People often think that if only everyone understood logic, we’d solve all the world’s problems. But let’s say I’m a billionaire that made my fortune in the fos

People often think that if only everyone understood logic, we’d solve all the world’s problems. But let’s say I’m a billionaire that made my fortune in the fossil fuel industry. You’re not going to reason me out of opposing any sort of carbon tax or cap. I simply don’t give a fuck if the world burns because my wealth depends on burning it. You’re not going to reason me out of that position. And of course, I can’t get my candidates to win on a ‘fuck the planet’ platform so I do political science research and public policy polling so I can figure out how to cobble together a political coalition that can win, while having a ‘fuck the planet’ as a side effect. You have your pro-life people, your anti-immigration people, etc, all of whom are voting for different motivations and all of whom are using logic and reason to decide who to vote for in pursuit of those motivations. Politics is about power and wealth and any attempt to improve ‘public debate’ that doesn’t recognize that is doomed to failure.