Humans have a tendency for unwavering "belief". The obvious is belief in deities. Our other institutions are just as vulnerable to being treated as infallible.

Humans have a tendency for unwavering "belief". The obvious is belief in deities. Our other institutions are just as vulnerable to being treated as infallible. Our economics are, and basically "putting all our eggs" into a global financial system over which we have little say, is this thing we have to keep believing in. "The debt, the debt!" not considering that if humans in the future really need to for survival, an imaginary number on paper can be waved away. We have to believe these things matter. And it isn't just laymen that are victim to unwavering belief. Very smart people can also be convinced of bullshit. And the rest of us just have to nod and smile in agreement. What other choice is there? I think we're in a period of social adjustment from the previous 100 years into the next. The last one was the great depression, leading into ww1 and ww2, after an era of extreme growth in wealth inequality (guilded age). Our population grew, but not enough were brought along. A number of us have backslid (my personal buying power has decreased despite raises, anyone in the $100,000/yr realm has power than equivalent pay in the previous generation). Like religions not accounting for non-believers, the system thinks its these folks fault, not its own. Maybe it's time we start considering resets in our social structures every few years. Jefferson argued for one in the Constitution. And maybe it's time we heed Adam Smith's advice and fight for equality of outcomes, not just opportunity (a notion we believe exists, but the reality that we are a society where everyone has equal opportunity is laughable). Cause it seems to me, it would do a lot to avoid these lopsided social structures if we're all kept on the same page materially. Game theory suggests it is a good idea when talking about community policing: https://aeon.co/essays/game-theory-s-cure-for-corruption-make-us-all-cops https://aeon.co/essays/game-theory-s-cure-for-corruption-mak...