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Critical thinking is the best strategy. Censorship is paternalistic, imperfect, often nefarious and in many subtle ways far worse than having an unreliable brai

Critical thinking is the best strategy. Censorship is paternalistic, imperfect, often nefarious and in many subtle ways far worse than having an unreliable brain.

trts 5y ago
It is a nice sounding claim and I hope you're right. I consider myself a critical thinker, but I'm not sure it's leading to my being more correct or better informed about things. It seems that the deluge of content available today guarantees that whatever view you're even mildly sympathetic toward will get reinforced, and then you are immediately placed on a slope toward the extremes (in terms of other recommended content). One of the few antidotes I've seen to this has been the emergence of long-form podcasting where conversations are still allowed to meander, dwell on minor points, or become boring. It seems harder for people to shill for multiple uninterrupted hours at a time. And yet if you rely on this as a source of information you can't pick very many topics to be informed about given the constraint of time.
epgui 5y ago
As nice as that sounds, critical thinking is not an emergent property of networks of people. Information pollution is, and we need to start thinking about it in the same way we think about other kinds of pollution. A little bit of garbage here and there is easy to deal with, and that's what critical thinking is for. But given enough garbage, your normal functions (and that of the network you're a part of) will be impaired. You are what you eat, and your brain is what it reads. Feed it enough garbage, and no amount of critical thinking will save you. If your goal is to have a "stable" system that converges towards truth, stability, consensus, and generally progresses over time, you need to have some sort of mechanism to regulate garbage.
- hairofadog 5y ago
  Well said. When people suggest "critical thinking" as a solution to high-volume and high-visibility disinformation, my guess is they think the problem I'm trying to solve is: "There's so much disinformation, and I just don't know what to think!" when actually the problem is "There's so much disinformation, and my fellow countrymen are acting on it in ways that cause measurable harm to me and to society at large." It's a complex topic. I'm not suggesting that there's an easy answer and I'm not here to sing the praises of censorship, but I find it frustrating to see "think critically" proposed as if it's the simple, obvious solution over and over again.
  - epgui 5y ago
    I think at least on some level, you might be right that there's a misunderstanding between the individual-level problem description and the system-level problem description. I think that's quite insightful.
- deepnotderp 5y ago
  Great point! Just one quick question: how do you decide what is “garbage”? Would it be heliocentric models of the solar system? What about hand washing as a way to prevent disease? Perhaps a bit more recently the sars-cov-2 lab leak theory?
  - epgui 5y ago
    Not everything is black and white. Some things are, and that is what I'm talking about. It's not for me to decide which politician has the best or most honest character (though I'll give you my opinion if asked). But if you do a math exam wrong, you're going to score garbage grades. There are some things in life which for all practical purposes are clear cut. I'll take your examples. 1. Heliocentric model: Garbage. 2. Hand washing: Not garbage. 3. SARS-CoV-2 lab leak theory: Not garbage. Obviously the distinction between garbage and not-garbage is not just about the topic, it's about the actual information. For example, it's important to talk about the heliocentric model because it gives us perspective on the current state of human knowledge and it humbles us in the face of uncertainty é what we don't (yet) know. There's great pedagogical or even archival value in this. We could write a book about this, but I hope one example makes the point. If you ask me, and I'm a biochemist, about the third, I will say that I believe it to be less likely than natural occurrence, and I'd worry about how productive the question was. But it doesn't mean it's pollution. I can have an opinion about something, even a strong one, and still defend your right to express contrary or different ideas. I know this skill seems to be in short supply these years, but it's not that difficult really.
    - deepnotderp 5y ago
      And why exactly is the heliocentric model of the solar system garbage compared to the geocentric model?
      - epgui 5y ago
        Because the overwhelming scientific consensus is that the Sun is not in the "centre" (whatever that means) of the universe. That idea, as originally conceived, is just incorrect.
sjtindell 5y ago
As you get older, your ability to think critically declines. If it was ever present. Even someone very sharp can be tricked. You’re talking about a principle, not the reality of our society.
- trts 5y ago
  this strikes me as ageist. Maybe there is a citation here? Once bitten, twice shy Fool me once, shame on you ... Why wouldn't the accumulation of experiences logically lead to people being savvier about claims over time?
  - sjtindell 5y ago
    If I remember right it was an explanation for why so many elderly folks fall for scams. Their ability to parse grifters declines, literally a part of the brain related to trust declines as we get much older. Here is some discussion in Scientific American https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-older-adults-are-too-trusting/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-older-adults-...
rbanffy 5y ago
> Critical thinking is the best strategy. Every problem has a solution that’s simple, elegant, and wrong. Humans are prone to fall for self-reinforcing belief loops like conspiracy theories. They subvert the mechanism of critical thinking a bit like a prion will misfold proteins and cause all sort of issues.

Critical thinking is the best strategy. Censorship is paternalistic, imperfect, often nefarious and in many subtle ways far worse than having an unreliable brain.

trts 5y ago

It is a nice sounding claim and I hope you're right. I consider myself a critical thinker, but I'm not sure it's leading to my being more correct or better informed about things. It seems that the deluge of content available today guarantees that whatever view you're even mildly sympathetic toward will get reinforced, and then you are immediately placed on a slope toward the extremes (in terms of other recommended content). One of the few antidotes I've seen to this has been the emergence of long-form podcasting where conversations are still allowed to meander, dwell on minor points, or become boring. It seems harder for people to shill for multiple uninterrupted hours at a time. And yet if you rely on this as a source of information you can't pick very many topics to be informed about given the constraint of time.

epgui 5y ago

As nice as that sounds, critical thinking is not an emergent property of networks of people. Information pollution is, and we need to start thinking about it in the same way we think about other kinds of pollution. A little bit of garbage here and there is easy to deal with, and that's what critical thinking is for. But given enough garbage, your normal functions (and that of the network you're a part of) will be impaired. You are what you eat, and your brain is what it reads. Feed it enough garbage, and no amount of critical thinking will save you. If your goal is to have a "stable" system that converges towards truth, stability, consensus, and generally progresses over time, you need to have some sort of mechanism to regulate garbage.

hairofadog 5y ago
Well said. When people suggest "critical thinking" as a solution to high-volume and high-visibility disinformation, my guess is they think the problem I'm trying to solve is: "There's so much disinformation, and I just don't know what to think!" when actually the problem is "There's so much disinformation, and my fellow countrymen are acting on it in ways that cause measurable harm to me and to society at large." It's a complex topic. I'm not suggesting that there's an easy answer and I'm not here to sing the praises of censorship, but I find it frustrating to see "think critically" proposed as if it's the simple, obvious solution over and over again.
- epgui 5y ago
  I think at least on some level, you might be right that there's a misunderstanding between the individual-level problem description and the system-level problem description. I think that's quite insightful.
deepnotderp 5y ago
Great point! Just one quick question: how do you decide what is “garbage”? Would it be heliocentric models of the solar system? What about hand washing as a way to prevent disease? Perhaps a bit more recently the sars-cov-2 lab leak theory?
- epgui 5y ago
  Not everything is black and white. Some things are, and that is what I'm talking about. It's not for me to decide which politician has the best or most honest character (though I'll give you my opinion if asked). But if you do a math exam wrong, you're going to score garbage grades. There are some things in life which for all practical purposes are clear cut. I'll take your examples. 1. Heliocentric model: Garbage. 2. Hand washing: Not garbage. 3. SARS-CoV-2 lab leak theory: Not garbage. Obviously the distinction between garbage and not-garbage is not just about the topic, it's about the actual information. For example, it's important to talk about the heliocentric model because it gives us perspective on the current state of human knowledge and it humbles us in the face of uncertainty é what we don't (yet) know. There's great pedagogical or even archival value in this. We could write a book about this, but I hope one example makes the point. If you ask me, and I'm a biochemist, about the third, I will say that I believe it to be less likely than natural occurrence, and I'd worry about how productive the question was. But it doesn't mean it's pollution. I can have an opinion about something, even a strong one, and still defend your right to express contrary or different ideas. I know this skill seems to be in short supply these years, but it's not that difficult really.
  - deepnotderp 5y ago
    And why exactly is the heliocentric model of the solar system garbage compared to the geocentric model?
    - epgui 5y ago
      Because the overwhelming scientific consensus is that the Sun is not in the "centre" (whatever that means) of the universe. That idea, as originally conceived, is just incorrect.

sjtindell 5y ago

As you get older, your ability to think critically declines. If it was ever present. Even someone very sharp can be tricked. You’re talking about a principle, not the reality of our society.

trts 5y ago
this strikes me as ageist. Maybe there is a citation here? Once bitten, twice shy Fool me once, shame on you ... Why wouldn't the accumulation of experiences logically lead to people being savvier about claims over time?
- sjtindell 5y ago
  If I remember right it was an explanation for why so many elderly folks fall for scams. Their ability to parse grifters declines, literally a part of the brain related to trust declines as we get much older. Here is some discussion in Scientific American https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-older-adults-are-too-trusting/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-older-adults-...

rbanffy 5y ago

> Critical thinking is the best strategy. Every problem has a solution that’s simple, elegant, and wrong. Humans are prone to fall for self-reinforcing belief loops like conspiracy theories. They subvert the mechanism of critical thinking a bit like a prion will misfold proteins and cause all sort of issues.