Better Solutions Through Looking At All of Reality

BETTER SOLUTIONS THROUGH LOOKING AT ALL OF REALITY

Christopher Ebbe, Ph.D.    12-7-10

It has long been an honored part of our culture’s traditions to contest issues through debate and rhetorical struggle.  Each side presents its point of view, hoping to convince the other side or to convince some other audience.  We see this in our courtroom procedure, where the prosecution and defense seek not to find the truth but to prevail, and in formal debating, which works the same way.  It’s well to note that this approach may result in worse outcomes for society than outcomes generated by all parties trying to find the truth.

The abortion debate gives us a good example to consider.  Pro-choice arguments promote a woman’s right to choose when to be pregnant and when to have a child, but they never publicly address the issue of abortion terminating the existence (“killing”?) of a life form that resembles a baby at some point and resembles a baby more and more as gestation proceeds.  The anti-abortion side deplores this “killing” but never publicly addresses the agony of parents who have children but don’t want to be parents or cannot appropriately raise children and the abuse and suffering that those children experience (besides claiming, with no evidence, that there are plenty of good homes wanting to adopt).  This failure to deal with the negative results of what they advocate suggests that neither side should be trusted in what it says.

The debate over welfare offers us a similar example.  One side wants to assuage the difficulties of those who don’t have jobs by giving them money but apparently believes that this kindly act does not encourage people to stay off work.  The other side emphasizes that welfare encourages people not to work but does not acknowledge that there is a problem in our economy about people qualifying for, finding, and keeping jobs.  (The use of “sound bites,” beloved of politicians and required by our media, appears to make it “normal” to express only one side of things, and then only briefly.)

Animal rights provides another relevant example.  Those advocating for better treatment of animals do not discuss how much more giving animals these rights would cost everyone in society, while those on the other side pretty much ignore the gratuitous violence and suffering through poor care that animals suffer currently.

Finally, consider the environmental debate.  Those who favor conservation and a “sustainable” economy never discuss how much this will cost the rest of us or the lifestyle changes that would be required (less air conditioning, less travel, etc.).  Those who oppose conservation never own up to what they would do if they are wrong and our lack of conservation results in a barren world that is unable to support their children, as well as the rest of our burgeoning population.  Would they “compensate” the rest of us for their mistake?

The key point in this criticism is that neither the “pro” nor the “opposed” side gives us a firm basis for making decisions, since they are giving us incomplete information.   As decisions regarding how our society works become more far-reaching in their impact, it is very important to have full information, and our style of debate between opposing sides and beliefs denies us this information.  The fact that each side works to “win” also means that they will be prone, consciously or unconsciously, to ignore reality when possible and slant their views to favor their assigned or favored position.  It would be much better for us all if everyone trying to sway our opinions were required also to answer the other side’s most meaningful criticisms.  It would be even better, in my opinion, if all sides were doing their best to find the truth, regardless of whether they liked the implications of their findings.  The crux of this entire argument is that the benefits of dealing with the truth, even when we don’t like it, justify dealing with all of reality and will result in a better life for us than blinding ourselves to parts of reality.  If you don’t believe this, you won’t buy the arguments presented here.

Speakers and advocates should be required to take responsibility for all of the consequences of their positions.  If a sustainable economy requires going back to 1960’s style houses, then say so.  Even more timely is the debate over whether torture of terrorist detainees should be permitted.  Anyone advocating for permitting torture should be required to say out loud before an audience “In order to gain the possible life-saving benefits of information gained from detainees, I am willing to cause them to undergo inhumane and even life-threatening torture, and I am willing to assist with these procedures if needed.”  And every advocate against torture should be required to say out loud before an audience “In order to maintain our society’s sense of humaneness and morality, I am willing to forego the possible life-saving benefits of information obtained by torture, and even if that information were relevant to finding a bomb that was expected to explode soon in the area close to my family, I would still not sanction torture to get that information.”

There are several psychological reasons for this one-sidedness of our thinking and our attempts to influence others.  (1) As human beings we want things to be simple and certain, rather than complicated and doubtful, and we are usually willing to ignore the problems that might result from implementing our beliefs, in order to have this illusion of simplicity and certainty.  Having things appear to be simple and certain removes our doubt about decisions we need to make and actions we need to take and allows us to feel moral and justified.  We see this desire for certainty in the attitudes of those who believe that being convicted of a crime proves that you committed the crime, rather than that it is just our best guess at whether you did (according to a legal standard of proof).  (2) We very humanly want what we want when we want it, and these desires motivate us to suppress information that might force us to restrain consumption or give up what we want to do.  (3) It is challenging for the human brain to look at positives and negatives at the same time.  We see this in the tendency to alternate between idolizing and demonizing individuals we know rather than to see simultaneously the strengths and weaknesses of our loved ones and our heroes.

In addition to these more important processes, in some cases people are simply ignorant of the negative consequences of their beliefs and actions, and in others they simply don’t care, as long as their lives are not going to be directly affected.

Before concluding, a word should be said about the positive value of the advocacy approach that is being questioned here, since the competition it depends on does motivate people on both sides to strive to find effective reasons and arguments.  Unfortunately, though, the goal of this is simply to bring others to their view, rather than to find the understanding that is closest to the truth, and I believe that finding the truth gives us better bases for decisions than two-sided advocacy.  There could be some concern that if everyone were just looking for the truth (and not competing to “win”), it might result in collusion by both sides, settling on a convenient conclusion instead of doing the work to find what is closest to the truth and tolerating the uncertainties of not really knowing the truth (which may be the final result of many of our efforts, given the state of our human knowledge and our limitations in understanding complex situations).

What can be done to improve this situation?  (1) We ourselves can begin to look carefully at all sides of an issue, rather than simply taking the side that we intuitively “like” the most.  This requires seeing the weaknesses of our favored positions and evaluating honestly how effectively we can defend or mitigate those weaknesses.  Since we would need information that we cannot get in order to be sure of our choices with respect to most issues, we would have to accept that in most cases we are guessing or making assumptions when we support our favored position, rather than presenting facts. 

Give yourself the time and space to look at all sides of an issue before you decide, and be sure that you are committed to finding the truth rather than simply finding things that support your favored side. 

(2) Every time someone tries to influence your opinion (advertising, politics, ethics/morals, etc.), think to yourself about what the opposing side would be saying about it, and see if you think that the questions they raise should be answered in order for you to decide one way or the other. 

(3) Require every speaker and candidate to deal honestly with the issue by addressing both the pros and the cons of her position. 

(4) Require every advocate to take responsibility for his position, by saying what he would give up or sacrifice as a consequence of maintaining his position.

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