I'm not particularly smart or in possession of more knowledge than any other average Joe. But I'm not stupid either, in the sense of having a great lack of intelligence or common sense. I'm also intelligent enough to know that the common sense argument isn't always the best or strongest argument to make, as plain truth and common sense need not always be in agreement.
Image by Gage Skidmore - source: Flickr
The instability of "common sense" becomes painfully apparent when I write posts, as I do daily, about politics. Politics is a topic on which many, myself included, have convictions so strong that they seem to have become part of our very being; the reason why debates on politics, and ideologies as well, often become rather heated, is because an attack on our most deeply held beliefs, has a tendency to feel like an attack on ourselves. What's "common sense" to me, doesn't have to align with the "common sense" of someone with a completely different world-view, one that's shaped through a completely different set of personal experiences and environment. Here we see that common sense isn't always "common", and that it doesn't always have to agree with truth; given that a truth exists out there, some commonsensical beliefs must be wrong, maybe even all of them.
The best method to come to an understanding about reality, is the scientific method, a well developed system designed to objectively explain events in nature, consisting of hypotheses, reproducible experiments and falsifiable predictions. Predictions need to be falsifiable to be able to be contradicted by evidence; this is what makes religion and science so different from each other, as the God-claim isn't falsifiable by evidence, no one can prove that a God doesn't exist. The difference between atheists and theists is that atheists try to have good reasons based on evidence for their beliefs, where theists use faith, belief without evidence.
I'm not trying to make a case against religion here; you can do with the above stated facts what you will, and I don't begrudge or deny anyone's religious or non-religious preferences. I do have a problem however with belief without reason when it comes to more earthly phenomenons, human interactions, society and politics; we're descending into an age of stupid with regards to those important aspects of the human condition. And the rise to prominence of Trump and other fascist and proto-fascist far right populists, is a sign of that. Much like there's no evidence for the existence of God, just like people's believe in God is based solely on faith, on belief without reason, so is people's faith in Trump. The difference is that Trump supporters are worse; many religious persons will readily admit that faith is the ground on which they believe in God, but Trump supporters will just scream "fake news!" and stubbornly persist in their mistaken belief in Trump's promises, words and greatness.
When confronted with Trump's racism, they'll say things like "well, he just says out loud what other presidents don't dare, he's honest!" For me, the discussion stops right then and there; there's no reasoning with someone who's opinions are based on the alternative facts necessary to be able to hold on to such denial of what's right in front of their eyes. When these people are told that Trump paid no taxes for 10 of the previous 15 years, they'll say "well, that's how smart he is!" They say this when they themselves at the same time barely survive on minimum wages, and pay more taxes than the self-proclaimed billionaire they adore so much. Much like with Trump himself, there's no reasoning with these people. Trump doesn't believe in science, he has said as much; when told that the scientists in his own administration uniformly believe that it's better for everyone to wear a mask if we want to combat the spread of this virus, or any other airborne virus, he said that he doesn't believe that science knows...
And he's right about that. Science isn't a person, so science can't know anything. And science isn't about absolute certainty in the first place; science is all about our best guess, our closest approximation to truth and knowledge about reality. That's why science never stops evolving, and why there's nothing more exiting for scientists than to have previous consensus challenged or disproved by new evidence. Unfortunately this fact about science, and the corporate media's lust for exclusive early reporting, make a dangerous combination; when scientists' developing and changing insights at the front of their respective fields are reported on, the general public might come away with the idea that scientists know nothing. We see this happening now with covid-19; it's new, and there are thousands of studies, many of them garbage and hastily put together, and some of which contradict each other. This is to be expected. But there's still consensus on some things among serious scientists and good research, which unfortunately gets lost in the media's lust for exclusivity and a president who's prone to retweet any conspiracy theory he thinks helps his case.
We live in an age in which individuals are allowed their own truths, their own facts even, and the presidency of Donald Trump, a serial liar, a racist and a criminal, is testament to that fact. Much of this sad state of affairs is due to individualism and egocentrism gone haywire under capitalism. You don't wear a mask for yourself, but to keep the virus from spreading to those who are vulnerable. You don't act on climate change for yourself, but to keep the planet habitable for future generations and poor people who live along the costs that will be flooded. Voting for Trump however, is something you do purely for yourself, just like not wearing a mask is something you do for yourself and yourself alone, because you feel your rights, your personal freedoms are attacked. For having, or being advised to wear a mask... Even if you're sure that wearing a mask doesn't help, you must know that many people are scared right now, many of them already old and / or sick, and you know that wearing a mask, even if it's just to help put those people's minds at rest, is no trouble at all.
I'll leave it there and invite you all to watch the below linked video about the ever nearing death of science in the collective mind. I believe the things said by the scientists in it is troublesome to say the least and, as much as I hate to say it, I believe they're exactly right in asking the question in the video's title.
Will America’s disregard for science be the end of its reign? | Big Think
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