Emotion vs Reason

[zeous]

The poster of the video put it well…

It’s simultaneously amusing and demoralising that basic common sense, evidence based arguments Thomas Sowell was making almost 40 years ago are still being ignored today in favour of emotions and feelings.

[AZswayze]

Sowell has the exact same hair style today, only gray. Sorry, off topic, but found it amusing.

I think it’s actually worsened with the rise of social media. The amount of misinformation spread online is astonishing. People have the internet at their fingertips, literally with regard to social media, and they refuse to do a 30 second search to validate claims.

It’s something I am ramming down my kid’s throats. Everytime they come to me with some piece of far fetched information I ask them where they heard it and tell them to do some research on it. Also, when we’re watching TV and hear something new I jump on Google and do a search with them. I’m not trying to toot my own horn, as I’m otherwise a failure as a father (partially tongue in cheek), and I’m nowhere near perfect in this regard myself. We’re all human, and emotion gets the best of all of us at times. I’m just worried about what seems like a growing tendency to take whatever we hear as fact.

You get a lot of s**t here, and I’ve given you plenty myself, but I do appreciate that you’ve been willing to respectively call me out and ask for evidence to support my claims. I learn a lot every time I’m forced to back my statements, and think critically about something I may be getting emotional over.

[zeous]

I think that’s awesome you work with your children that way.  They’ll thank you for it sooner or later, I imagine.  As for the trend toward getting worse, you may be right.  However, one of the interesting things about human society is that everything seems to ebb and flow, so even though there are negative aspects to social media, a percentage recognize those negative aspects and start to work harder in the opposite direction and wind up re-balancing the system overall.  So I agree, but think there’s two sides to the coin as always. 

And you’re right, we all get emotional at times (other than psycho/sociopaths), that’s just part of our nature.  I also appreciate the good conversations and various perspectives people are willing to express here at UH and UF.N, and I don’t look at it as getting s**t from people.  I enjoy it, for the most part, and think it’s a healthy part of a self-governed society which I’m a believer in.