3 ms·

How do we get more people to evolve to this position?

WalterSear 13y ago
That's the really bad news of the age: I don't think we can. "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it." - http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck Ideas, just like science, advance one funeral at a time.
- thesteamboat 13y ago
  I'm not entirely sure that's true. Consider the rapid advances in the mainstream acceptability of LGBT concerns over the past 20 years, and the number of people who have come to `a new understanding'. Similarly, the shift in perspective over the acceptability of racism; James Meredith, the student whose enrollment at Ole Miss sparked riots, is still alive as are many of his schoolmates. I'm reasonably sure that most of them have had their opinions regarding integration changed by public opinion and the subsequent years.
  - WalterSear 13y ago
    All good points.
  - sophacles 13y ago
    It would be interesting to know the amount of background efforts in the years prior to these "sudden groundswells" (which makes me think of the overnight success myth). For example in the civil rights situation, a a t of stuff happened in the background of WWII and immediately after in the army, as well as having lots of academic and popular writing going on. I'm also interested inthe demographics of the social graph of the wave of support. I suspect it starts in the 20somehing crowd realizing that they are allowed to have their own valid opinions and taking up the banner that was conveniently placed there for years prior waiting for them to find it. All those years it was available were formative years for those people and the idea was floating in the background, therefore not foreign.
jaekwon 13y ago
More leaks, more discussions.
tjmc 13y ago
One of the best arguments I came across as an undergrad was Kohlberg's stages of moral development [1]. Of his 3 stages, I've come to the conclusion that most people never evolve past the second stage which is basically "against the law = wrong". The point of questioning whether the law itself is unjust, or could be appropriately ignored under certain circumstances either doesn't occur to people, or bothers them more than any injustice caused. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg's_stages_of_moral_development http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg's_stages_of_m...
- vehementi 13y ago
  What's worse is the cognitive dissonance in people who in one discussion will lament how some particular law is fucked (usually it is a law pertinent to their lifestyle that they take issue with, e.g. gun control is too restrictive, or marijuana is not legal), and in another discussion will white wash that idea and say what amounts to "you do the crime you do the time" as so many posts here sadly boil down to. So we have in these discussions - everyone individually recognizes that the legal system is fucked, the laws are fucked, the way we make laws is fucked, the judges are corrupt, the prosecutors care only about case volume, the defense attorneys are underpaid and overworked, the jury is stupid and uninformed, the press sensationalizes everything, ... and drilling into any one of these topics will reveal miscarriages of justice and tragedies of procedure, but tl;dr "bradley manning was found guilty".
  - ahomescu1 13y ago
    On the other hand, a lot of people are still upset that Zimmerman was found not guilty.

That's the really bad news of the age: I don't think we can. "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it." - http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck Ideas, just like science, advance one funeral at a time.

thesteamboat 13y ago
I'm not entirely sure that's true. Consider the rapid advances in the mainstream acceptability of LGBT concerns over the past 20 years, and the number of people who have come to `a new understanding'. Similarly, the shift in perspective over the acceptability of racism; James Meredith, the student whose enrollment at Ole Miss sparked riots, is still alive as are many of his schoolmates. I'm reasonably sure that most of them have had their opinions regarding integration changed by public opinion and the subsequent years.
- WalterSear 13y ago
  All good points.
- sophacles 13y ago
  It would be interesting to know the amount of background efforts in the years prior to these "sudden groundswells" (which makes me think of the overnight success myth). For example in the civil rights situation, a a t of stuff happened in the background of WWII and immediately after in the army, as well as having lots of academic and popular writing going on. I'm also interested inthe demographics of the social graph of the wave of support. I suspect it starts in the 20somehing crowd realizing that they are allowed to have their own valid opinions and taking up the banner that was conveniently placed there for years prior waiting for them to find it. All those years it was available were formative years for those people and the idea was floating in the background, therefore not foreign.

jaekwon 13y ago

More leaks, more discussions.

tjmc 13y ago

One of the best arguments I came across as an undergrad was Kohlberg's stages of moral development [1]. Of his 3 stages, I've come to the conclusion that most people never evolve past the second stage which is basically "against the law = wrong". The point of questioning whether the law itself is unjust, or could be appropriately ignored under certain circumstances either doesn't occur to people, or bothers them more than any injustice caused. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg's_stages_of_moral_development http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg's_stages_of_m...

vehementi 13y ago
What's worse is the cognitive dissonance in people who in one discussion will lament how some particular law is fucked (usually it is a law pertinent to their lifestyle that they take issue with, e.g. gun control is too restrictive, or marijuana is not legal), and in another discussion will white wash that idea and say what amounts to "you do the crime you do the time" as so many posts here sadly boil down to. So we have in these discussions - everyone individually recognizes that the legal system is fucked, the laws are fucked, the way we make laws is fucked, the judges are corrupt, the prosecutors care only about case volume, the defense attorneys are underpaid and overworked, the jury is stupid and uninformed, the press sensationalizes everything, ... and drilling into any one of these topics will reveal miscarriages of justice and tragedies of procedure, but tl;dr "bradley manning was found guilty".
- ahomescu1 13y ago
  On the other hand, a lot of people are still upset that Zimmerman was found not guilty.