions one has that can potentially affect others. You owe it to your fellow humankind to take a moment to try and reflect whenever possible. The more you can overcome the ego and openly admit, "I may not have all the information, and my opinion may be biased", the easier it will become.
Thing is you get eaten alive for questioning anything nowadays
Interesting. So how long have you been a racist?
@@Systolic_Gaming Very true.
💯
@@Systolic_Gaming Yep, but if one has purpose, makes the struggle somewhat adventurous in a way. As long as we be the change we wish to see in the world I suppose. Sometimes you have to do you so hard that they must follow.
This all makes sense, but we also recognize this divide has grown over time. I would argue that through most of our nation's history there was general agreement over social issues, and party differences were over the practical matters of life. The divide we now see has come about because personal life issues, the way people choose to live their lives, have been made into a matter of public opinion. Such things should never be the perview of public opinion, as it only matters to the private people living in that way.
I saw a rabbit and a duck at the same time actually. That's what made me click on the video. I think preferences are fine, but I think it's important to know *why* we hold those biases. And, be willing to acknowledge our reasoning isn't universal and take time to understand why someone else disagrees.
Because most people are not thinkers and like easy solutions. Easy and in line with their core feelings being key aspects, which this video kinda talk about.
Example; How many people do you think reflect on stuff like "Warfare is a continuation of diplomacy with different means." (Carl von Clausewitz)
VS just; War bad, they are the bad guys and we are the good guys of course.
I see a racetrack
That's BS.Your brain will see one before the other.Its such basic common sense.You may have forgotten which one that was but I can tell ya with 100% certainty the you did
@@yyxy.oncesaid I saw a weird vase that I couldn’t decide if it looked like a duck or a rabbit. The base of the drawing is what initially caught my attention, not the top. It’s weird that you’re so confident in your incorrect opinion though.
@@yyxy.oncesaiddo you only think that because you were told that? It is possible to see it as something else entirely, come up with your own interpretation first based on evidence you see, and then hear someone else's perspective and understand their evidence but still hold your own non-dabbit/ruck interpretation or even create a new one based on new evidence.
Is the problem that in discourse we lack confidence to be able to remain ourselves when faced with resistence?
"We don't tend to fight over things like the properties of water."
Oh yeah? Watch this:
Is water wet?
Yes
No
Yes, but also no
No. Wet is defined as being saturated by a liquid. Water is not saturated, therefore it is not wet.
Wet is an effect of water 🙂
There's also this thing called the "middle ground fallacy." Just because people can't agree on something, even millions of people, does not mean both sides are wrong and the answer lies in the middle. One side is quite likely more correct--in such cases where there even is a correct answer--than the other. Perhaps just barely, or perhaps almost entirely.
It's impossible to tell if you are right just by how you feel. But sometimes you are right, regardless. It's not impossible to have a correct answer to a complicated question. The hard part is verifying the correctness of that answer. Knowing both sides of an issue can certainly help, but it very rarely lies in the middle.
Right. This middle ground thing can go too far. "Maybe rape and murder aren't so bad"?
Some lines need to be drawn.
The issue is that politics dips constantly into issues of values and morality, which there are no objective facts about but everyone wants to claim their morality is as objective as the number of neutrons in a helium atom. Reality doesn't work that way.
@@AbandonedVoid and you know this because it is an objective fact?
Do I need to continue or do you see the logical fallacy already?
@@AbandonedVoid Factual information hasn't been in short supply since the dawn of the millennium. The real bottleneck is the number of reasonable people.
A reasonable person still has biases, but is willing to engage with information that challenges these biases. Unreasonable people are not.
Reasoning is hard and can be uncomfortable. It can even make you miserable. But believing the things that make you feel right and good? Very easy.
And we all want to believe we are intelligent, good people, so naturally whatever we believe must also be the same.
Middle Ground Fallacy explained with the rabbit-duck drawing: “The rabbit people say the mouth is on the left, while the duck people say the mouth is on the right. Therefore, the mouth is in the middle.”
One of the best perspectives when talking about the political spectrum is that it’s not a spectrum, but a circle. The far left and right are basically on top of each other. I think people have this notion of the other side being “wrong” and want to run as far away from the other side as possible, sometimes over correcting and contradicting their values. In short, they become the thing they are trying to avoid, however they word it differently to justify the same thought process. It definitely changed my perspective.
There was a book I read 20+ years ago, called "the walls in your mind". Very fascinating, talked about people's hidden assumptions, fears, hopes, and expectations that create a wall (an inability to consider or to understand a different point of view).
People who see ducks are obviously fascists.
Heh.
Rabbit-duckism is obviously an oxymoron
And censorship is fascism
@@tbartube2229 every state censors. They differ in what, why and to what extent. Fascism, being totalitarian, is the political model that censors the most, with greater aggressivity, and being hierarchical, censors to maintain a rigid class structure.
@@pedrohenriquedadaltdequeir4859 Exactly. However this is clearly jokes and fun. Doesn't mean every joke here is very funny, but the top would get a good chuckle out of me if I made this video. 💀😂
Funny, when I saw this thumbnail and it shows that drawing, I first saw the rabbit, but then tried to see what else it could be and almost immediately saw the duck. I believe that I think the same way about social issues. I recognize my initial intuition, but then I usually step back and try to disprove that rather than looking for things that support it first.
That's a skill we should be developing, in kids and adults. A related skill is compensating for confirmation bias - like skeptically questioning even things which appear to confirm our existing biases - what we'd like to believe.
Yes same, but I often run into walls.
I can see why people think different but I can't feel the way they perceive things.
For example nuclear energy
I'm very pro due to the great technology and big potential behind it and I understand that people who are against it are usually fearful of accidents and possible mutations if exposed to the fuel, but I can't feel for these people...
Same, although I usually end up thinking people are stupid for thinking in a binary. I also don’t see myself as very smart, but just observant enough to see how stupid so many people are being. I would definitely be lumped into one side of the binary system we have, but there’s no one “side” who’s takes I completely agree with. I see so many unobservant hot takes from “my side”, it’s beyond frustrating, but the alternative is to join something so much worse. I feel like an alien most of the time, and it’s really lonely.
Same here but I did it without thinking about it
Its called testing your hypothesis. Its science!
This was very interesting. I’m a person my whole life who sees both. And often argue with both sides of a spectrum. Some may call me wishy washy. If you don’t stand for something you’ll fall for anything. Well everyone is standing and America is falling.
This needs more likes
Some opinions can both be right at the same time. I’d rather be opened minded and see the bigger picture. You start to see the manipulation and the mental gymnastics on issues.
how is America falling ?
@@nivelcourbiche6140 were you born in the past decade or something? The country was much more unified 15 years ago.
@@awesomeferret would you say that that lack of unity is the main factor of "America's downfall"? And in what metrics can this fall be measured ?
Thank you for sharing your knowledge of history, government and etc. with everyone on CZcams. I know my brain cells are much happier since I found/subscribed to this channel-your topics of discussion are interesting and explained beautifully well. Peace ♥︎
It's crazy how the mind will put up barriers. My sister could say something and I think "well, she doesn't know what she's talking about./She is clearly wrong." But when I discuss things with my mom, even on things we disagree on, I'm way more open. Both the person and how they phase things make a night and day difference on how it's perceived.
Sometimes you’re right and you’re sister has no clue about what the fucks going on.
Maybe there's good reason you're more resistant to what your sister says. Socializing is about division of resources. For people who try to take resources and not give back, you'll naturally be wary and critical of them, so they don't exploit you. Biases can be an important defense against exploitable characteristics you have that make you vulnerable, like altruism and generosity.
I’ve found the same thing! I’m completely and utterly non-partisan, but on the political spectrum I find it much easier to talk to my mom, dad, and brother about politics, even though we’re all at varying levels of liberalism to conservatism. My sister, however, my guard is ALWAYS up.
….but that could be because she’s said some pretty crazy crap like “vaping helps you prevent getting COVID”….
@@HavianEla my sister got back from a protest and said to me. "I got to take a shower and wash the covid off of me." She spent +3 hrs in a croud of people and she thought the shower is gonna be the difference between getting covid or not. (This was in the middle of 2020)
@@KasumiXSora
I probably got Corona from a neighbor from whom I only briefly borrowed a key. I wasn't standing close to him, nor did I talk to him. He died, I almost. That was April 2020, when hardly anyone fell ill. By the way, I'm 30 years old. My girlfriend didn't get it even though we live together. We were further apart but we were still in the same room and we still talked. Anything can make all the difference.
“Dont touch in your face without washing your hands.“ is one of the most important rule. The virus can get on the skin and on your clothes.
Some things sounds stupid, but are true. Why should the reality not be stupid?
even while watching this video i caught myself thinking "yeah, everyone *else* needs to stop being so biased," and that's honestly kinda scary.
You're not one of those Duck People, are you?
I have a hard time believing some comments saying how they always step back and evaluate both sides. They could be saying the truth, but I think they are like you that initially thought about other people and not themselves
I think it's important to understand WHY people see things the way they do, even if you disagree with them on those subjects entirely. It helps when understanding your own bias and whether you are objectively coming to your own conclusions or simply being influenced. (And not just external influences... you can also influence yourself based on past perceptions.)
@@Swiftbow It's not bias when you're always right. My rabbit people feel me.
@@thedude5295 Well, I see the rabbit first, too. So... ;)
This is a great explanation of a very big problem in society. We truly must learn to see things from multiple perspectives.
It's also good to take in account the impact our emotions have in this. If we look at something and it makes us feel bad, we tend to come up with logical arguments against it. If it makes us happy, the opposite. Without emotions we couldnt have any preferences either.
Ok, I agree whole heartedly with the core of this explaination, yet I would add another level of detail to it.
We are not really getting into political fights and heated debates because of pure difference in preference. If my favorite color is blue and yours is red, we don't really get into an emotionally charged battle about what's the better color, because in terms of the topic of favorite colors, we both know, that the other persons favorite color does not compromise our own preferences. They just happen to like something else, which does not threaten us.
The more your believes interfere with my sense of safety and stability, the less rational I am going to react for over the course of my life I have built for myself strategies to cope with life, ways to perceive life that give me a sense of safety and comfort. If those pillars of my personal bubble get attacked, I will be offended. I will be biased to protect my stance on the topic as it is the thing that has kept me safe in the past. Humans value stability, as it gives them safety and calms their fight or flight mentality.
If that safety is questioned, we revert to fight or flight. In that moment, finding the truth becomes less valuable than our survival. The problem is, that what we perceive as a threat to us is an amalgamation of our past experiences, upbringing, culture and personal traumas not nessecarily the reality of the situation.
In order to not start fighting like animals, we would need to be able to exist in an atmosphere of uncertainty and lack of comfort and stability in order to fully comprehend and rationally comprehend the other perspective. Are two people able to hold that state of being and are brave enough to step outside their worldview to put both differing points of view on the table to discuss objectively about them, then there will be no fight, there will be exchange of ideas.
Most people are just too afraid of stepping far enough outside their stability bubble, which for most of us is a rusty survival shelter made of fears.
I kinda agree with what the video said but the thing that dont agree with is the comparison, as if all political topics are just a rabbit or duck with neither being right or wrong. There is a right and a wrong and gray, and some values can not be overcome by compromise. So what do we do? Like with the gun issue one side wants to ban guns (or heavily regulate) and the other wants less or the same, compromise will solve neither problem and piss of both sides. And over time compromise will shift towards one side. Ex using guns again, if one sides wants more regulation and the other wants same or less, c9mpromise will make it so some regulation comes in again then years later same issue and compromise happens again and then more regulation. So is it really compromise if one side just gets what they want over a long period of time rather then a short? End result is the same with one side still enforc8ng their own ideals onto others.
I really appreciate your take, especially that bit about uncertainty and discomfort. So many people are comfortable with censorship because it keeps their world view from being challenged/threatened. Everyone needs some uncomfortable truth and you won’t find it on the evening news channel.
The revelations will not be televised.
Then there's the situations where the fight or flight response is actually completely justified and the other side is a genuine threat not just to the perception of safety but to actual safety and security, that does happen and isn't really something that is fixable with more perspective in most cases.
@@GodOfOrphans Yes and I would ask, why "the other side", what ever it may be, has chosen to become a threat to your genuine well being. I'd argue that in most cases that other side is either not aware of how their ideas, actions or votes could be a detriment to others, or they in fact have chosen a radical position in the believe that it is the only thing left that can secure their own safety within society.
I argue, that the absolute vast majority of people who are not extreme narcissistic psychopaths do not wish a society where one loses and the other wins. Most of us just wanna live together harmonically.
That's all there is to revenge and hatred. When we feel hurt by someone who seems to not care about us, we want to cause the same pain to that person in return, to make them realize what they do, but what we really just want is them to see, hear, listen and feel into our truth willingly.
And to circle back to the original point, this is what happens with the vast majority of political discussions where you could say that one side's ideas have become so radical, that it becomes an actual threat to the other side, which in many instances nowadays it has come to.
Yet the threat "they" are posing, in most cases is just a little child crying and throwing things at you because they see no other way of communicating and getting their needs met anymore, so trying to fight back against that traditionally by force will just reinforce their perception, that you will not care about their inclusion, their safety, etc..
It's surely a quite complex matter but what ever topic may split society today their are only two roads. One is solving the issue by opening up to each other, the other is to let it escalate until one destroys the other or both each other, either socially, or even physically and I personally choose to build bridges instead of rifts.
@@GodOfOrphans
You are correct that someone can be a threat, but it isn't their thoughts/beliefs that are the real threat. It's their actions. And that's *almost* certainly not the case if you're in the US or Western Europe, and the topic is politics, despite the rhetoric that has been thrown from both sides. BTW, I'm not saying both sides aren't advocating stupid unevenly harmful policies, just that baseline physical safety almost certainly isn't a risk (except from specific deranged individuals acting separate from the bulk of 'their side', who are a real threat at times)
Funnily enough, when I first looked at the image, my process was “it’s a rabbit, oh, it could also be a duck”. Likewise I found nothing offensive when warned. I’ve always been curious and put the pursuit of truth beyond all else. I recognise these characterises in others however.
Are you on the left or right of the political spectrum?
I have a feeling you are on the right.
I also saw a bunny first that could be something else.
@@gyn6131 it’s all relative. I should say I’m at the centre, but wouldn’t everyone? I guess there’s a traditional consensus as to what constitutes left, and what constitutes right. On this basis. there are elements of left and right I agree with. I am certainly right of this extreme left government we have currently.
i also saw a rabbit, then i figured it was also a duck. so this is how those Rorschak tests work?
@@hedleyparis397 Unfortunately by left end definitions, you being a rational centrist now makes you an alt-right extremist like the rest of us with IQ's over room temp.
It has nothing to do with truth dumbie. It's about morality judgments which are not objective and never could be.
To think people with beliefs that conflict with yours are wrong is what having beliefs means in the first place. What's most important is to be willing to fully discover WHY they are wrong, because you might find that answer difficult to find. If so you must not simply accept that, and that's when your start to actually consider the possibility that they could be right. I've changed positions on important beliefs many times in life this way
I think this is a good breakdown on the comfort-zone, in-group-out-group knee-jerk discomfort part of more 'arbitrary' politics... but most political issues are not like the duck rabbit, they have observable, material components and are decisions made practically for people who have to live with the outcome. I do not think it's a purely point-of-view bias discomfort when, say, a white supremacist speaks and somebody who isn't white recognizes what this person wants. Or when a homophobe makes a point, we're not looking at a rabbit-duck. There certainly are issues that are opaque and remain opaque to the average person ("do property taxes validate increased rent prices?") and may be just a matter of bias interpretation (and even that may have a material condition attached to them like, "are you a landlord, or are you not?") but many political issues are decisions about who should live/have an easier time living and who should die/should have fewer chances in general before then, and in no unclear terms.
They don’t “just seem appealing” etc.
Our preferences are influenced by education.
If we only hear one side of an issue or ideology, we might believe it. If we have a broad interest and level of research then we may well have a good reason to believe one thing or another.
Absolutely
This one gets its
Your statement is an example of a common cognitive bias I've seen from the left: that you can just educate someone out of their right-wing beliefs. Humans don't have "broad interests" when it comes to anything that triggers their emotions. You can't 'educate' me or you into believing abortion is right or wrong, for example. If you think so, you have a cognitive bias. The best we can do is get each other to see where we are coming from - that we are emotionally invested in the issue, and have reason to invest. Then perhaps counterevidence against our position will pull more weight and get us to change our minds.
He addresses this in the video though. If you have a strong enough initial reaction or bias then all that research may do is go to inform that biased view further while dismissing things that support the other side. Its possible to be doing this without even realizing it so its tricky to know to what degree your opinion has been affected by your own bias.
But there is good research on both sides of most political issues, and then we come back to preference. Then it’s just a matter of which conclusions make sense to you.
We only really get hard data on policies that have been tried, but people will come up with a hundred different reasons why a policy with objectively bad outcomes is still the best policy.
The great irony is such information is that so many will look at this and think "Oh that explains X person, that applies to Y group" without ever coming close to considering how that could also apply to them and their peers.
Well, did you think about how it applies to you? ;)
@@TheMyguitarisblue Yes, it's lightly implied in the comment. My point is to look at ourselves first, but I see the irony in how I have formulated it.
@@TheMyguitarisblue It's an irony-ception. Can we add more layers?
@@ZasarLeNoir Im wondering if the video creator is bias toward people being unbias. I mean he never addressed the other way of looking at it. This creates a world where open-minded people think other open-minded people are smart and open-minded people will think closed-minded people are dumb. Has anyone ever considered if being closed minded is optimal?
@@devinfleenor3188 It's a complicated problem. What's being open-minded, how's it defined? It's a bit of a subjective issue. In an absolute form of close mindedness, how would you be ever able to learn if you rejected everything that was presented to you? But on the other end of absolute open-mindedness wouldn't that make you the most gullible tool?
Personally I think it's useful to be open-minded, but cautious. Listen, understand the perspective, test the knowledge, and then make a mind for it.
That world, unfortunately is the world we have, everyone wants to find a way to say they're amongst the smart ones, and that the other ones are the dumb ones. The most likely scenario really is that we are of average intelligence with different perspectives and biases.
Given shift in the Overton Window, this video implies a great deal on which sides are willing to listen to the other side our _political divide._
To wit: it takes enough people on one side of that divide willing to accept the arguments of the other side in order to shift the window, so look at what direction that window is shifting, and those who fall on the opposite side are the ones with a more open mind.
Thank you for giving me something new to look into.
It was also helpful for me with the info on those that know less are more confident and those that know more are less confident. I've always been big on stepping back and trying to understand. I only know enough to know I don't know very much at all, so when people confidently argue things I struggle to articulate the various other complexities that i am aware of and leave space for things I'm not, while simultaneously trying to weed out misinformation. It's not really conducive for arguing and there's few that you'd actually be able to have a genuinely full conversation with.
To be fair the duck's beak makes it look more fake being so rounded to me personally, so I am a bit biased due to this in my own rationality in thinking the rabbit looks more realistic.
6:17.
Over the last 8 years or so, I keep saying that the more I learn things the less I understand.
20 years ago, I knew so little, yet it was so easy to fit everything into a coherent pattern.
Interesting.
Thanks for the video.
Excellent point. I think what you are illustrating, as well as Ryan, is the Dunning-Kruger effect.
Then youre sources suck. Ive been studying much abroad YT since 06. I may seem "'biased"' but in the literal multitudes of debates ive been on here, it has proven the "dunning kruger" concept untrue (at least for me), and which ive come to find it only effects naive, close minded neurotypical ppl.
you learned.a lot but lost decisiveness or the.ability to prioritize.
@@MMABeijing
At 28 I made a Decisive decession to join the World's finest Navy and become a Hospital Corpsman with the USMC.
I've made a career change in my mid 30s.
Nearly 2 years ago I made it a priority to go back to college.
Last year I started a Social Enterprise.
--
I'm not putting in time in a career I hate until I finally get to retire.
There is no retirement.
Best I can do is pull in Master Yoda: "You must unlearn what you have learned. "
"Taste buds in our minds". That's the perfect way to describe it.
Thanks for talking about this subject.
This was very well presented. I didn't feel uncomfortable at all (as was warned). Good stuff!
You are lucky! I could feel my brain going “… hey…” a few times, but that was also the point of the video. It was well done! I have come back to watch a few times
I remember having fun back in high school with this little “drawing conclusions” experiment: (WAIT! I just thought of the joke “I’m such a lousy artist I can’t even draw conclusions”)
Anyway, I came up with “Practice makes perfect. But nobody’s perfect. Therefore, nobody practices.” Logical? Ridiculous?
I saw the rabbit but couldn’t figure out what the other animal was until he said it. It was there for me but out of my mental grasp.
It’s not that practice equates to perfection, but rather that perfection is an unreachable goal that can be progressed towards through practice.
Nobody’s perfect, but that doesn’t mean you can’t put in the effort to becoming perfect.
I heard practice makes permanent. If you practice drawing , say, a camel, and tell yourself it's a cat, eventually it'll be difficult to not have a knee-jerk reaction , even if part of your brain knows better.
It wasn't out of your mental grasp, It was just a really badly drawn rabbit.
@@ashley_smith "Perfect practice makes perfect" is the shorthand for telling people that simply showing up to practice and half-assing it and doing things incorrectly will actually make things worse. When you are at practice it is more important to have fewer high-quality reps than a large quantity of bad reps because during a game you don't have to time to analyze things so you fall back to muscle memory, which is established during practice.
Yeah I would say the more accurate way of saying it is "practice tends toward perfection"
Practice eventually makes perfect, but as temporally finite organisms, none of us ever reach true perfection.
The comments below are pretty interesting. I would also like to share a quote from my dad. "There is no such thing as an 'expert.' Rather, there are varying levels of ignorance." In this use, "ignorance" is not a synonym for "stupid." Ignorance is just a relative lack of knowledge. "Stupidity" has to do with how we make decisions based on the information we have. Nice piece, Ryan.
Wondering about language and lexicon. Did (or would) your father say there was no such thing as _expertise?_
@@zapazap
Hello, Mr. Hann;
Is "expertise" based on KNOWLEDGE & experience?
"Language and lexicon" are often used to lie.
A lie is not honest, it is dishonest in intent.
That is, a lie is a deliberate effort to mislead others.
My old daddy used to say, "If they'll lie they'll steal'.
Twisting words to mislead is another way to do the same.
The real issue is the liar is corrupt.
That is why the liar is willing to be dishonest, to mislead.
This 'issue' is based on morality.
You wrote "Wondering about language and lexicon".
When you wrote it, were you really 'wondering' about that, or trying to mislead?
I honestly can't tell from the written word alone.
You may not know what motivates your question.
It sounds like you may be trying to disagree w/ Mr. Cherry.
That could be my bias.
Or it could be an oppositional statement.
IMO, Mr. Cherry's statement is accurate and correct.
Thus your question appears to try to find fault w/ Mr. Cherry's statement and experience.
The real issue is always, what do you believe.
Do you believe it is wrong to lie, to steal, to be corrupt?
That is for each to decide for themselves.
It is not right for a country, government, nation, party, or an individual to lie to you, to steal from you, or to be corrupt.
That is why laws against such things have been passed.
To protect us all from the immoral and corrupt.
Yes I agree
Your dad is right
@@jons2447 Cannot bear to read your formatting. Sorry. Cheers!
I saw the rabbit first, but then looked and thought "oh ok, I guess a weird bird too"
What troubles me is, this human tendency we're seeing of people not having the bandwidth to not be divided, is growing in response to environmental stressors, like the pandemic, economic depression conditions, and climate change disasters.
We're going to continue to be divided, I think, because of these conditions.
Having seen many such "tests" in books, magazines and videos for a very long time, I am preconditioned to recognize such images as dual in nature. I immediately saw both animals and never second guessed myself.
Same with the spinning ballerina, is she going left or right? Anytime I come across these kind of mind game illusions the second I see the one image I'm looking for the other
bunny-moose
I saw both images, and then decided to turn the screen upside down and I saw a chicken foot with a spot on it
Well.. it's that "never second guessed myself" part of the brain that this video is talking about. That part that makes us feel like our subjective interpretation of the world is objectively true.
So You make comment without seeing the video,
It's automatic. I've had lovely discussions with students along these same lines of open-mindedness and all heads invariably nod serenely, and yet the moment a topic arises that one or another feels passionatley about, they will instantaneously and righteously proclaim the popular talking points exhibiting zero absorption of the experience we'd just had. There's not always enough time to point out the missed mark, as typically many will be weighing in at once, but it's a marvel to behold how cerebral lessons on the workings of tolerance are the water to the oil of preconceived judgments. In other words, it feels good to be able to admit to the possibility of operating with an open mind but the actual value judgments to which the process of open mindedness might apply are reflexive and inured.
That can be overcome but the person doing the reflexive response has to be the one to combat it and doing so requires the habit of self-examination, a willingness/desire to expend energy on monitoring their own thought processes, the intelligence (which not everyone actually has to a sufficient degree), logical thought processes to do so (which many people are never exposed to) and the patience and self-discipline to put off the initial strongly preferred response in favor of the added work long enough to come to a reasoned conclusion. All of this is absolutely essential to someone being able to set that aside. Given these hurdles it isn't surprising that many people seem to never do so.
@@JF95 I would settle for "the conclusion is sufficiently complex to come to, and I'm not willing or able to put the time into it, so my conclusion should be that I cannot come to a conclusion, and therefore, I should not have a strong opinion".
I think this sort of thing was considered and trained as 'being humble" in times past. But its been out of vogue for quite some time and has been replaced with a sort of faux humility that in reality is even worse than foregoing it (because it adds a layer of deception on top of the the mess that's already there).
I think it would be wise for any socially held belief system to include this sort of humility. Its got me wondering if the horrible social times of the past, which seemed to come in waves, might be heavily influenced by this humility falling in and out of popularity of the social belief systems of the time.
@@TheCapstah If you or I ever find ourselves in a position of supreme power or authority over the rest of the population, I guess it would matter what either of us would settle for. My statement was just an acknowledgement that it isn't always a mechanical foregone conclusion that people will never amend their opinions even if they are deeply held while acknowledging that many individuals will either choose not to or will be lacking in some quality that it takes to do so.
Still others will re-evaluate and come to the conclusion that the original opinion they had is still the most correct one currently available to them and that would look like either of the two failure states to an observer that actually falls into one of the two themselves and doesn't know it or doesn't care.
@Joshua Ford I was agreeing with you., to be sure.
I was just suggesting a possible solution that came to me while pondering your response.
Hehe. Supreme authority would not the problem solve. Even if you killed every thoughtless fool that could be found, then killed the thoughtless fools who did the killing.
There would be thousands born the very next day.
This is why I suspect that only a cultural solution, born of individual influence from one person to another, that encourages the virtues that are required, is a desirable and workable solution.
@@TheCapstah Agreed, I never want that kind of power, it would just ruin whoever I had become when I got there and give me the power to do ridiculous harm. There have been many attempts at creating such a culture, sadly we are faced with an issue in which it is, I believe, impossible to know what will most matter to future generations.
We can know ourselves, and the people around us to an extent, but how could a social construct you or I would think good be anything more than a halter with bit for future people born into such an arrangement? This, I feel is the trap each successive generation falls into. They are forever seeing the rebellious children deviating from "the proper" path and resenting their different viewpoint leading them down a different road with each successive repetition of the cycle. At least that is where my thoughts have brought me.
I don't really think there is a truly satisfactory answer that will serve anything more than the short term. I believe that everyone has to do the best they can within their means and as they see fit. I would love to see that humility you speak of become one such norm though. It would likely curb a great deal of the strife we see around the world on a daily basis.
“There is no truth. There is only you, and what you call the truth.” -Conor Oberst
I read the title, looked at the sketch and immediately saw both duck and rabbit. This tracks with the fact that I empathize with perspectives on both sides of the political divide.
No one sees themselves as the bad guy. Everyone thinks they have good reasons to think and act as they do. These reasons are easy to discover if you look for them. Most people don't look for the reasoning of their ideological opponents, because that would make life so much more difficult.
Very interesting perspective. I’d like to add that while human nature operates on bias for survival, these biases are a result of our immediate environment. This could explain the blatant polar divide in our politics.
For instance, gun control. Those with a rural bias are in an environment where guns are largely used as a tool to help handle the surrounding nature. But those with an urban bias are in an environment where guns are largely used to facilitate crime and harm people. Both perspectives make perfect sense within their own environment despite being contrary to each other.
Perhaps this could be solved by relegating these hot topic issues to smaller jurisdictions. It would further complicate the law, but compromises need to happen to achieve political unity and stability.
very well pointedout
You miss the point of the anti-gun-control argument. That whole ideal is built on the premise that every human being has the right to carry arms - of whatever type, but guns are the most common example - for their own defense against _anything_ - a bear, a deer, a rabid raccoon, a rabid gunman out to kill people. Everyone.
Of course not everyone will choose to, and that's fine - that's their choice! I can even understand requiring a gun safety and care course. But. The right to self-defense is inalienable. And everyone should have the right to use whatever they want for that self-defense.
@@Brievel lol I agree with you 100% bro, 2A all the way. I'm just trying to make a fair steelman argument for provincial gun control. An armed society is a polite society, but heavily urbanized areas relegate a lot of their rights in order to keep the city in working order.
For instance, people have the right to peaceably assemble. If 5% of a rural population goes out to protest in the streets, it'll be small and hardly impede on anyone's day. But if 5% of an urban population does the same, it'll cause gridlock and essentially shut down the city's industries, food imports, etc. and will lead to chaos and potentially deaths.
The logic behind both sides of any political argument comes down to the problems largely faced in the environment. That's why we can observe a distinct red/blue political divide along rural/urban lines. Rather than allowing one side to dictate the other, we need a better definition of where these political lines are to be drawn so people living there can govern themselves. For this to happen, states need to give more political power to district elected officials. Unfortunately, there's no way that crooked politicians on either side of the aisle would be willing to give up their power allowing that solution to happen.
@@mikerotchburns42069 It would require entirely eliminating all corruption and starting over from the ground up with new people.
@@Brievel yep, and with the power vacuum that something like that would cause, we would probably end up with more corrupt people in place. Gotta love politics haha
Me, looking at the world of American politics: “Wait! It was a duck/rabbit the whole time?”
Ryan Chapman, behind me with a gun: “Always has been!”
Two sides, same coin. The tree is thirsty. Need to be watered.
But it identifies as a horse/dog/dinosaur/butterfly/dragon/cloud/moon/book/water/dirt/astroid and you need to go to jail for not knowing that based on the image you see. 😋
@@illbeyourmonster1959 didn't that stawman joke die years ago?
@@ItzMisterBlitzer you're in the depths of CZcams comments my friend, unfunny jokes are undying here
@@ItzMisterBlitzer Given how that's not a strawman, no. not really.
Have you considered doing a Grammar nazi fail for your next act?
one way to mitigate this is to look more closely at the more intelligent comments from the opposing side to try to truly understand them, rather than looking at the more ridiculous ones to mock.
Ryan explains things so clearly, it really is quite a talent.
1:42 not just about social issues. People have barriers in their mind about religion, finance, health, fitness, diet, etc. Cognitive dissonance is hard to overcome, but if you learn it, a whole new world opens.
Everything you mentioned is considered a social issue. The worrying thing is it's spreading to non social issues. I've seen people unironically argue 2+2=5 (to explain the false reasoning 2.4 rounds down to 2 but 2.4+2.4=2.8 and that rounds up to 5. It's one of the stupidest arguments I've ever seen as 2.4 and 2 aren't the same number and to treat what's after the decimal point as meaningless is baffling. The most disturbing thing is that was taught in a real school)
Those are social issues though
All you can really do is learn ways to resist cognitive biases. A great tool is consciously attempting to prove yourself wrong, rather than just trying to prove ourselves right, which is human nature. Considering how smart we like to think we are, we can certainly be incredibly dense.
Plus, most of the topics you listed could arguably be described as social, but I also agree that this problem exists for every one of our beliefs, it doesn't matter if it's about abortion or rocks, whatever, we don't like the feeling that we might be wrong, so we subconsciously form biases.
@@tomraineofmagigor3499 yeah that argument is dumb and makes no sense in the context such a calculation comes up: the quick back of the envelope fermi calculation that is used to get a sense of the order of magnitude of the answer. It’s not even consistently applying its own rules.
If we say well 2.4 rounds to 2 then we would say 2+2 is 4 so we’d say 2.4+2.4 approximates 4. That’s the ‘right’ way to do it.
We would not say well 2.4 rounds to 2 and 2.4+2.4 is 2.8 which rounds to 5 so therefore 2+2 is 5. That’s just asinine. It’s like that mathematical “proof” that shows 1=2 because in the steps you lose track of the fact a=b and what that implies.
@@zenaku666 I know. I was simply explaining the context of what I was saying. I didn't say I thought it was true
I would just like to posit that when looking at the figure as a duck, the “beak” part is much to wide and rounded to be a true duck. They are much more in line with being rabbit ears and since it is the most distinctive part of both animals it is the most important part as well
Looks more like a pelican than a duck imo
Pelican
based rabbit believer
Pelican and donkey
If you see a duck, you might be one of those folks who "see" things in those million-dollar splatter paintings made by hippies.
Bloody good stuff! Really enjoying your channel.
The horror of this is that people know this and we’re still stumbling around blindly.
I certainly appreciate the point made here, it's a profound one and something everyone needs to be aware of in the pursuit of thinking critically. But the problem no one has ever answered is the problem of foundationalism. You have to assume an epistemology, or you'd never understand or believe anything. Once you start setting foundational axioms, you are setting biases in place, and even changing the axioms is just setting new biases.
As in, for example, Neo-Theocracy vs. Neo-liberal secularism.
Very interesting comment. Thanks.
This is painfully true. I've gone through the process of tearing down everything I thought I knew in a naive attempt to reach some sort of what I thought would be enlightenment. Instead, I've merely become confused and lost, unable to relate to anybody or make any important decisions about anything because there's always something more to consider. One should always be open to the possibility of changing their beliefs, but they cannot exist without beliefs to change in the first place.
What if the foundation you establish is right?
@@davidlafleche1142 if you think it's right, truly you do, then stand by it and fight for it with an open mind. whether or not you're actually right is irrelevant.
I've since forgotten who said this, but the words have stuck with me: "smart people tend to be *very good* at justifying things they came to believe for non-smart reasons."
It's often very difficult to convince an intelligent person that the logic or reasoning behind something they'd previously internalized as true may in fact be flawed.
I think that's the difference between intelligence and wisdom. An intelligent person can defend their position. A wise person questions their position.
@@letsgoiowa yep, it's like how skepticism is actually about being skeptical of what you would otherwise take for granted, just as much as questioning what you don't believe
Adam grant states it in his book "think again", but he probably wasn't the only one who ever said this :)
Hmm, I wonder how that intersects with "You can't reason someone out of something they didn't reason themselves into in the first place."
I was totally persuaded by the 10000th variation of an argument for God's existence that finally no philosopher bothered to debunk...
This was very helpful to hear, and makes so much sense. Common sense, which is scary when you think about not thinking about things that way to begin with.
I admit that I wanted to see the rabbit first and then saw the duck; however, I now welcome a new vision to the table. The Bent Spray-Bottle.
The topics you cover are always infinitely fascinating. You touch on a niche thats unexplored on youtube. In depth, academic-centered political content. Keep up the good work!
This made me uneasy for a bit of a different reason.
I tend to be able to listen to and empathize with both sides of an argument. I've grown up thinking this was a positive trait because it allows me to interact with a wide variety of people.
I still think it's a good thing, but I've realized recently that it also keeps me quiet. It's as you say: the more you know about each side of an issue, the less likely you are to feel totally confident in your opinion. I feel that I've come to a point where I very rarely debate with anyone. It seems it's much more likely to "win" an argument the more heavily entrenched one's beliefs are.
I'm fairly empathetic myself, I would say. I think in that situation, a set of clear values can help to decide between two sides of an argument. For instance, if prior to a debate on abortion the primary value you care about above the rest is "sanctity of life", then even if you can understand someone else's perspective, you can still arrive at a clearer stance.
Overall though, I agree that it is harder to "make up your mind".
I totally relate to your sentiment here. I feel like I can often see both sides, but I often don't feel confident in my position as a result. So, I let people talk about what they think/feel, but don't as much express myself on the topic aside from understanding their point of view.
I'f prefer to see both sides as equal, but for that to happen both sides need equal amounts of work on presentation and content, however presentation vs content seems to be the substance of most of these disagreements.
Great video!!! Incredibly important stuff. Confirmation bias is a powerful, powerful thing. I would also implore people to read an introduction to psychology textbook, or enroll/watch university lectures on biases.
Thank you Ryan. You have a good handle on this psychological/political dilemma.
Things are becoming so politically charged and people are so afraid of being wrong that they're rejecting important psychological findings. So I hope this video convinces even just a few people to see some of the flaws in their thinking.
Awesome video man!
Which psychological findings are you talking about? Explain.
@@Tectonictaless That is a great question and there are a lot. Here's a few I can think of:
1. This video for one. People are very susceptible to the confirmation bias. "This person in this group did a bad thing therefore I can confirm my belief that all of them are bad."
2. While men and women are more simmilar than different, there are plenty of findings that show men and women think different in some ways particularly when it comes to interest. Men tend to be interested in things while women tend to be interested in people. More evidence seems to show that this is a biological difference and not something propagated by society. In recent years scandinavian countries have pushed for equal opportunity and equal outcome. The result was not men and women becoming more similar, they actually became more different.
3. While prescription drugs may be needed in certain circumstances more so than others, generally speaking people with mental health conditions cope better when they have positive human contact and support and exercise. Everyone is different, and I know a lot of people understand this, but there are still many people that believe you can just suck it up or just pop a pill and everything's fine.
4. Father's play a significant role in the family unit. Children who grow up with good fathers in their their life statistically perform better and succeed in relationships.
Sure, there are many people that know these things, but I have seen far too many people who try to deny these things all the time. And it's not just one side of the political spectrum. It's everywhere.
Anyone else feel free to add more.
@@MinkDaddy
These are very interesting! But that little bias bell went off in my head in a few places.
#2: super intriguing I’m gonna look this one up, but wouldn’t equal opportunity give women the freedom to enter the field of their choice?
I mean if women are better with people as you say, more women should be salespeople, but that has culturally been a role filled by men so the numbers are disproportionate. However when it comes academia, women are more likely to be professors in The Humanities and social sciences, while men are more likely to join STEM fields, so that holds up but I suppose my problem lies in what you mean by “different”
#3 this seems a bit self explanatory as any good psychiatrist would recommend a little TLC before prescribing any drugs. Just to make sure the problem is chemical rather than environmental.
#4 While statistics show that the nuclear family on average does better than single parents do, there are so many more factors that go in hand with the lack of a father than just not having one.
Having 2 parents puts less financial strain on the household.
Dead parent leads to trauma leads to bad life decisions
And Abandonment issues are self explanatory
Same sex couples also statistically raise children who perform better (in the classroom anyway) regardless of what sex the parents may be. So I’m not sure that the sex or gender of the parent matters, rather it’s the presence of a father figure, or just having two parents in a healthy relationship.
I’d love to hear some counter arguments and/or studies if u have em handy!
@@MinkDaddy
also another really important psychological thing that people like to deny is the existence of trans people!
The APA (American Psychological Association) has stated that gender and sexuality are fluid, can vary in individuals, and that variation is a natural part of the human experience :)
This is all stuff I'm very familiar with on an intellectual level, but I find that if I don't have it brought to mind on a regular basis, it's very hard to resist my tendencies to go partisan and ignore my biases. So thank you for this opportunity.
Reminding yourself of this will result in both the duck and rabbit people hating you.
Ain’t that the truth
And I think you're spot on!!
I've been a fan of Jonathan Haidt for years. I especially like his research on the differences in world view between those on the right and those on the left. For example, those on the right prefer order over chaos and believe more in the concept of karma while those on the left tend to be more adventurous and less risk averse.
so eye opening! you are master of every topic you made
When "the dress" image hit the internet years ago, this was on full display, but I now see how weird my reaction may have been.
I recall seeing it as white and gold, and still to this day see it that way. But I heard people saying blue and black and I was not angry or dismissive, I truly wanted to understand what was happening. Now that I knew there were two color pairs to see, I needed to be able to see them both. I looked into it a decent amount, I think eventually figuring out a way to see both color pairs. But it was not emotional other than the fact it was thrilling to have such a problem in front of me like I had never encountered before.
Meanwhile, some of the vitriol I was seeing online and even between friends and coworkers was mind boggling. Who actually cares what color it is, and why is that a position worth defending? So many crazy insults about something so trivial.
So in that way, both the problem itself and the reaction to it were uniquely fascinating to me. It was fun seeing that thru.
Similarly, I find watching the political dynamic play out in our country/world very fascinating. Being not solidly affiliated with either side, I do feel like an outsider looking in, watching a train wreck from afar. But it also makes me feel like I don't belong anywhere, and that is kinda lonely sometimes. I live my life in shades of grey, but this world is black and white.
I always found the dress discussion a bit silly. Having just now looked it up, there are at least three different versions of the image, and I'm not really sure if that wasn't the case originally, but even looking at the same image live with other people, you have to admit that the image is composed of particular colors, while the actual object imaged is clearly subjected to a lighting effect, and of course there may be further effects from the screen on which you are viewing it. Any discussion of that topic without those considerations is kinda silly.
Don't feel bad. The world is in shades of grey, it's just that most people prefer the certainty of black or white.
I understand this.
buddy, youre curious and open hearted. Do not follow this man. He is poison in your well. Find somewhere else, anywhere else. This is a barren land.
I'd relate to you but it's hard to find it all amusing when people are actively worsen the quality of life for me and those around me and it's become a "political issue." I love this idea but it's ignoring the fact that some sides aren't worth platforming. Some sides are dangerous. And some side will actively suppress the other. I can see both sides, I can see all sides, and I can see we're all being used and brain washed. Maybe the answer isn't looked at the bunny-duck at all. Maybe that's all simply a distraction.
I completely agree Ryan. I always try to look at things from different perspectives to have a better grasp on the matter at hand. The people on the other side, though, tend to be very narrow-minded, which is why my side is better than theirs. So clearly this video is praising my side and condeming the other, bad side.
Thanks for supporting my side Ryan!
Ha…!!! Thank you I needed that
The real question is.
How do we get on one side in the first place?
I think some folks pick a team or inherit a team and just defend it the same way folks who are biased to their favorite sports team.
So, my next question is, are they self aware of their bias? As the ship starts to sink, will they ever admit, "ok, this person I got behind is a terrible leader. I made a mistake."
Doubtful. They would require them to be secure and confident in the first place.
Lol
😅
One side promotes debate while the other side cancels/de-platforms. There is a ‘good’ and a ‘bad’ side.
My brain just exploded. 🤯
Excellent video! Thank you. 🥰
i quite like the subject and structure of this video, it tackles the underlying human nature of division while encouraging all to be more open minded and think outside of themselves.
The point about common understanding of purely physical subjects vs social elements no longer holds water when physically observable reality is being actively relegated to the status of social elements. Needless to say, the push for such isn't uniform across the divide.
Thank you! His "neutral" example about rising sea level is literally a disagreement about a purely physical subject.
@@anthonynorman7545 Only if you believe that the flooding is real, that there's a reason other than pure happenstance and that water is wet.
To be fair he didn't say it was a neutral example, he used it as an example of something that triggers people, so not neutral at all.
@@mikekelly5869 *believe* it's rising? The rising is one of those objective physical things they were talking about.
The framing and placement of the example in the video implies that it's a neutral. Otherwise, they've undermined their entire argument. Surely, they wouldn't have had that much of an oversight?
@@anthonynorman7545 I was being somewhat ironic, alluding to deniers of everything from the moon landing to Earth being a spheroid to covid to climate change. He directly referred to the flooding and its potential climate change link as a trigger sibject that provokes divided opinion, so in the context it's divisive, not neutral.
@@mikekelly5869 I was being sardonic as he was actually undermining his video.
“I say it’s duck season.”
“I say it’s rabbit season.”
“Duck season!”
“Rabbit season!”
. . .
In the thumbnail I instantly saw Rabbit…but guessing it had to be a trick thing, I eventually realised the Duck interpretation existed. Rabbit is the natural thing to see for me. Ok, now I can watch the remaining 7minutes….
I saw the rabbit first but also saw the bird (duck). This really was very helpful and explains a lot. I know I have biases and realized that completely shut down listening. I try to be aware of this but don't always catch it. lol
And just like the duck rabbit, this video can be extremely informative and extremely reductive at the same time.
Reductive? Sure, but do we really want him to recapitulate hundreds of pages of psychological research in a video.
@@Kaddywompous I think some of the both sides rhetoric he uses can also reduce away all the complexity of politics if we just draw the conclusion that any political stance is solely the result of bias. This leads to a relativistic attitude where you don't even engage with politics. It's important to recognise the true complexity of the situation, that bias will cause people to believe they are objectively right even when they aren't, but there is still a right answer, and we have a duty to try and pursue it. In this framework we don't ignore the political dimension of our lives (reducing it's complexity), but try to recognise our biases and increase the nuance of our political thought by ensuring the biases aren't simplifying the issue. Rather than saying there's no duck or rabbit, we say there's a duck and a rabbit.
@@-undecided-1663 I agree with everything you said except that I don’t think he was making the point that “every political stance is the result of bias”. Of course that may just be my duck centered bias at work. I could be wrong.
@@Kaddywompous certainly not stated in the video, but I have seen people take positions like this and I think the ideas in the video could be used to support it if taken the wrong way
I think this common idea drastically oversimplifies things itself. My strongest political opinions come directly from personal experience. Usually a strongly negative one, and the goal of the political opinion is to prevent other people from having that negative experience. So for instance, watching my parents skimp on food to cover medical bills has driven me to have strong opinions about certain economic issues. This is very different from a discussion of my favorite ice cream flavor. There is truth behind it. Regardless of the ultimate "correct" solution, there is something that people would almost universally see as wrong behind it. We might disagree on the solutions, and that can be more like the ice cream flavor discussion. But people who simply disregard that experience or act like it doesn't matter, or say it's necessary for the greater good, I will not be able to have a calm conversation with. So political opinions I think stem from real world incentives a lot more than you're implying
I completely agree, being detached from politics enough to see both sides when one side is advocating for taking away people's rights feels like a weapon of the powerful rather than an acknowledgement of the different opinions that have little effect on people's lives. The way we structure society through politics has an immense effect and maintaining the "calm level headed discussion" standard is always going to benefit systems of oppression
So if it's good enough for you it's good enough for everyone else? Lol that seems like a bad way to go about things
I read this twice before responding. It's natural that your political opinions would come from your experiences and temperament. We all have different experiences and different temperaments. When you wrote "correct" in quotes you meant a preferred solution that gets you a desired result. That is not oversimplified, it's what I heard the video saying. In your example, skimping on food to pay bills is a personal choice made through individual priority. I don't immediately see anything wrong there. I would need more info before making a judgement about how I would handle it. That doesn't mean it doesn't matter to you, it means it doesn't matter to me because it's not my current situation.
If any of that offends you, then you won't be able to have a calm conversation with anyone that doesn't agree with you. That really demonstrates the point of the video. People are divided because of the individual bias and are often incapable of understanding a different view. First comes the feeling, then comes the reasoning to support. You are an example of that here.
@Russ Ingram respectfully, what does that mean?
That's an example of why I don't take Jonathan Haidt very seriously as a political commentator.
Politics in the US is so toxic because Republicans in the Nixon era started choosing to make it that way, because they realized their message of small government and cutting social safety nets wouldn't fly on its own merits. Crisis is what drives the narratives they sell, and allowed them to gradually push the Overton Window to the right.
This was really great. Very well explained and avoided any bias. Truly the video we need right now. Thank you.
*sigh*
Reading some other people's comments and realizing so many people missed the point. It makes me sad. If you watch this and your first thought is to point out that sometime the "other side" is super wrong and not worthy of compromise, THAT is part of the problem. How can you REALLY know if you've never made a concerted effort not just to understand *what* they believe, but the root of WHY they believe it? Only then, when you have really made a good faith effort to understand why they came to the beliefs that they did, can you really assess whether compromise is justified or not.
But, he didn't avoid any bias. You could see it from the start when he mentioned duck first and repeated that statement all through the video. Never acknowledging the rabbit first just because he drew these squiggly lines. He introduced his own personal bias for everyone to see.
I stand for the mushroom personally, get rid of these opressive animals... ;)
The more I watch political debates, the more I’m convinced politics is just about having the least terrible idea
When these ideas revolve on how to organize and manage people on the scale of cities & nations, it's not all that surprising really. The imperfect can only produce imperfect results.
Well, one of our founding fathers (I think) said that the government that governs least governs best, or something to that effect. If you believe that you might think all government ideas are therefor bad but we need to settle on some ideas so we pick the least terrible ones.
it s just manipulation to gain power . i don t think many care about ideas or want to do something , they would rather just do what others want to gain power ( give billionairs tax cuts and give women the ability to yeet babies . good deal ) .
"With purely physical subjects, we tend to be open to evidence and converge"
Yeah.. until you ask someone to take some sort of action based on those physical subjects.
"Viruses are small organic replicators that infect the body and can cause harm" is not a controversial statement until "therefore people should" gets involved. Then both statements become controversial.
Obviously. It is as clear as day that would happen. You just introduced something completely different. The first part is about the state of reality, what exists and how it works, and that has nothing whatsoever to do with what should be done.
Policy is social by nature after all
The Earth is flat.
I don't think the response to the pandemic was a situation where both sides were equal and people were just biased. One side had their priorities straight, and the other side clearly did not. That is, assuming that the concept of "liberty" is the end goal, which it always should be in any society that dares to call itself "free."
"people should" is not the same as "people have to or else"
One is a suggestion and is fine. The other is a mandate and is not fine. I understand the priority some people have of keeping safe those with weak immune systems and other issues that put them at risk. I have at-risk individuals in my family, and they are very dear to me. But both I and they understand that liberty is far more important that a slight increase in safety, particularly when at-risk individuals are far outnumbered by those who are not at-risk.
At any rate, as has already been pointed out, one of those aspects of the issue is purely physical, while the other is social. Nobody debates the definition of "virus." We all know what they are and what they do. But the response to a virus is social, and that is why there is debate.
I want to know why putting on a mask destroys one’s liberty. We have to wear clothes in public which is far more fabric then a mask, surgeons wear them in the operating room as a mandatory safety precaution. Should we stop wearing clothes in the name of liberty, should surgeons be able to dress however they want when operating on people? Should we gain the right to scream fire in a movie theater in the name of free speech? All because America is a free country where we can do what we want?
The right to swing your arm ends where another’s face begins.
Just leaving this here, because I feel like this video might leave some people with some shitty lessons...no, this does not excuse enlightened centrism. No this also does not mean all opinions are equally valid. This just means that you have to properly analyze differing viewpoints instead of passing judgement onto them before doing proper research on the topic. Politics is insanely complex. You won't understand political topics by watching two youtube videos on them, especially not if they're of the same opinion.
No opinions are valid or invalid. They're opinions, not facts. Way to show your own biases.
@@AbandonedVoid is that a bias?
It’s not that all opinions are valid, it’s all people are valid. This is an important thing that unfortunately tends to be misunderstood by people like yourself. I used to see things the way you do, very much so, but I have eventually realized the peace of mind and also the peace that it has helped me be able to just live and exist with minimal turmoil and anxiety, as I have I just except the fact, that according to natural law, humans just will have different perspectives. That’s what this video is about, not that you need to agree with them, the point is still being willing to understand a point of you that you disagree with. For example, I strongly disagree with the notion that the world is screwed up because we have straight away from our traditional, conservative roots and that we need to go back to it, although I empathize with it and I empathize with the people who believe such a thing. I in fact used to think that way but my thinking has changed, nonetheless, I fully empathize with the sentiment that would make one think that way. That is what the point is of being willing to see from other perspectives. From my point of view with example he gives here, that picture will always be a rabbit, but I will not disrespect other peoples perspectives that it might be a duck.
@@otakumangastudios3617 I disagree with you here for the simple reason that there are people with opinions that are completely misantropic. Also not all people are valid since I firmly believe that we have to judge people by their actions. I wouldn't cry a single tears for the death of a Jeff Bezos, a Henry Kissinger or god forbid an Adolf Hitler.
@@angryyordle4640 I wouldn’t either, because I don’t know them personally. To me in general there’s no point in crying tears for someone you have no particular positive feelings for. I also believe in feeling authentic feelings, and I suppose I’ve come to this conclusion because much of my life was spent feeling obligated to feel emotions I didn’t feel, such as feeling sorrow for someone I barely knew. So that’s why I draw that conclusion. By the way you don’t have to cry single tear for for them, that’s not my point in the first place. My point is to understand them. Say if someone could’ve been understanding of Hitler psyche before he went the direction he did, we probably wouldn’t have a holocaust to speak of regarding especially 6 million Jews being horrendously murdered.
To my thinking, as a 77 yr old, well educated and well traveled male, I find what you call "bias" is really the product of experience, education and rational thinking. I "know" why I make my decisions, and true "bias" is reserved only for the "new and unknown" until I learn more about the details. At that point, experience, education and rational thinking take over.
.... and I'm still looking for the 3rd animal he mentioned was in the drawing.
Saw the rabbit first, then saw the duck after you told me about it. Its like when draw a kind of cube and it appears to flip.
Also, I know it's just a visual example, but there's one problem with the duck-rabbit. It clearly looks more like a rabbit; a messed up one, but still. The most defining feature are the two protrusions which look like either bunny ears or a duck bill. Because they look more like actual bunny ears than some puffy, rounded bill, it looks more like a rabbit.
Taking it way to serious, I know.
The childrens book actually does a better job because the duck bill/ears are straight across and the eye is right near the area a ducks eye would be but also where a rabbits is so I really think it’s just the drawing in the vid that’s the problem not the concept but what do I know 🤷♂️
@@monkeymanspunkyman Also, it's just a simple visual representation to give you an idea of how perspectives can vary. Obviously, it's a lot more complicated in real life.
Lol I thought it looked like a pelican and a rabbit instead of a duck and a rabbit. When he said duck, I got confused 😅
@@lucidberrypro Must be an independent.
@@DrachonaTheWolf 😂
When you already knew this and know it's going to get much worse before it gets better. Social media is really making this a lot worse.
The Backfire Effect can explain these differences. It’s the primal part of our brain. That “fight or flight” response.
Side note: saw both rabbit and duck probably because of my career. 😂 😂 😂
Interesting how I immediately saw the rabbit, not the duck. It was a good analogy. Thank you.
Yeah. It's called cognitive bias. Specifically in this case I believe this would be considered motivated reasoning. Our political motivations influence our reasoning. Everyone is affected by this although not equally. And that's just the beginning. There's also conformity bias and authority bias. There's even a phenomenon called "belief perseverance". Once formed, beliefs are resistant to evidence to the contrary even clear and conclusive evidence in some cases. But I believe we can mitigate these affects if only a little. First, we have to know about it. So you're educating people about it. That's good. But that's not the end. You still have to recognize it and want to be less biased. Which isn't easy. One has to make a commitment to believing true things and even then there's no grantees.
We've all been fooled. I certainly have on more than one occasion. It's those people who have never experienced learning that you've been misinformed about something who worry me the most. They're the ones who are more likely to double down and rely on their imperfect reasoning.
This is a huge interest of mine and a topic I've been talking about for years. I'm glad to see people finally talking about it.
So true! It's just very hard for people to realize that they are being lied to and suddenly have start researching things for themselves, and especially when you drag scientific studies and evidence that have been skewed into it.
I’ve realized this a few years back and I try to see both sides as much as possible. I am religious but I try to see other religions to understand why they could have been believed. Same thing with politics. I am a republican but I will criticize my side when they made poor decisions and I try to congratulate the other side when they make good decisions. It actually has gotten easier the more I try to do it. But it still is difficult sometimes
Democrat here and I try to do the same thing its easy to get into an us versus them mindset especially on hot button issues. Everyone has their own experience and background and you can find evidence for pretty much any point of view. That's why its important to maintain balance and give everyone a chance to say their piece even if we disagree with it.
@@keeperofthenerd6694I agree completely. If you don’t try to see the other side, you end up in a echo chamber and become ignorant of your surroundings. That is also how history repeats itself. It’s so refreshing to see someone on the other side who thinks similarly to how I do
I used to be Republican because that was how I was raised it was through open mindedness that helped me get over some of the more extreme views that my parents had raised in me so its important to me to gain all perspectives. Everything is relative and I like to belie that most people do genuinely want what's best for everyone (key word being most people such as serial killers obviously don't). Its easy though to get stuck in a cycle of projected hatred which makes it difficult to actually discuss. Further more as I said before everything is built upon by each individuals experience. While I might disagree with things that people believe that doesn't invalidate their experience or vise versa.
Exactly. Both sides have good ideas and blindly following one party is really stupid
^ This might be the most tame internet conversation I have ever seen. Wow.
This was very helpful. Thanks for making this video.
What you explained makes sense, to an extent. Of course, it is naive to think you can get into all of the nuances of such complex subject in a short video. The part you omitted, which I believe is critically important, is that there is a large part of this country that are on neither political extremes. These are the centrists from both parties PLUS the independents. We are more willing to look at each issue from both perspectives. And it is thanks to this group in the middle the country has not gone completely coocoo.
06:45 That is the Dunning-Kruger Effect, it is often taken is a very negative light, but it actually affects everyone in fields that they have only superficial knowledge about.
I hadn't thought about it before, but what's the opposite?
Where one assumes a task is more complicated and difficult and not understood by themself than the reality?
I don't think imposter syndrome is quite it.
@@kamikeserpentail3778 The Dunning-Kruger Effect also refers to how people with moderate experience in a field begin to recognize how little they actually know, and how masters in a field come back around to appropriately assessing their knowledge as high. It's usually drawn with a graph showing "perceived knowledge" and "actual knowledge" with a dip in the middle
The DKE is actually overblown. It does not describe the curve you may be thinking of. In actuality, it's that people's average confidence remains the same regardless of how much they know-- not that they think they know more as they know little or that they think they know less when they know an intermidiate amount. The amount that you know you don't know increases through surveys of knowledge. Knowledge and practice brings mastery. Confidence is tied to all of this in its own way.
Does it require knowledge in a specific field though? I would have thought that the same effect exists regardless of knowledge. Eg I may be intelligent but not have any more real knowledge of virology than somebody else. However even from the same level of actual knowledge I may be much more capable of realising that there is potentially lots of complexity to the field that I am unaware of. Is that not still the DK effect, in which case isn't it more about some sort of base intelligence and understanding of complexity in general than knowledge of a specific area?
Great video, though I want to make one comment, which I think is philosophically important to consider... "We're not trying to be not divided." often is due to the limitation of the solutions to the problems that we face. Let's take the abortion problem for example (I'm not here to debate stance, by the way, just to use it as an example), the two sides see this problem as two fundamental choices that cannot co-exist, because they're directly conflicting. One side thinks it's a woman's choice - this pertains to the freedom of choice, while the other thinks it's about a life - which gets into moral ground on whether it's considered murder of human or not. And then this can further become an onion-peeling problem, debating on what is life and when does it begin, which gets into the age-old philosophical questions that don't have answers.
So even if we don't try to be divided, some of the things by nature are conflicting and cannot co-exist, thus creating divisions that cannot be avoided.
The big X Factor is how the 2 political parties in the USA dumb things down to make us choice binary decisions.
Because there are not term limits, the main goal is getting reelected. 90% of the time.
So, you follow the base. What does the base want? That is crucial for those in Congress.
For a good while term limits was only liked by one side, but now both sides are warming up to it.
From what I've gathered the GOP base has been unstable ever since 2004.
We got the Tea-Party folk, then later the Trump base.
They got really lucky with a divided Democratic Party in 2016.
And now they still have a divided base, but amazingly the Democrats have been shedding moderates at an alarming rate.
J. Haidt talks about it all the time. I'm a big fan of him because, you guessed it, he confirms what I already know. 😝
I agree with everything he says.
Especially his thoughts on Academia.
Thank you for making this point! When we talk about politics (or talk about talking about politics, as in this video), we can take disparate perspectives, thesis and antithesis (a duck and a rabbit), and try to find a synthesis (duck-rabbit). But in reality, politics is not abstract, but actionable, and some of the most divisive issues present two choices of which there is no agreeable synthesis. It is a duck-rabbit that must be adjudicated, into either a duck, or a rabbit. Even if both sides concede that the issue is more complicated than they initially granted, in the end, only one side can actually have their way. Many issues are not like this, and many issues are divisive even when there is a range of mutually agreeable solutions available, or creative solutions outside the realm of the main debate (it's not a duck or a rabbit, it's actually an aardvark), but nonetheless, many political issues have no synthesis solution.
Well said! 👍🏽 Trigger warning -- I'm going to say something about abortion, so only scroll down if you're okay with hearing some random stranger's opinion about this contentious topic here.
Abortion came up years ago when some friends and I were watching the old movie, "Back to the Future". It seems to be a divide between pro-life people and pro-choice people:
_If you were sent back in time, and you had to choose, would you:_
A. Choose to make sure you will be born, or
B. Choose to prevent yourself from being born?
Everyone I've asked so far who is pro-life, has always chosen A.
The pro-choice people I've asked, may choose either A or B, it hasn't been predictable so far.
They're more likely to be pro-choice B's when suicide isn't an option because it would hurt others who love them.
So I like asking about this choice online.
(Full disclosure: I'm pro-choice and I've wished I'd been aborted since I was a little girl; so my hypothesis is -- abortion is murder to pro-life people, because life is a gift; but abortion can be euthanasia for some pro-choice people, although not all pro-choice people.)
@@brentharrington8134 Unfortunately when people care as much as they do about some subjects, it isn't as simple as that. To go back to the issue being used as an example in the prior post, One side sees their way not being followed as an abrogation of their very real, at least to them, right to make their own choice on a medical concern affecting their body (or the 2nd/3rd person variation on that statement) and the other side sees the exercise of such a decision to be the murder of another human being. When you start from the place both sides are arguing from, it isn't about reaching consensus anymore, but about protecting the important thing that overrules the other sides argument even if you could be wrong because what if you are right and concede to the other side, making you complicit in the thing you were trying to avoid. The right to make a medical choice concerning one's own body vs the protection of another human being's life doesn't leave much room in the middle when the two perspectives are applied to the same axis. Yes there are people arguing in bad faith on both sides of it, just as is always the case, but in the end this one isn't actually about ego so much as it is about completely different world views. Yes, people's egos are tied up with their world views, but reducing it to a struggle with one's ego doesn't actually address anything useful outside of a thought experiment. In the real world it just casts a dishonest light on the position of whichever side is less favored by the person making that claim.
@@brentharrington8134 The problem with this is that there are some social issues that many wouldn’t find acceptable even if it was just somewhere else. For example, if a bunch of people got together and decided to buy up a corner of the US and start taking slaves, people would have a problem with that. That’s an easy bipartisan issue, equally few would disagree on either side. But what about other things such as abortion? The moral ground of a fetus being a human being and not a clump of cells is quite a strong one held by a lot of people, that wouldn’t be okay with just ignoring it happening on the other side of the river.
This should be taught in Middle school or high school. It happens to everyone and I found it happening to myself watching this video.