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DEMONSTRATE
INFORM
PERSUADE
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Is it possible? Can we invent something?? ...or what??? |
COMPREHENSION DEMONSTRATE INFORM PERSUADE DEMAND |
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Three
powerful insights
that
are simple but subtle
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The Whole Truth otherwise we fall victim
to the
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What's Relevant & What's Irrelevant otherwise our decisions become
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Multi-dimensional Ranking & Ordering otherwise we substitute
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glean confirmations & trash disconfirmations and open wide the door
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is necessary for rational decisions. Irrelevance
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This one is just
at the fuzzy limits of human understanding. Rank ordering by putting
things in a line is obvious.
Putting them in a many dimensional array is a real puzzler. But it's the right thing to do. |
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(one of them) of the Liberals "Reality is in the mind of the beholder." "Anything is true in your reality." Post-modernism New Age nonsense LIST TO PORT |
Two ways to tilt: to the left............to the right |
(one of them) of the Conservatives Solipsism (self is all) Egocentrism (self is served by all) Ethnocentrism (Uns über alles!) Reality is as far as you can see. LIST TO STARBOARD |
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If we tend to see but one cause for each effect and one effect for each cause, when we find some "The Cause" we sense that we need look no further. |
This is a matter of sorting variables: first, recognizing that there are many variables acting all at once, then determining the correct relationships between them. Necessity and sufficiency are often not seen as clearly distinct: they get confused with each other. Nevertheless, relevance is not sufficient for rational decisions, and irrelevance is not necessary for pseudoscience and gullibility. Not seeing that race and ethnicity are usually irrelevant easily slips into bigotry and racism. |
Infants sense only themselves. Children sense themselves, but also others as others relate to themselves. Adolescents sense a wider set of interpersonal relationships. Societies are multidimensional webs of interpersonal relationships. Mutual reciprocity is a "golden rule" among these relationships. |
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Pseudoscience stirs in a lot of wishful thinking into its mix. Evolution is always an occult (hidden) element in our lives. Wishful thinking might lead to mistakes, perhaps fatal mistakes. Evolution is slow and statistical. And protecting individuals from their foolishness might set our evolution back. PSEUDOSCIENCE
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Misidentified relevance usually stirs up a lot of trivia, especially when the relevant factors are a bit abstract—as they are, for example, in the errors of "Energy is the capacity to do work." Pseudoscience stirs in a lot of irrelevancy into its mix.
WHAT
IS ENERGY
Poster # 3 |
"Value" of different people cannot be rank ordered on a line (one dimensionally). People cannot rationally be assigned a dollar value, except by a single (scalar) criterion— and that one usually turns out to be fame (the "genius" of the star system of movies). Contribution to society is actually multidimensional. MULTIDIMENSIONAL RANK PATRIOTISM Poster # 1 |
Link to da Vinci Days posters.
RELIGION
and RATIONALITY
out of depths seldom heard
from
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a world at peace |
faith |
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good
health
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safety | ? |
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a happy marriage |
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wealth
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strong
leadership
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. ? |
fame |
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good
reputation
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freedom |
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respect
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| wisdom |
eliminate poverty |
self-respect
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two concepts
central to politics &
economics:
Freedom
and Equality
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Freedom from people who deny my personal "reality": each person's reality is defined by each person's faith. Freedom from the disasters of decisions and actions taken by people who believe reality doesn't really exist "out there." Freedom to "better oneself," perhaps by manipulating people to be subservient to yourself. Freedom from being manipulated into subservience to others. Freedom from the agonies of decisions. Freedom from interference from people who will make decisions for you if given the chance (or perhaps they need a strong leader). Freedom to invent, design, and operate tollgates to the public domain. Freedom from arbitrary tollgates to what should be the public domain, but the gates are installed by people who contribute nothing to the public domain but their tollgate.
A word that makes no distinctions carries no information. |
MORE AND MORE BEYOND THE EDGES OF EASY HUMAN COMPREHENSION |
Equality of opportunity. Equality of access to the essentials for maintaining life. Equality of access to the public domain. Equality of access to tollgate privileges. Equality as an element of fairness. Equality: blind to race, ethnic origin, wealth, social status, ... There is no equality: people are different. What's "equality"? When there are a quasi-infinity of rankings by which to line people up, "equality" means only that no one can be rationally stated to be superior to any other. "I have learned that a man has a right to look down on another only when he has to help the other get to his feet." . . . . Gabriel Garcia Marquez Equality among people has an element of mutual reciprocity—a concept at, perhaps beyond, the edge of human comprehension.
Equality carries some meaning so abstract that words fail us. |
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However, if the implications of mutual reciprocity are too "abstract" to be seen, then freedom becomes supreme. |
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Encourages self-deception.
An invitation to dumbing
down:
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