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Joined: Jul 2011
Posts: 2,007
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Joined: Jul 2011
Posts: 2,007 |
It is really hard for me to understand how people can walk around and have opinions or espouse views with no references, no research and no knowledge about the issue they are speaking of. Yet assume just because they open their mouths that somehow what they have to say is relevant? Because you are getting paid to talk and you can't just sit there and say nothing?
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Joined: Mar 2012
Posts: 154
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Posts: 154 |
I suppose you haven't spent much time in a courtroom makingaripple.
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Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 5,181
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Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 5,181 |
Do gifted people, or would gifted people get paid to talk about something they know nothing about? No-- er, or perhaps, "Frequently." See, the thing is that it's often one's place to offer an opinion-- regardless of whether or not one happens to possess expertise in the particulars of the moment. Adulthood is filled with such "faking it" moments. I've learned that they are common not only for gifted persons, but for ALL people. Which brings me to the next statement... What about the larger implications of engaging in such activity? Well. Now there is a million-dollar question. I think that the nuanced version goes further. If one makes the assumption that such things as the former are inevitable among human beings... the only real question for individuals is whether it is better to speculate based on one's intellect and particular knowledge/experience (which may or may not be relevent and accurate), or to keep silent. If those of superior intellect choose the latter on the basis of imperfection, we are not preventing the former. We are not-- necessarily-- doing anything to provide genuine expertise in its absense. We may merely be creating a void. I'm not so much convinced that nature, per se abhors a vacuum, but human beings certainly like to fill silence. If smart people won't speak, I think it is a fair assumption to predict that the alternative isn't better.My opinions aren't necessarily "better" than anyone else's, but conversely, they are also not necessarily "worse" either. I've learned to speak up. My expertise? Nearly thirty years of what I would consider to be nominally 'adulthood.' Fools will rush in if others don't.
Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.
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Joined: Jul 2011
Posts: 2,007
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I'm not so much convinced that nature, per se abhors a vacuum, but human beings certainly like to fill silence. Maybe vacuums are lonely or just really enjoy the experience of being filled.
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Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 5,181
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Good point. LOL.
Oh-- and expertise quite frequently does NOT result in any sort of consensus regarding what one could term factual "truth" in the first place. Take any three art critics and you'll get four to seven different opinions, all of them at least nominally "expert."
So there's that.
I mean, sure-- nobody wants to hear someone who isn't an electrical engineer expound on their personal "vision" of that subject. (In fact, some of us don't even want to listen to the expert there, but I digress...)
If we decide that as individuals we lack a good understanding and prefer to keep silent (for fear of being wrong, perhaps) then we can't exactly argue that everone else should also be bound by our personal creed on that score and keep their traps zipped as well.
Right? Because that really would be arrogant. What makes me an expert in deciding how much expertise is sufficient to allow someone to make erudite/informed statements on any particular subject? Nothing, that's what.
Fact-based fields are terrific, because nothing is subjective. That's lovely, but it leaves a lot of things in life which are not categorized that way, where subjective truth is the only truth. Art appreciation, for example, simply doesn't operate by the rules which govern electrical engineering.
The world would be a flat and boring place without disagreement regarding more-or-less subjective truths. I enjoy the variety, myself, even if I sometimes find naivete or ignorance quite bemusing or even exasperating.
Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.
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Joined: Oct 2011
Posts: 2,856
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One of the greatest contributions of the physical "fact-based" sciences to the human experience is their ability to astound us with how terribly wrong we've been on a regular basis. Because argue all you want, the results are the results. It's very humbling to know that the subjects upon which I'm considered an expert are the ones in which I'm most likely to be astonishingly wrong.
Most researchers in the physical sciences are delighted when the results run counter to expectations, because that's when discoveries are made, and real learning begins.
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Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 5,181
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Yup. Makes life interesting, all right. 
Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.
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Joined: Jul 2011
Posts: 2,007
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The world would be a flat and boring place without disagreement regarding more-or-less subjective truths. I enjoy the variety, myself, even if I sometimes find naivete or ignorance quite bemusing or even exasperating. They're not subjective. They just can't be quantified or measured with a ruler or a Hadron Collider.
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Joined: Feb 2010
Posts: 2,640 Likes: 2
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Joined: Feb 2010
Posts: 2,640 Likes: 2 |
Fact-based fields are terrific, because nothing is subjective. That's lovely, but it leaves a lot of things in life which are not categorized that way, where subjective truth is the only truth. Art appreciation, for example, simply doesn't operate by the rules which govern electrical engineering.
The world would be a flat and boring place without disagreement regarding more-or-less subjective truths. I enjoy the variety, myself, even if I sometimes find naivete or ignorance quite bemusing or even exasperating. Some disputes in the social sciences, such as those about the connection between intelligence and academic achievement, are informed by facts but also have subjective elements. These disputes can be more acrimonious than purely subjective ones, because each side in the dispute is convinced it is factually correct, and they can be more long-lasting than disagreements in the natural sciences, because they cannot be resolved by a single, clear-cut experiment.
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Joined: Jul 2011
Posts: 2,007
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Had another, "I must be really stupid" moment today. But in the end it's difficult for me to measure that someone would metaphorically go to a food bank when not poor nor hungry, but it happens, a lot. I am apparently surrounded by all these very smart people. That about covers the social and the science. It's all relative and I'm a stupid animist after all. I shouldn't have gone out. How primitive could the Indigenous people actually be? All objective and subjective sciences can have evidence-based grounding and ultimately factually correct outcomes. But who is best prepared to discern the outcomes or solutions? I think that is where acrimony resides, which I suspect and I could be wrong, becomes an exercise in ego rather than anything else. Even art appreciation has rules(and history),is it observation or judgement? And there we are, back again to opinion. Does it matter that one likes paint by number paintings of poker playing dogs? No not really. However if the poker playing dog lovers teach art appreciation at an Art College, then yes, it's a problem. Or not. No problem. You're posting from an iPhone, right?
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