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> It's a sign of the inability to relate emotionally to other people, not clear-headed rationality. I dunno. In my books the ability to disregard emotional bia

by aegiso 13y ago

> It's a sign of the inability to relate emotionally to other people, not clear-headed rationality. I dunno. In my books the ability to disregard emotional biases is the definition of clear-headedness. I get that people aren't rational. But that's not a good reason to waste money and inflict social damage in the process of placating them. Your argument could just as well be used to advocate for the "inconvenience" of promoting intelligent design in public science education.

johnchristopher 13y ago
edit: juste a note to assure you that my intentions are just to correct a misunderstanding of the current topic, not attacking your position of how one should think or assess the gravity of any situation. > I dunno. In my books the ability to disregard emotional biases is the definition of clear-headedness. When it's your own emotional bias you disregard we can talk of clear-headedness[1]. But here we are talking about taking other's emotional state into account. In other words: the ability to disregard other's emotional biases is not the definition of clear-headedness. [1] but we are not machine and we have to take our own emotional state into account sometimes.
mithaler 13y ago
There's a difference between an explanation and an excuse; rayiner was giving the former, not the latter. In any case, is it a flaw of our government that our legislators write laws that the majority of people happen to want? The fact that the majority want something irrational is incidental; people want it, and that's why politicians do it.
- hrkristian 13y ago
  Is it though? Politicians are elected by majority, but their actions aren't really decided by majority. That has been shown time and time again, perhaps especially after Snowden. Either way, a majority outcry to implement X doesn't mean an alternative solution Y should be disregarded.
saraid216 13y ago
Clear-headedness is the ability to account for emotional biases, not the ability to disregard them. There is a world of difference between acknowledging a fuller set of influences versus deluding yourself into believing no other influences exist.
baddox 13y ago
I'm on your side. It's one thing to relate to people's emotions, but it's another to ignore the fact that people can be in control of their emotions. Just because people might get worked up about scary-looking things doesn't mean that the correct response is to go to all lengths to prevent scary-looking things without discriminating between things that are actually dangerous and things which aren't.

by aegiso 13y ago

johnchristopher 13y ago

edit: juste a note to assure you that my intentions are just to correct a misunderstanding of the current topic, not attacking your position of how one should think or assess the gravity of any situation. > I dunno. In my books the ability to disregard emotional biases is the definition of clear-headedness. When it's your own emotional bias you disregard we can talk of clear-headedness[1]. But here we are talking about taking other's emotional state into account. In other words: the ability to disregard other's emotional biases is not the definition of clear-headedness. [1] but we are not machine and we have to take our own emotional state into account sometimes.

mithaler 13y ago

There's a difference between an explanation and an excuse; rayiner was giving the former, not the latter. In any case, is it a flaw of our government that our legislators write laws that the majority of people happen to want? The fact that the majority want something irrational is incidental; people want it, and that's why politicians do it.

hrkristian 13y ago
Is it though? Politicians are elected by majority, but their actions aren't really decided by majority. That has been shown time and time again, perhaps especially after Snowden. Either way, a majority outcry to implement X doesn't mean an alternative solution Y should be disregarded.

saraid216 13y ago

Clear-headedness is the ability to account for emotional biases, not the ability to disregard them. There is a world of difference between acknowledging a fuller set of influences versus deluding yourself into believing no other influences exist.

baddox 13y ago

I'm on your side. It's one thing to relate to people's emotions, but it's another to ignore the fact that people can be in control of their emotions. Just because people might get worked up about scary-looking things doesn't mean that the correct response is to go to all lengths to prevent scary-looking things without discriminating between things that are actually dangerous and things which aren't.