3 ms·

Education isn’t deciding which authorities to trust — that is literally authoritarianism. The point of education is to make your own good decisions in unclear c

• thorum 2y ago
  I agree in principle, but most people do not have the necessary education to make accurate judgments across all fields from first principle reasoning. Eg someone with a PhD in physics probably doesn’t have the knowledge to debunk every argument against the COVID vaccine. In those cases we naturally rely on asking some biologist who does have that knowledge what they think.
• jhanschoo 2y ago
  I have a similar point to make as the other comment. Not everybody has the resources to e.g. verify the germ theory of disease. In fact humanity didn't have the resources to verify that until recent history. The smartest, brightest, and most successful medical practicioners would use to tell you that disease is caused by an imbalance of the humors, or of yin and yang; this was a comparatively obvious and reasonable, but ultimately wrong explanation supported by anatomical evidence, compared to the fanciful explanation of invisible insects infiltrating and attacking your body; a theory that requires extensive institutional knowledge, trust and infrastructure to develop and verify. So when a government and its politician leaders frequently lie to its constituents, it can be difficult for a rational individual to trust the public health advice coming from the same apparatus.